MERODACH BALADAN (nt:52 Trit;-m), son of Baladan, king of Babylon,' sent letters and gifts to Hezekiah, ostensibly as an embassy of con gratulation on Hezekiah's recovery from his sick ness (2 Kings xx. 12, where the name is mis written Beroa'ach B.; Is. xxxix. 1; in 2 Chron. xxxii. 3i the writer mentions only ' the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon who sent unto him to in quire of the wonder that was done in the land'). That the embassy had a political object (Joseph. Antig. X. 2.9) is very probable ' • and, perhaps, the statement, Hezekiah was glad of them,' and the mention of his showing them `all his treasures and all the house of his armour,' may imply that he was disposed to listen to overtures of alliance. Any such intention, however, on the part of Hezekiah was effectually checked by the stern re proof of the prophet Isaiah.
This incident forms one of the connecting points between sacred and profane chronology [CHRONO LOGY, sec. 12-15]. Indeed, of late it has become cardinal to the whole question of the relations sub sisting between the Biblical annals and those of Assyria and Babylon for the time of Sargon and Sen nacherib. It is placed, with the connecting words ' At that time,' immediately after Hezekiah's re covery, which, as being 15 years before the close of his reign of 29 years, should fall in his 14th year, which is expressly named as the year of Sen nacherib's invasion (2 Kings xviii. 2, 13 ; xx. 6 ; Is. xxxvi. 1 ; xxxviii. 5). This i4th year, as it lies io7 years before 4 Jehoiakim = I Nebuchad nezzar, comes to 713 or 711 B.C. according as Neb. is set on Biblical data at 6o6, or with the Canon at 604 B.C. Now the Canon has Mar dokempad reigning in Babylon 12 years at Ae. Nab. 26-38 = 721-709 B.C. The time agrees ; and the name, read Mardok-empal (A for A), is well ex plained as Mardok-ba/ (by the consideration that the modern Greek uses wr to denote the b of other languages, its own f being our 74, with the adan dropt for shortness. So Bunsen, App. to Egypt's Place, i. 726 ; Dr. Hincks, 5ournal of Sac. Lit., No. xv. 134. Knobel's explanation, on Is. xxxix. 1, is less satisfactory ; Ewald, Gesch. des V.
344, makes empad an abbreviation from empalad. But the Armenian version of the lost Chronicon of Eusebius brought to light a passage of Berosus, preserved by the Polyhistor, which, if authentic, disproved the identification of Merodach Baladan Mardokempad, and altogether disturbed the received chronology of Hezekiah's reign. It pur
ports that ' after the reign in Babylon of a brother of Senecherim, Akises had reigned not 3o days when he was slain by Maraclach Baldan, who, after an usurpation of six months, was slain by one Elibus. But in the third year of this Elibus, Senecherim, king of Assyria, invaded Babylon, took Elibus captive, and made his own son Asordanes king' (Chron. Armeno-lat., i. 5). To this the Polyhistor appends an enumeration of reigns amounting to SS years, from i Senn. to i Neb., which makes Senn. = 692 B.C., i.e., 17 years after the end of the 12 years of Mardokempad, and 5 (or 3) years after the death of Hezekiah in the usual chronology. But it happens that at this precise year, 692 B.C., the Canon has Mesessi-Mordak reigning in Babylon 4 years : this, then, becomes the Merodach Bala dan of Scripture and Berosus to those who accept the numbers of Polyhistor, and therewith Niebuhr's proposal to strike off 20 years from the 55 of Ma nasseh, so lowering I Hezekiah to 704 B.C., and 14 Hezekiah to 691 B.C., synchronizing with the 2d of Sennacherib and of Mesessi-Mordak (Movers, die Phdnizier,i. 154.; v. Gumpach, Abriss der Bab. Assyr. Gesch.; Lepsius, Kgnigsbuch derAeg, 97, ff.; Scheuchzer, Pul a. Nabonassar). Of those who held to the Biblical numbers and to Mardokempad as the M. B. of Scripture, some, rejecting Polyhis tor's numbers, affirmed the M. B. of Berosus to be the NI. B. of Scripture (Gesenius, Comm. fiber yesai, 998, ff.; Brandis, Rerum Assyr. temp. emend.—re tracted in a later work ; Ordo Sad. sec. 496—also retracted) : by most this identity was denied (Winer, R. W.B., s. v. ; Ewald, Gesch. 344 ; Hitzig, fiber d. Eg-rif a'er Kriti k ; Knobel, in lot. Esai. ; Thenius, in loc. 2 Kings). A third view, taken by Duncker (Gesch. des Alterth.,i. 456), in volves the assumption that the embassy from M.B. (of Berosus, not = Mardokempad) occurred long after the Assyrian invasion and Hezekiah's illness (see Knobel, zz. s.) : this, which also requires an alteration of Polyhistor's numbers, is quite incom patible with the Scripture narrative [HEZEK1AH, p. 296, col. 2].