Ancient Tyre consisted of two parts.

The first part of the city was on the

mainland and the second part was on an island about half a mile from
the shoreline.

One export that contributed to the great wealth of Tyre was purple
clothing dye, which came to be known as Tyrian purple.

Murex shellfish lived in the warm

Mediterranean Sea near Tyre. Murex
shellfish from the Mediterranean Sea were
captured in traps in large numbers. It took
12,000 shellfish to produce the dye for a
single garment.

Owning garments dyed purple was

extremely expensive for most people. In
time. purple came to be a colour
associated with royalty.
THE WALLS OF TYRE
Due to its wealth, the island portion of the city built huge walls to
protect itself from thieves and raiders. The walls were about 150
feet high and correspondingly thick, made of big stones joined
with mortar. The mainland became the secondary part of the city
basically to supply the island with water and supplies.
At first, Tyre had a good relationship with Israel and Judah.
When King Solomon built the first temple in Jerusalem, King
Hiram of Tyre became famous for supplying cedar from the
forests of Lebanon as well as other materials and even skilled
workmen.

(A replica of transporting cedars for Solomon’s temple)

FALSE GODS OF TYRE INFLUENCE ISRAEL

“Baal” was commonly worshipped in Phoenicia. The particular Baal god
they worshipped in Tyre was named Melkart. King Ahab of Israel married
wicked Queen Jezebel who was the daughter of the Phoenician king of
Sidon. She was a zealous worshipper of Melkart and a vicious opponent
to the worship of the God of Israel. For example, it was Queen Jezebel
who had Naboth killed so that her husband King Ahab could take his
vineyard.

After this point in history the once good relations enjoyed by Tyre and
the people of Judah and Israel ended.
 Figurine of a deity from
Tyre, 7th century BCE,
National Museum

EZEKIEL PROPHECIES AGAINST TYRE

The people of Tyre developed jealousy and rivalry toward Jerusalem and
were happy over their misfortunes. They even handed over those who
tried to escape from Jerusalem’s destruction to Babylon. For these
reasons the prophet Ezekiel was inspired to prophecy against her:

“Son of man, because Tyre has said against Jerusalem, ‘Aha! The
gateway of the peoples has been broken! Everything will come my way,
and I will become rich now that she is devastated’;

therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord Jehovah says:

‘Here I am against you, O Tyre, and I will bring up many nations against
you, just as the sea brings up its waves. They will destroy the walls of Tyre
and tear down her towers, and I will scrape away soil and make her a
shining, bare rock. She will become a drying yard for dragnets in the
midst of the sea.’ (Ezekiel 26: 2-5)

Did the prophecy come true?

Part 1: NEBUCHADNEZZAR’S SIEGE OF TYRE

Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Tyre for

13 years!

The mainland city was

destroyed. The walls
and towers were levelled
to the ground along with
the homes within.

However, lacking a significant navy, Babylon was unable to take the

fortified island city.
PART 2: ALEXANDER THE GREAT DESTROYS THE ISLAND
CITY

Ezekiel had said that Tyre would be plundered by “many nations”.

(Ezekiel 26: 3)

More than 250 years later, Alexander the Great, King of Greece came
to Tyre and successfully destroyed it had it “thrown in the water”.

ALEXANDER BUILDS A CAUSEWAY

Alexamder’s army built a massive causeway to the island. They used the ruins of
the mainland Tyre along with timber from the famous cedar forests of Lebanon and
the abundant stone and even soil from the old city of Tyre that had lain in ruins since
its destruction by Nebuchadnezzar over two centuries before.

The walls were conquered and Tyre was razed to the ground. Tyre, no longer even
an island was for a time, only fit for fishermen to dry their nets on the bare rock.

Aerial photo of Tyre circa 1934. Centuries of sedimentation has turned

Alexander’s causeway into a peninsula 500 meters wide.

Today, visitors who look for ruins from Phoenician Tyre will be
disappointed for nothing at all remains from that time period. Everything
from that era was removed and thrown into the sea to build Alexander’s
causeway, leaving only “shining, bare rock” (Ezekiel 26:4).

As predicted by Ezekiel, Tyre was completely destroyed and never to be

inhabited again.