It is a beautiful story, written in the Aramaic language before the fifth century BC in the land of Assyria. A reference to this story appears in the writings of "Clement [?] of Alexandria" and "Strabo [?]." It was drawn upon in the Greek translation of the "Book of Tobit," and it was also used by "Democritus" and "Menander." As for its Aramaic origin, "Renan" says: "We cannot doubt that the vast majority of the Assyrian people spoke the Aramaic language in an ordinary manner. Aramaic was used by the high officials of the land of Assyria whom 'Sennacherib' sent to negotiate with King 'Hezekiah.' And when Persian rule succeeded Assyrian rule, the Aramaic language preserved its lofty standing and its great importance." We see specimens of this language—slightly influenced by Hebrew—in certain passages of the "Book of Ezra," which is contemporary with "Ahiqar." This Aramaic text was perhaps rendered into a more developed Aramaic at the dawn of the Christian era—that is, after the passage of 600 or 700 years since the composition of the book—when Aramaic was in its transitional stage. The prevailing belief now is that this Aramaic translation is the source of all the translations of the story that appeared thereafter. The Arabic text, for instance, was translated directly from the modern Aramaic text, though it drew upon many other texts as well; likewise the Armenian text; and likewise the Old Slavonic text, which came from Aramaic by way of Greek. As for the known Aramaic manuscripts, they are late and contain many variations. The Aramaic has come down in many manuscripts, some of them in the library of Cambridge (no. 2020) and others in Berlin (Sachau 336 and 134), which were written in "Tel Keppe" in the year 1883 or 1884. Among them is a leaf in the British Museum (no. 7200), another passage in Berlin (Sachau 162), a manuscript defective at its beginning and end in the British Museum (no. 2313), another in the "Convent of Our Lady" near Alqosh (no. 100), and there are also three manuscripts of the Story of Ahiqar preserved in Urmia. The scholar "François Nau" has made a thorough study of this story.

The Content of the Book

In the book there are two collections of wise proverbs, interwoven with a story whose summary is that "Ahiqar" was a vizier, or scribe, or counselor to "Sennacherib," king of Assyria and Nineveh (704–671 BC), and then to his son "Esarhaddon" (680–668 BC). God had endowed him with astonishing wisdom, and he had acquired vast wealth at the Assyrian court. Yet he remained without an heir despite his many wives, whose number reached sixty, according to what is stated in the book (chapter one, verse two). Some see in this a punishment for his rejection of the God of Israel and his relapse into paganism; others hold that he had been a pagan, then returned to the worship of the true God, as appears from the expressions that occur in the story. At that point he adopted "Nadan," his sister's son, still an infant, in order to make him his heir and successor in his office at the Assyrian court. He began to raise him well and to lavish upon him abundant counsel, which we find in the first cycle of his wise admonitions (from chapter two to chapter three). But Nadan did not heed the counsels of his uncle; rather, his conduct grew wicked, so Ahiqar took back the inheritance from him and granted it to his younger brother "Nabuzardan." At this Nadan bore him a grudge and sought to entrap him by a plot he devised, writing letters in his uncle's name addressed to Pharaoh and to the king of Persia, intending to conspire with them to overthrow the system of rule in the Assyrian Empire, and arranging matters so that these letters would fall into the hand of the Assyrian king. Then Esarhaddon sentenced Ahiqar to death on the charge of high treason. But Ahiqar escaped death, because the executioner was a friend of his and did not wish to strike off his neck; instead, he directed him to hide in the garden of his house.

After a time, the king of Egypt asked the Assyrian king to send him a wise man who could answer his questions and build him a palace in the air. The Assyrian king was at a loss, and he grieved over Ahiqar and his extraordinary wisdom. So Ahiqar came into being again and went to Egypt to answer Pharaoh's questions. When he had learned Pharaoh's question, he prepared two eagles, two boys, and two cotton cords, each two thousand cubits long. He began to train the two eagles and the two boys: he would tie the two eagles with the two cords and train the two boys to ride upon their backs, then release them so that they flew into the air, where the two boys would cry out: "Bring us stone and mortar." The appointed day came, and Pharaoh asked him to build him a house between heaven and earth. Ahiqar asked him to prepare the stone and mortar for this purpose, then Ahiqar released the two eagles with the two boys upon them. When they had settled between heaven and earth, the two boys cried out: "Send up the stones, for we are ready to work." Ahiqar and his followers began to shout at the workmen and the king's soldiers to deliver to the builders what they wanted. When the king saw the impossibility of conveying anything to them, he conceded victory to Ahiqar. On the following day Pharaoh said to Ahiqar: "When your master's horse neighs in Nineveh, our mares here hear it and miscarry." When Ahiqar heard this, he brought a cat and began to flog it severely. They told the king of this, and he summoned him and said to him: "Why do you flog this poor animal?" Ahiqar said to him: "My lord the king had given me a rooster that knows the hours of the day and the night, and I left it in Nineveh, and this cat rose up against it this very night and cut off its head; therefore I am flogging it." Pharaoh said to him: "Between Egypt and Nineveh there are sixty-eight leagues, so how could the cat go to Nineveh and return from it in a single night?" Ahiqar said to him: "If there is this distance between Egypt and Nineveh, then how do your mares hear the voice of my master's horse?" These riddles continued: at one time the king would ask him to twist him a rope from the sand of the sea, at another to sew for him a millstone that had broken. And Ahiqar answered his questions with confounding replies, until he won Pharaoh's admiration and his many gifts. Upon his return to the land of Assyria, laden with gifts and honors, he asked King Esarhaddon to hand Nadan over to him. Ahiqar bound Nadan's hands with chains of iron and cast him into a dark place in his house and made his food bread and water. He would flog him severely, saying to him: "It is said in the proverbs that whoever does not hear with his ears, let him be made to hear through the back of his neck." Here begins the second part of the maxims (chapter 23, which is very long and consists of 142 maxims). And out of fear of the harsh punishment he expected from his uncle, Nadan swelled up, then burst and died. The conclusion comes in the thirty-fifth chapter, added to the book by one of the later authors, who may have been a Christian in view of the expressions that occur in it, such as "mortal sin," "the kingdom of heaven," and "eternal happiness." In this conclusion it is stated that Ahiqar was a pagan in the beginning and then believed in the one God at the end of his life.

As for the character of Ahiqar, it is said that he was the son of "Anael," the brother of "Tobias," who is mentioned in the Holy Scriptures.

(François Nau, The Story of Ahiqar, pp. 50–51)

From the Maxims of Ahiqar

My son, a lowly [?] sparrow in your hand is better than a thousand in the air.

My son, to carry stones with a wise man is better than to drink wine with a base man.

My son, when the rich man eats a serpent, they say he ate it as a remedy; and when the poor man eats it, they say he ate it out of hunger.

My son, if you send a wise man on an errand, do not instruct him overmuch, for he will accomplish your errand as you wish; and do not send a fool, but rather go yourself and accomplish your errand.

My son, if you hear a word, let it die in your heart and do not disclose it to another, lest it become an ember that burns your tongue and leaves pain in your body and earns you disgrace and shame before God and men.

My son, you have become to me like the wheat weevil, good for nothing but to spoil the wheat and gnaw at it.

My son, you have become to me like a dog that the cold drove to take refuge in the bakers' shop, and when warmth crept into its body it began to bark at them and bite them, and they began to beat it; and when it did not cease its barking, they were compelled to kill it for fear of its bites.

My son, do not commit adultery with your friend's wife, lest others commit adultery with your wife.

My son, eat your portion, and do not mock your neighbor.

My son, the wicked man falls and does not rise, but the upright man is not shaken, for God is with him.

My son, subdue your son while he is a child, before he surpasses you in strength and force and rebels against you, so that you are shamed by all the evil deeds he does.

My son, do not bring upon yourself the curse of your father and your mother, lest you never rejoice in the blessing of your own children.

My son, do not curse your Lord in the day of your calamity and your misery, for if He hears you He will be angry with you.

My son, judge justly in your youth, that you may attain dignity in your old age.