Tyre

TYRE - City of the Phoenicians (q.v.) situated on the Syrian coast, originally on a rocky island (hence its name Sor 'rock,' which has survived to this day as Sur). It lay some 22 miles S. of Sidon (q.v.) and 35 miles N. of the Carmel headland. It was no doubt settled very anciently. Herodotus (c 450 BC) was told it was built 2300 years ago (ii. 44). It is mentioned in an Egyptian Papyrus of the time of Rameses II. (1301-1234 BC) as a city to which water has to be brought in ships and which is richer in fish than in sand. We hear of it first in the Tell el-Amarna letters of the time of Akhenaten (1377-1358 BC). Its king Abimiiki, a loyal henchman of Pharaoh, complains that the king of Sidon had seized Ushu, the mainland suburb (later called Palai-Tyros, 'old Tyre,' by the Greeks). Tyre must soon have forsaken its loyalty to Egypt, for Seti I. (1317-1301 BC) subsequently subdued it. Under Rameses III. (1197-1165 BC) it was again lost.

An early predominance of Sidon over Tyre must be assumed. However, the leadership of Tyre became definitely established about the same time as that of Jerusalem over the Hebrews. In the absence of inscriptions we are heavily dependent for the history of Tyre on the OT, the Assyrian inscriptions, and materials preserved by Josephus from Menander of Ephesus, a writer who apparently drew on official Tyrian records (Jos. c. Apion, i. 18 and 21 [116,155]; Ant. viii. v. 3 [144]; ix. xiv. 2 [283]). Basic for the chronology is the statement that from Hiram I. to the founding of Carthage in the seventh year of king Pygmalion 155 years and 8 months had elapsed. As the founding of Carthage took place in 814 BC, Hiram I. is to be dated 969-936 BC, according to the king list of Menander. The date is of great importance for Hebrew chronology, as Hiram is the contemporary of David and Solomon. It is clear that Tyrians needed good relations with the Hebrews to gain strength against Sidon, and that Israel needed Tyrian neutrality in its warring with Philistines and Aramaeans. It is very doubtful whether the border of Israel ever extended to Palai-Tyros, as 2 S.24.7 seems to imply (the reference to Tyre in Jos.19.29 is probably a later addition). If the Hebrews managed to get a foothold in Phoenician territory they evidently found it expedient not to press it. Hiram, indeed, got the territory of Cabul from Solomon (1 K.9.10f), thus safeguarding or regaining the plain of Acre, and it may well be that the Hebrews soon lost the Mount Carmel region, which they seem to have had in their hands for a while, as the territory ofAsher reached the sea S. of Dor (Jos.19.26). Hiram's power is shown by the fact that he is credited with having founded Qart-hadast 'New City,' predecessor of Kition, on Cyprus. He greatly enlarged the island area of Tyre by means of engineering operations, and built new temples for the chief god of the city, Melqarth ('king of the city') and 'Ashtart, and set up a golden stela in the temple of Baal-shamem 'the lord of the heavens,' i.e. of the firmament. That he supplied the Hebrew king with the technical assistance necessary for building and equipping palaces and Temple and sold him the required lumber from the Lebanon Mountains is vividly reported in 1 Kings.

Under the divided monarchy we find Israel's king Ahab with a Tyrian princess for his queen - Jezebel, daughter of Ethbaal (887-856 BC according to Menander's figures). A regular covenant existed between Israel and Tyre, which the latter violated by delivering up a whole people to Edom (Am.1.9, but read Aram for Edom), i.e. deporting an entire Hebrew community. Already in the 9th cent. the Assyrian inscriptions begin to shed light on events. In 876 BC Ashurnasirpal received Tyre's tribute. Shalmaneser III. likewise collected tribute in 842 BC and portrayed the scene on the gates of Balawat, and Adadnirari III. (809-782 BC) reports the same thing. Menander gives valuable information about King Elulaeus (725-690 BC). He again subjected Kition (which as we know from Assyrian inscriptions had been occupied by Sargon), but when Sennacherib (whose name has been corrupted to Se-lampsas in the Josephus text) came to Phoenicia the cities of Sidon, Acco, Ushu, and others deserted the Tyrian overlord. Tyre was vainly besieged for five years. Sennacherib mentions Elulaeus as Lull and misleadingly calls him king of Sidon. He says nothing about Tyre at all (to cover up his failure there) but reports that a whole series of cities rebelled against Tyre and submitted to him. Luli fled to Cyprus where he died. The Assyrian thus confirms Menander's report, and we see that Tyre was, indeed, holding sway over Sidon and the cities southward to Acre in this period. But Sennacherib now handed over the power to Sidon.

Tyre was, however, soon to come to the fore again after the fall of Sidon in 678 BC. The Tyrian king conspired with the Egyptian Tirhakah, and the city underwent a five year siege by Esarhaddon. In 668 BC it submitted to Ashurbanipal. Tyre was involved with Pharaoh Hophra and Judah in resistance to Nebuchadrezzar in 586 BC and was besieged for thirteen years - a siege that ended in 572 BC with the surrender of its king Ithoba'al III., who was carried off to Babylon. Subsequently we hear of Tyre being ruled by 'judges.' Descendants of the exiled king of Tyre were, however, allowed to reign again by Nabonidus.

The events of Nebuchadrezzar's time are most vividly reflected in Ezk.26-28.19, 29.17-21. The description of the Ship Tyre unrolls a remarkable picture of Tyrian wealth and far flung connexions, but it is noteworthy that the Hebrew author's horizon is limited to the Near East; he has no clear idea of the vast Tyrian colonization (see PHOENICIA).

The rising power of the Greeks spelt the end of many of the Tyrian colonies. In Carthage (Qart-hadast), however. Tyre had a daughter city that still was to play a great role and that preserved ties with its parent.

In the Persian era the Tyrians naturally became very valuable to the Achaemenid rulers. They assisted Cambyses in his invasion of Egypt. Later we find them aiding the Persians in the wars with Greece. That brought new prosperity and concessions to Tyre and Sidon. The Phoenicians pushed their influence far southward in the Palestinian coastal plain. We hear of Tyrian fish merchants at the gates of Jerusalem (Neh.13.16). But after the peace of Antalcidas in 387 BC the Tyrians (and Sidonians) went over to the side of Persia's enemies. Artaxerxes iii. Ochus destroyed Sidon c 350 BC (cf Is.23.1f, Ezk.28.20f), whereupon Tyre surrendered. It is uncertain whether the threat against Tyre and Sidon and the districts of Philistia in Jl.4.4-8 is from this period or a later one; it reveals Phoenician traffic in Hebrew slaves, and Jewish hopes of selling Phoenicians as slaves to the Sabaeans.

In 332 BC Alexander the Great appeared before Tyre, which refused to admit him. A great siege followed, to which according to some scholars Zec.9.3f refers. The city was reduced by means of assault from land and sea. Land assault was made possible by the construction of a mole leading out to the island. Originally 200 feet wide the mole has now become an isthmus half a mile wide through sanding up. But Tyre's destruction and the slaughter or enslavement of its population was not the end. It was resettled soon and again became a great city. Strabo speaks of its many storeyed houses, higher than those in Rome, and of its two harbours - the southern, Egyptian one then being open and the northern one a closed harbour. We learn in an inscription of an era of Tyre that began 274-273 BC. It became Seleucid possession in 198 BC, but gained autonomy in 126 BC. This was confirmed by Pompey in 65 BC. Tyrian territory in the time of Christ extended to Kedesh in Galilee; hence Jesus did not have to go very far toward the city of Tyre to be in its sphere (Mk.3.8, 7.24-31, Lk.10.13). Tyre (and Sidon) suffered from the anger of Herod Agrippa I. and sent an ambassador to pacify him (Ac.12.20). There was a Christian church at Tyre, which Paul visited (Ac.21.3f). Its Jewish or proselyte origin seems likely as there had been Jews there for centuries (see Ps.87.4).

In subsequent centuries when heathenism was persecuted, a Christian Church was built on the site of the old temple of the god Melqarth. Origen died at Tyre in AD 254. Jerome (4th cent.) speaks of it as 'the most noble and beautiful city of Phoenicia.' It fell a prey to the Islamic conquest in AD 638, but was taken by the Crusaders in AD 1124. It produced a crusader-historian, William of Tyre. In AD 1291 the Crusaders gave up Tyre, where the evidences of their fortifications and other structures are still to be seen. These later buildings make excavation of Phoenician Tyre virtually impossible. Exploratory soundings carried on by Renan in 1860 and more recently by Lasseur (1921) have not produced any finds antedating 600 BC. Poidebard's explorations rediscovered the mole of the Egyptian harbour in 1934, thus confirming Arrian's report that it was a closed one in Alexander's time. By Strabo's time it had evidently sanded up and so one must imagine the beach scene of Ac.21.5 as taking place on the one formed by Alexander's mole. [Article: Dictionary of the Bible, J.Hastings, 2nd Ed., T&T.Clark, 1963 - E.G.K.]
[Map: Atlas of the Bible. LH Grollenberg OP. © Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd, 1956.]