Though the narrative and its details stand outside history, the setting of the feast at which the temple vessels from Jerusalem were desecrated has been remembered from actual Neo-Babylonian cult practice. In Babylon, the image of Marduk was served meals daily in a style befitting the divine king, including musical accompaniment and beautifully arranged desserts of fruits. After the god's meal, water in a basin was brought and offered to the idol to wash its fingers. According to several extant descriptions, the dishes of food that had been presented to the image were then sent to the king for his consumption. The food had been blessed by its proximity to the god, and the blessing was now transferable to the king. One exception is recorded, on a tablet from Uruk, which mentions that the crown prince— this was Belshazzar— enjoyed the royal privilege.
The ritual importance of the god's sacred leftovers is illustrated in an inscribed claim of Sargon II:
- "the citizens of Babylon [and] Borsippa, the temple personnel, the scholars [and] the administrators of the country who [had] looked upon him (Merodach-baladan) as their master now brought the leftovers of Bel [and] Sarpanitu [of Babylon and] Nabu [and] Tasmetu [of Borsippa] to me at Dur-Ladinni and asked me to enter Babylon"
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- (Oppenheim, pp 188ff)
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Idols of conquered cities were ordinarily brought to Babylon and set in positions of reverence to Marduk within his temple. The Israelites, having no idol ofYHWH, had been forced to give up the vessels of Solomon's Temple. These are used and defiled in the story by Belshazzar and his nobles.
Many scholars have used the Nabonidus Chronicle and Cylinder of Nabonidus to place the date of October 12, 539 BC on the events which transpired in the text.[2][3] They have compared the dates with astrological predictions to identify the night or dawn at which a new moon would appear during the month of Tashritu, since it is believed that the feast was dedicated to the moon god, Sin.
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