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307 a falling-out against my father [he had]; to his faith-keeping the king ceased to attend; all this Nabu has caused to happen." spreading rebellions, put together a coalition of loyal kings and ap- pointed the Elamite Kudur-Laghamar as its military commander. Their first order was that "Borsippa, the stronghold [of Nabuj. with weapons be despoiled." Carrying out the order, "“Kudur- Laghamar, with wicked thoughts against Marduk, the shrine of Borsippa with fire he destroyed and its sons with a sword he slew." Then, the military expedition against the rebellious kings was or- dered. The Babylonian text lists the targets to be attacked and the names of their attackers; we easily recognize the biblical names among them: Eriaku (Ariokh) was to attack Shebu (Beer-Sheba) and Tud-Ghula (Tidhal) was to "smite with a sword the sons of Gaza." Acting in accordance with an oracle of Ishtar, the army put together by the Kings of the East arrived in Transjordan. First to be attacked was a _ stronghold in "the high land," then Rabattum. The route was the same as the one described in the then Bible: from the highland in the north through the district of Rabat-. ‘Amon in the center, southward around the Dead Sea. Thereafter, Dur-Mah-Ilani was to be captured, and the Ca- naanite cities (including Gaza and Beer-Sheba in the Negev) were to be punished. But at Dur-Mah-Ilani, according to the Babylonian text, "the son of the priest, whom the gods in their true counsel had anointed," stood in the invaders' way and Ma all a aa "the despoiling prevented." Could the Babylonian text indeed refer to Abraham, the son of Terah the priest, and spell out his role in turning back the invaders? The possibility is strengthened by the fact that the Mesopotamian and biblical texts relate the same event in the same locality with the upon one highly intriguing clue. This is the unnoticed fact that the date formulas for the reign of Amar-Sin call his seventh year—the crucial year 2041 B.C., the year of the military expedition—also MU NE IB.RU.UM BA.HUL (Fig. 100), "Year [in which] the Shepherding-abode of IB.RU.UM was attacked." Abraham: The Fateful Years The assembled gods, thus alerted to the role of Nabu in the and the Ca- same outcome. But there is more to it than just a possibility, for we have come