11 THE ISRAELITE-JUDAHITE STRUGGLE With the re-emergence of Assyria as the leading Mesopotamian power in the early part of the first millennium BCE, Babylon’s continued supremacy in Mesopotamian cult and culture once again became increasingly unbearable for the Assyrians. The religious stature of Ashur, the Assyrian national god, was not yet commensurate with Assyria’s political dominance in the region, nor was Esharra, his principal temple in the city of Ashur, yet elevated to a status worthy of a seat of the chief imperial deity. It is against this backdrop that Sennacherib’s religious reforms must be interpreted. These have been widely discussed elsewhere 29, and require only a brief summary: A) Sennacherib destroyed the city of Babylon and removed its ashes and the statue of Marduk to Ashur, the Assyrian religious- cultural capital. There he built a temple (bıt akıtu) outside the city, in ¯¯ which he deposited the ashes from the devastated city. In this manner, he tried to refute the Babylonian claim that the axis mundi resided in Marduk’s temple of Esagil, and shifted it to Ashur, making it the new “axis of the world”, and seat of the king of the gods 30. H. ZIMMERN, “Marduks (Ellils, Assurs) Geburt im babylonischen 29 We l t s c h ö p f u n g s e p o s ” , MVAG 2 1 ( 1 9 1 7 ) 213-225 ; H. T A D M O R – B. LANDSBERGER – S. PARPOLA, “The Sin of Sargon and Sennacherib’s Last Will ”, SAAB 3 (1989) 25-51; P. MACHINIST, “The Assyrians”, 353-364; H. TADMOR, “Monarchy and the Elite in Assyria and Babylonia: The Question of Royal Accountability”, The Origin and Diversity of Axial Age Civilizations (ed. S.N. EISENSTADT) (Albany, GA 1986) 203-224; A. LIVINGSTONE, Mystical and Mythological Explanatory Works of Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars (Oxford 1986) 205-235; A.R. GEORGE, “Sennacherib and the Tablet of Destinies ”, Iraq 48 (1986) 133-146; W.G. LAMBERT, “The Assyrian Recension of Enuma Elis ”, Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten (ed. H. WAETZOLDT – ¯ ˇ H. HAUPTMANN) (Heidelberg 1997) 77-79; E. FRAHM, Einleitung in die Sanherib-Inschriften (AfO Beiheft 26; Horn 1997) 220-227, 282-288; idem, “ Sanherib und die Tempel von Kuyunjik”, Tikip santaki mala basmu. ˇ Festschrift für Rykle Borger zu seinem 65. Geburtstag (ed. S.M. MAUL) (Groningen 1998) 114-117; G.W. VERA CHAMAZA, Die Omnipotenz Assurs. ˇˇ Entwicklungen in der Assur-Theologie unter den Sargoniden Sargon II., ˇˇ Sanherib und Asarhaddon (AOAT 295 ; Münster 2002) 111-167; N. NA’AMAN, “ The King Leading Cult Reforms in his Kingdom: Josiah and Other Kings in the Ancient Near East”, ZAR 12 (2006) 155-158. D.D. LUCKENBILL, Annals of Sennacherib (Chicago, IL 1924) 136-139 30 lines 22-35, 44-57; E. EBELING, Stiftungen und Vorschriften für assyrische Tempel (Berlin 1954) 3-5; FRAHM, Einleitung 173-174 ; L. KATAJA – R. WHITING, Grants, Decrees and Gifts of the Neo-Assyrian Period (SAA XII ;