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The Rise And Fall Of "the Ships of Tarshish" "The ships of Tarshish crossed the seas for your trade." - Ezekiel 27:25 (The New Jerusalem Bible) The ships of Tarshish helped make King Solomon rich. The people who built them influenced the development of the Greek and Roman alphabets. They also founded a city that gave its name, Byblos, to the most influential book ever published. Who built and sailed the ships of Tarshish? How did the ships get their name? And how do events involving these people and their ships attest to the accuracy of the Bible? Lords of the Mediterranean The Phoenicians built the vessels that came to be known as the ships of Tarshish. Phoenicians had already become expert seamen about a thousand years before the time of Christ. Their homeland was a narrow strip of coast that more or less corresponds to modern-day Lebanon. Other nations occupied the land to the north, east and south. To the west lay the vast Mediterranean Sea. To gain wealth, the Phoenicians looked to that sea. The Phoenician seamen gradually built a thriving merchant fleet. As profits grew and technology advanced, they constructed larger ships that could handle longer voyages. After reaching Cyprus, Sardinia, and the Balearic Islands, the Phoenicians followed the North African coastline in a westerly direction until they reached Spain. Phoenician shipwrights built boats 30 meters long. These ocean going vessels were apparently called "ships of Tarshish" since they could undertake the 4,000-kilometer journey from Phoenicia to southern Spain, the possible location of Tarshich. (Over time, the term "ships of Tarshish" came to signify a type of ship, one capable of long sea voyages) The Phoenicians may not have been bent on ruling the world, only on making money from it. They did so by establishing trading posts. As traders, however, they become the lords of the Mediterranean. Beyond the Mediterranean In their quest for profit, Phoenician explorers ventured into the Atlantic Ocean. Their ships continued to hug the southern coast of Spain until they came to an area called Tartessus. About the year 1100 B.C.E., they founded a city that they called Gadir. This port , now known as Cadiz, Spain, became one of the first large cities of Western Europe. The Phoenicians traded salt, wine, dried fish cedar, pine, metalwork, glass, embroidery, fine linen, and cloth dyed the famous Tyrian purple. What wealth did Spain have to offer in return? Southern Spain proved to be the Mediterranean's richest source of silver and other valuable metals. Regarding Tyre, the principle port of the Phoenicians, the prophet Ezekiel said: "You did business in Spain and took silver, iron, tin and lead in payment for your abundant goods." (Ezekiel 27:12) Today's English Version The Phoenicians discovered a seemingly inexhaustible supply of these minerals near the river Guadalquivir, not far from Cadiz. The same minerals are still extracted from this area, now called Rio Tinto. These mines have been producing high-quality ore for some three thousand years. With the Spanish-Phoenician shipping line firmly established, the Phoenicians claimed a monopoly on Spanish silver. The silver flooded into Phoenicia and even into nearby Israel. King Solomon of Israel formed joint business ventures with Phoenician King Hiram. As a result, in Solomons's day silver was counted as "nothing at all" (1Kings 10:21) (Solomon's "fleet of ships of Tarshish" collaborated with Hiram's fleet, probably operating out of Ezion-geber and trading in the Red Sea and beyond(1Kings 10:22) Although the Phoenicians became successful merchants, they could be ruthless. Reportedly, they sometimes lured people aboard ship on the pretense of showing them their wares, only to enslave them. In time, they even turned on their former trading partners, the Israelites, and sold them into slavery. Hence, Hebrew prophets predicted the destruction of the Phoenician city of Tyre. These prophecies were finally fulfilled by Alexander the Great in 332 B.C. E (Joel 3:6; Amos 1:9+10) This destruction marked the end of the Phoenician era. The Phoenician Legacy Like all good business men, the Phoenician traders put their agreements in writing. They used an alphabet very similar to ancient Hebrew. Other nations saw the advantages of the Phoenician alphabet. With modifications, it became the basis for the Greek alphabet, which in turn was the forerunner of the Roman script, one of the most widely used alphabets today. In addition, the important Phoenician city of Byblos became a center for the distribution of papyrus, the precursor of modern paper. The use of papyrus in writing encouraged the development of books. In fact, the English word for the world's most widely distributed book, the Bible, is derived from the name Byblos. Indeed, the historical record of the Phoenicians and their ships build a confidence that the Bible is firmly rooted in fact. I found this to be such a good articled that fills in many points of interest in the reading of Bible accounts. Katidid. |
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