Ancient stone carving from Persia depicting the united Medes and Persians, found at the eastern stairs of the Apadana of Persepolis, Persia (now Iran).
Ancient stone carving from Persia depicting the united Medes and Persians. The Medes are wearing rounded headwear. Found at the eastern stairs of the Apadana (large hypostyle hall) of Persepolis, Persia (now Iran).

What is…
Media

also known as: Māda, Mada (in Old Persian), Mād

Hebrew: Madai, which is rendered in the King James Version…

Greek: Μῆδος —transliteration: Médos —meaning: a Mede, a Median, an inhabitant of Media

  1. “Media” (Esther 1:3; 10:2; Isaiah 21:2; Dan. 8:20)
  2. “Medes” (2 Kings 17:6; 18:11)
  3. “Mede” singluar (only in Dan. 11:1)

  4. “Madai,” the 3rd son of Japheth, and grandson of Noah (Genesis 10:2)

    Biblical scholars have generally identified Madai with the Medes. The ancient Jewish historian Flavius Josephus1 and most subsequent ancient historians indicate that the Medes are descendants of Madai, as do ancient Assyrian and Hebrew sources. The Kurds, Balochs, Azeris maintain traditions of descent from Madai.2

We first hear of the Medes in the Assyrian cuneiform records, under the name of Amada, about 840 BC. They appear to have been a branch of the Aryans, who came from the east bank of the Indus River, and were probably the predominant race for a while in the Mesopotamian valley.

For 3 or 4 centuries, they consisted of a number of tribes, each ruled by its own chief, who at length were brought under the Assyrian yoke (2 Kings 17:6). From this subjection they achieved deliverance, and formed themselves into an empire under Cyaxares (633 BC). They controlled what is today northwestern Iran (aka Persia).

Median people spoke the Median language, which is an Old Iranian language.

The ancient Greek historian and geographer Herodotus (484-425 BC) claims that the Medians were divided into 6 tribes:

  1. Arizanti
  2. Budii
  3. Busae
  4. Magi
  5. Paretaceni
  6. Struchates

Cyaxares entered into an alliance with the king of Babylon, and invaded Assyria, capturing and destroying the city of Nineveh, at the time one of the greatest cities in the world. Thus they put an end to the Assyrian monarchy as prophecied by God through the prophet Nahum (Nahum 1:8; 2:5-6; 3:13-14).

Media now rose to a place of great power, vastly extending its boundaries. But it did not long exist as an independent kingdom. It rose with Cyaxares, its first king, and it passed away with him; for during the reign of his son and successor Astyages, the Persians waged war against the Medes and conquered them, the two nations being united under one monarch, Cyrus the Persian (558 BC).

The “cities of the Medes” are first mentioned in connection with the deportation of the Israelites on the destruction of Samaria (2 Kings 17:6; 18:11). Soon afterwards Isaiah (Isa. 13:17; 21:2) speaks of the part taken by the Medes in the destruction of Babylon (compare Jeremiah 51:11, 28).

Daniel gives an account of the reign of Darius the Mede, who was made governor by Cyrus (Dan. 6:1-28).

The decree of Cyrus, Ezra informs us (6:2-5), was found in “the palace that is in the province of the Medes,” Achmetha or Ecbatana of the Greeks, which is the only Median city mentioned in Scripture.

Idolatrous polytheism of the Medes

Ancient Media encompassed parts of modern-day Iran and Iraq, was home to several prominent false deities across various cultures. They were also familiar with the Mesopotamian pantheon.

  1. Flavius Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews, (2011), 1.122–1.153. “Now as to Javan and Madai, the sons of Japhet; from Madai came the Madeans, who are called Medes, by the Greeks; but from Javan, Ionia, and all the Grecians, are derived.”
  2. Mahir A. Aziz, The Kurds of Iraq: Ethnonationalism and National Identity in Iraqi Kurdistan, (2011), p. 47.

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Article Version: May 13, 2025