Two Super Powers Collide – the Battle of Carchemish 605BC

Two Super Powers Collide – the Battle of Carchemish 605 BC

 

‘After all this, when Josiah had set the temple in order, Neco king of Egypt came up to make war at Carchemish on the Euphrates, and Josiah went out to engage him.’ (2 Chronicles 35:20).

 

‘To Egypt, concerning the army of Pharaoh Neco king of Egypt, which was by the Euphrates River at Carchemish, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon defeated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah.’ (Jeremiah 46:2).

 

The Assyrians controlled the Carchemish area after victory by the Assyrian king who took Samaria (Sargon II – Isaiah 10:9) in 717B.C., until the conquest of the city by the Babylonians in 605 BC.

 

 

 

When Josiah, king of Judah and an ally of the Neo-Babylonians, was slain in battle, Egyptian King Neco replaced Josiah’s chosen successor with his own choice and imposed tribute on Judah.

 

 

In 606B.C. the Egyptians routed the Neo-Babylonians, but, at the great Battle of Carchemish(a Syrian city on the middle Euphrates River) in 605B.C., Nebuchadnezzar defeated the Egyptians (with Assyrian allies), breaking the power of their strong army and forced their withdrawal from Syria and Palestine.

 

The Chronicle states: Nebuchadnezzar “crossed the river to go against the Egyptian army which lay in Carchemish. The armies fought with each other and the Egyptian army withdrew before him. He accomplished their defeat and beat them to nonexistence.

 

 

 

As for the rest of the Egyptian army that had escaped from the defeat so quickly that no weapon had reached them, the Babylonians overtook and defeated them in the district of Hamath so that not a single man escaped to his own country. At that time Nebuchadnezzar conquered the whole of Hatti-land.” The `Hatti-land’ included the Promised Land.