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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comFausset Bible Dictionary: Tirhakah
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. (See HEZEKIAH; SO; ESARHADDON.) The Tehrak of the Egyptian monuments, who reigned over Egypt from 690 or 695 B.C. to 667 B.C.; probably king of Ethiopia before he took the title "king of Egypt." Third king of Manetho's 25th or Ethiopian dynasty. Naturally he helped Hezekiah of Judah against their common enemy Sennacherib, who threatened, Egypt. Herodotus (2:141) and Josephus (Ant. 10:1-3) represent Sennacherib to have advanced to Pelusium; here Tirhakah, the ally of Sethos, the king priest of Lower Egypt, and of Hezekiah, forced Sennacherib to retire, His acquisition of the throne of Egypt seems subsequent to his accession to the Ethiopian throne, and to the diversion which he made in favor of Hezekiah against Sennacherib. He extended his conquests to the pillars of Hercules (Strabo xv. 472), the temple at Medineet Haboo is inscribed with his deeds.
But Memphite jealousy hid his share in Sennacherib's overthrow (at the time of his second invasion of Judah), and attributed Setho's deliverance to divinely sent mice, which gnawed the enemy's bowstrings. The Ethiopian influence and authority over Egypt appear in the large proportion of Ethiopians in Shishak's and Zerah's armies (; ); also in Pharaoh Necho's (). Isaiah (-18;) announces Sennacherib's overthrow, and desires the Ethiopian ambassadors, now in Jerusalem, having arrived from Meroe, the island between "the river of Ethiopia," the Nile, and the Astaboras, in "vessels of bulrushes"' or pitchcovered papyrus canoes, to bring word to their own nation (not "woe," but "ho!" calling the Ethiopians' attention to his prophetic announcement of the fall of Judah's and their common foe; Vulgate translated "the land of the clanging sound of wings," i.e. the land of armies with clashing arms; Vitringa supports KJV Ethiopia "shadowing," i.e. protecting the Hebrew "with wings"; Kenaphaim, related to the name of the idol Kneph, represented with wings: ).