The Death of Alexander the Great
2328 words long.
Published on 2024-06-14
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Above is illustrated the "Nine Worthies", nine historical "princes" who possessed traits thought to embody the ideals of chivalry. One of those nine is Alexander the Great. I defy you to guess which one! I couldn't... (The answer is at the end of this article.) The Nine Worthies include (though not in the same order as in the carving):
- three pagans (Hector, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar),
- three Jews (Joshua, David and Judas Maccabeus) and
- three Christians (King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey of Bouillon)
This article first appeared in the chapter "CSI Babylon: Job 20" in Peace, like Solomon Never Knew. For centuries, doctors and historians have tried to solve the mystery of how Alexander the Great died. Poison? Infected battle wound? Illness? The symptoms of his ailment were dutifully recorded by his attendants and preserved for posterity. New diagnoses pop up every few years in a medical journal. So like investigators in one of those Crime Scene Investigation TV shows, we shall try to solve the mystery using information that those doctors have not considered: the Bible.
CSI Babylon: Job 20
How did Alexander the Great die? Every few years, another doctor writes a journal article with a shiny new diagnosis. They base their theories on surviving accounts by ancient historians. Are they missing a key piece of evidence? We continue our chapter-by-chapter dissection of Job with the twentieth chapter, whose speaker is the most obnoxious of the three friends, Zophar.
Speech 13. 338-219 BC. Zophar (Job 20).
Everyone who lived in the Middle East during the 20th generation lived in the shadow of one man: Alexander the Great. When he died, they say his body showed no sign of decay for six days, proving his divinity. Doctors still argue about what killed him. Was it:
- malaria? [38]
- poison? [34]
- polio? [38]
- typhoid fever? [38]
- Guillain-Barré Syndrome? [33]
- alcohol poisoning?
- gallstones followed by acute pancreatic necrosis? [37]
- wine fermented from Veratrum album (white hellebore)? [34]
- West Nile encephalitis? [36]
(Refer to sources [32-42].)
Over two thousand years later, we have no body to examine and no witnesses to interview. Will we ever know for certain how he died? At least historians like Flavius Arrianus, Ptolemy, Plutarch, and Quintus Curtius preserved the symptoms and progression of the disease.
During a banquet to honor the death of his best friend, Alexander consumed much wine. He was struck with excruciating abdominal pain. Plutarch related that another pain felt as though he were stuck in the back with a spear. Doctors induced vomiting to empty his stomach, fearing poison or tainted food. Over the coming days, he spiked a high fever. They used cold baths to try to break the fever. Alexander suffered exhaustion, intense thirst, chills, and difficulty breathing. Then followed jaundice, delusions, convulsions and a creeping paralysis. Though not one of the early symptoms, he eventually lost his appetite and suffered diarrhea. At the end, he he became mute and could move only his hands and eyes. Between eleven and fourteen days after he took ill, he died, weeks before his thirty-third birthday.
What does Zophar’s speech have to do with a Macedonian conqueror? In my book on Job, I associated the three friends with an evil Trinity. Eliphaz, who listened to a lying spirit in Job 4, was the Evil Spirit. Bildad, who ridiculed the idea of trusting in a “Son of Man”, was the Anti-Christ. That leaves Zophar as the Father of Lies. This chapter has the best evidence for such an association of Zophar with Satan. In verse 14, he mentions the “venom of serpents”. Then he says, *“He will suck the poison of serpents; the fangs of an adder will kill him.” *(Job 20:16, NIV)
As Revelation 13 reveals, Satan controls the beasts of the world, its evil empires. That means that Satan controlled the empire of Alexander, one of the beasts and one of the heads of Daniel’s visions. The devil is full of hatred, even for his servants. Job 20 is Satan’s epitaphios logos, his funeral oration, for the fallen “Lord of Asia”, the “Great King” and “Son of Zeus”. Here then are the profound connections between Job 20 (from the NIV) and the death of Alexander:
Verse 5. “... the mirth of the wicked is brief, the joy of the godless lasts but a moment.” Alexander fell ill during the merriment of a banquet.
Verse 6. “Though the pride of the godless person reaches to the heavens and his head touches the clouds...” Though a man, he pursued and accepted divine honors and titles, just as Satan sought the throne of heaven.
Verse 7. “he will perish forever, like his own dung; those who have seen him will say, ‘Where is he?’” The word dung brings to mind the diarrhea that beset him.
Verse 8. “Like a dream he flies away, no more to be found, banished like a vision of the night.” Delirium and hallucinations seized him.
Verses 9-10. “The eye that saw him will not see him again; his place will look on him no more. His children must make amends to the poor; his own hands must give back his wealth.” After Alexander died, his generals, called the Diadochi, fought each other to seize his title and kingdom. One was Cassander, who ordered the execution of Alexander’s wife Roxane and his sons Heracles and Alexander IV and usurped the throne of Macedon. Wikipedia says this of Cassander. “It was later even said that he could not pass a statue of Alexander without feeling faint.” Truly the one who took his place did not want look on him any more. Among those who contend that Alexander was poisoned, Cassander is their prime suspect.
Verse 11. “The youthful vigor that fills his bones will lie with him in the dust.” Alexander died young.
Verses 12-14. “Though evil is sweet in his mouth and he hides it under his tongue, though he cannot bear to let it go and lets it linger in his mouth, yet his food will turn sour in his stomach; it will become the venom of serpents within him.” The first symptoms were excruciating stomach pain. Yet despite the travails of the first day of his illness, Alexander attended another banquet the next day. He could not bear to let his pleasures go.
Verse 15. “He will spit out the riches he swallowed; God will make his stomach vomit them up.” His doctors induced vomiting.
Verse 16. “He will suck the poison of serpents; the fangs of an adder will kill him.” There is no mention of real snakes in the historical record. This may refer to medicines that his doctors gave him that worsened his condition, or metaphorically to the supernatural agent contributing to his death: Satan.
Verse 17. “He will not enjoy the streams, the rivers flowing with honey and cream.” His corpse was encased in a sarcophagus filled with honey! (Honey deters the decomposition of dead bodies.)
Verse 18. “What he toiled for he must give back uneaten; he will not enjoy the profit from his trading.” Alexander eventually lost his appetite. Metaphorically, it means he never enjoyed ruling over the empire he conquered.
Verse 20. “Surely he will have no respite from his craving; he cannot save himself by his treasure.” Alexander suffered an unquenchable thirst.
Verses 22-23. “In the midst of his plenty, distress will overtake him; the full force of misery will come upon him. When he has filled his belly, God will vent his burning anger against him and rain down his blows on him.” This describes the start of his anguish, when he filled his belly with food and wine. The full force of misery struck his belly first. Reports indicated that if anyone touched his midsection gently it caused sharp pain. This also identifies the second, more substantial spiritual agent of Alexander’s destruction: God.
Verses 24-26. “Though he flees from an iron weapon, a bronze-tipped arrow pierces him. He pulls it out of his back, the gleaming point out of his liver. Terrors will come over him; total darkness lies in wait for his treasures. A fire unfanned will consume him and devour what is left in his tent.” Though doctors say his symptoms do not indicate cirrhosis as the cause of death, Alexander was a heavy drinker, and drank to excess the first two days of his illness, which may have injured his liver and weakened his body’s ability to fight off disease. Reports of his symptoms include jaundice, indicating liver failure.
There is no mistaking the “fire unfanned”; persistent high fever plagued him until he met his end. Also, recall how Plutarch described the initial pain as feeling like being stuck in the back with a spear, an almost identical analogy to being pierced by an arrowhead.
A skeptic might argue that these symptoms could apply to someone other than Alexander the Great. Iron and bronze connect this passage to Nebuchadnezzar’s vision of the statue in Daniel 2. Bronze refers to Alexander’s own empire. This suggests treachery: the king of the bronze empire laid low by bronze. Iron represents the next empire: Rome. The kingdoms that sprang from his empire, the Ptolemaic and Seleucid empires, would eventually be conquered by Rome, the iron weapon from which his successors could not flee.
Verses 27-28. “The heavens will expose his guilt; the earth will rise up against him. A flood will carry off his house, rushing waters on the day of God’s wrath.” The flood could be a poetic description of the ailing man’s diarrhea, but there is no mistaking the wrath of both heaven and earth. Both God and Satan had their hand in Alexander’s destruction, including his house: the murder of his wife and children.
After the idea of cross-referencing the chapters of Job with history occurred to me, I quickly found several close matches, before running into a brick wall. A number of chapters had no obvious link, prompting a mixture of discouragement and frenzied research. Chapter 20 was among the most difficult. I pondered these words:
Like a dream he flies away, no more to be found,
banished like a vision of the night.
The eye that saw him will not see him again;
his place will look on him no more.
- Job 20:8-9, NIV
This era was the beginning of the time between the testaments, when God sent no prophets to Israel. God was no more to be found. That connection was tenuous, but taken together with the idea that this chapter describes the death of Alexander, we have a complete picture. Israel refused to listen to the prophets, so God would stop sending them and instead send conquerors to get his message across.
The last thing to say about Alexander is that while human doctors don’t know what caused his death, God knows. The proof is simple. If the Almighty can:
- describe the setting of Alexander’s death (a feast),
- reveal most of his disease symptoms,
- highlight a peculiar feature of his burial (being coated in honey)
- account for the fate of his family
- over a millennium before the man was born,
- then the Lord knows everything.
With three references to the poison of snakes, which symbolizes treachery, the likeliest interpretation is that Alexander was poisoned.
Now that is 20/20 hindsight!
Notes:
- In an upcoming book, I will point out how one of Habakkuk’s prophecies also suggests poisoned wine. (That analysis ended up in Plague, Precept, Prophet, Peace.)
- During the Reformation, Johann Brenz (Brentius) in his commentary on Job 20:20, gave an illustration of the avaricious man, writing:
“You have an example of this in Alexander the Great, who,
not content with the sovereignty of one world, groaned on learning
that there were more worlds.”
He made no claim that Job 20 was prophetic, but his observation is confirmatory.
Answer to the Statuary Riddle:
The 14th-century carving "Nine Good Heroes" (known as "Neun Gute Helden" in the original German) at City Hall in Cologne, Germany, is the earliest known representation of the Nine Worthies. From left to right are the three Christians: Charlemagne bearing an eagle upon his shield, King Arthur displaying three crowns, and Godfrey of Bouillon with a dog lying before him; then the three pagans: Julius Caesar, Hector, and Alexander the Great bearing a griffon upon his shield; and finally the three Jews: David holding a sceptre, Joshua, and Judah Maccabee. Thus Alexander the Great is sixth from the left.
Bibliography
This uses the bibliography reference numbers from Peace, like Solomon Never Knew.
[32] Gamble N, Bloedow EF. (2017). “A Medical-Historical Examination of the Death of Alexander the Great.” Journal of Ancient History and Archaeology. volume 4 (issue 3). DOI: 10.14795/j.v4i3.269
[33] Hall, Katherine (2018). “Did Alexander the Great Die from Guillain-Barré Syndrome?” The Ancient History Bulletin, 2018; Vol. 32: pp. 106-128.
[34] Schep L., Slaughter R. J., Vale A., & Wheatley P. (2014). “Was the Death of Alexander the Great due to poisoning? Was it Veratrum album?”. Clinical Toxicology 52.1 (2014), 72-77. DOI: 10.3109/15563650.2013.870341
[35] Phillips, G. (2004). Alexander the Great: murder in Babylon. HB Virgin Publishing.
[36] Marr JS, Calisher CH (2003). “Alexander the Great and West Nile virus encephalitis”. Emerging Infectious Diseases. 2003;9:1599-603.
[37] Sbarounis CN (1997). "Did Alexander the Great die of acute pancreatitis?" Journal of Clinical Gastroenterol. 1997 Jun;24(4):294-6. doi: 10.1097/00004836-199706000-00031. PMID: 9252868.
[38] Oldach D, Richard RE, Borza E, Benitez RM (1998). “A mysterious death”. New England Journal of Medicine. 1998;338:1764-9.
[39] Behrman AJ, Wilson RB (1998). “A mysterious death”. New England Journal of Medicine. 1998 Oct 22;339(17):1248; author reply 1249. doi: 10.1056/NEJM199810223391716. PMID: 9786760.
[40] Milnes RD (1968). Alexander the Great. New York, NY: Pegasus; 1968.
[41] Baldwin S (2018). Miserable, but Not Monochrome: The Distinctive Characteristics and Perspectives of Job’s Three Comforters. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Pub. House.
[42] Stedman RC, Denny J (2007). Let God Be God: Life-changing Words from the Book of Job. Grand Rapids, MI: Discovery House.
