Sennacherib Invades Judah

¹³ In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, King Sennacherib of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them.^(A)

Sennacherib Threatens Jerusalem

36 In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, King Sennacherib of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them.^{(A) 2} The king of Assyria sent the Rabshakeh with a great army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. He stood by the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the fuller’s field.^{(B) 3} And there came out to him Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the palace, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the recorder.^(C)

⁴ The Rabshakeh said to them, “Say to Hezekiah: Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: On what do you base this reliance of yours?^{(D) 5} Do you think that mere words are strategy and power for war? On whom, then, do you now rely, that you have rebelled against me?^{(E) 6} See, you are relying on Egypt, that broken reed of a staff, which will pierce the hand of anyone who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who rely on him.^{(F) 7} But if you say to me, ‘We rely on the Lord our God,’ [[is it not he whose high places and altars Hezekiah has removed, saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar’?]]^{[a](G) 8} Come now, make a wager with my master the king of Assyria: I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to set riders on them. ⁹ How then can you repulse a single captain among the least of my master’s servants, when you rely on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen?^{(H) 10} Moreover, is it without the Lord that I have come up against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me, Go up against this land, and destroy it.”

¹¹ Then Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah said to the Rabshakeh, “Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; do not speak to us in the language of Judah within the hearing of the people who are on the wall.”^{(I) 12} But the Rabshakeh said, “Has my master sent me to speak these words to your master and to you and not to the people sitting on the wall, who are doomed with you to eat their own dung and drink their own urine?”

¹³ Then the Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in the language of Judah, “Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria!^{(J) 14} Thus says the king: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you.^{(K) 15} Do not let Hezekiah make you rely on the Lord by saying, ‘The Lord will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’^{(L) 16} Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria: Make your peace with me and come out to me; then every one of you will eat from your own vine and your own fig tree and drink water from your own cistern,^{(M) 17} until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and wine, a land of bread and vineyards. ¹⁸ Do not let Hezekiah mislead you by saying, ‘The Lord will deliver us.’ Has any of the gods of the nations delivered their land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?^{(N) 19} Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?^{(O) 20} Who among all the gods of these countries have delivered their countries out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?”^(P)

²¹ But they were silent and answered him not a word, for the king’s command was, “Do not answer him.” ²² Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was in charge of the palace, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of the Rabshakeh.^(Q)

The Long History of Rebellion

Arrogant Assyria Also Judged

⁷ therefore the Lord is bringing up against it the mighty flood waters of the River, the king of Assyria and all his glory; it will rise above all its channels and overflow all its banks; ⁸ it will sweep on into Judah as a flood and, pouring over, will reach up to the neck, and its outspread wings will fill the breadth of your land, O Immanuel.^(A)

¹⁷ The Lord will bring on you and on your people and on your ancestral house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.”^(A)

¹⁸ On that day the Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the sources of the streams of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.^{(B) 19} And they will all come and settle in the steep ravines and in the clefts of the rocks and on all the thornbushes and on all the watering holes.^[a](C)

²⁰ On that day the Lord will shave with a razor hired beyond the River—with the king of Assyria—the head and the hair of the feet, and it will take off the beard as well.^(D)

²¹ On that day one will keep alive a young cow and two sheep ²² and will eat curds because of the abundance of milk that they give, for everyone left in the land shall eat curds and honey.

²³ On that day every place where there used to be a thousand vines, worth a thousand shekels of silver, will become briers and thorns. ²⁴ With bow and arrows one will go there, for all the land will be briers and thorns, ²⁵ and as for all the hills that used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not go there for fear of briers and thorns, but they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.

Sennacherib’s Invasion

32 After these things and these acts of faithfulness, King Sennacherib of Assyria came and invaded Judah and encamped against the fortified cities, thinking to win them for himself.^{(A) 2} When Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come and intended to fight against Jerusalem, ³ he planned with his officers and his warriors to stop the flow of the springs that were outside the city, and they helped him. ⁴ A great many people were gathered, and they stopped all the springs and the wadi that flowed through the land, saying, “Why should the Assyrian kings come and find water in abundance?”^{(B) 5} Hezekiah^[a] strengthened himself and built up the entire wall that was broken down and raised towers on it,^[b] and outside it he built another wall; he also strengthened the Millo in the city of David and made weapons and shields in abundance.^{(C) 6} He appointed combat commanders over the people and gathered them together to him in the square at the gate of the city and spoke encouragingly to them, saying,^{(D) 7} “Be strong and of good courage. Do not be afraid or dismayed before the king of Assyria and all the horde that is with him, for there is one greater with us than with him.^{(E) 8} With him is an arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God, to help us and to fight our battles.” The people were encouraged by the words of King Hezekiah of Judah.^(F)

⁹ After this, while King Sennacherib of Assyria was at Lachish with all his forces, he sent his servants to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah of Judah and to all the people of Judah who were in Jerusalem, saying, ¹⁰ “Thus says King Sennacherib of Assyria: On what are you relying, that you undergo the siege of Jerusalem? ¹¹ Is not Hezekiah misleading you, handing you over to die by famine and by thirst, when he tells you, ‘The Lord our God will save us from the hand of the king of Assyria’?^{(G) 12} Was it not this same Hezekiah who took away his high places and his altars and commanded Judah and Jerusalem, saying, ‘Before one altar you shall worship, and upon it you shall make your offerings’?^{(H) 13} Do you not know what I and my ancestors have done to all the peoples of other lands? Were the gods of the nations of those lands at all able to save their lands out of my hand?^{(I) 14} Who among all the gods of those nations that my ancestors utterly destroyed was able to save his people from my hand, that your God should be able to save you from my hand?^{(J) 15} Now, therefore, do not let Hezekiah deceive you or mislead you in this fashion, and do not believe him, for no god of any nation or kingdom has been able to save his people from my hand or from the hand of my ancestors. How much less will your God save you out of my hand!”^(K)

¹⁶ His servants said still more against the Lord God and against his servant Hezekiah. ¹⁷ He also wrote letters to throw contempt on the Lord the God of Israel and to speak against him, saying, “Just as the gods of the nations in other lands did not rescue their people from my hands, so the God of Hezekiah will not rescue his people from my hand.”^{(L) 18} They shouted it with a loud voice in the language of Judah to the people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, to frighten and terrify them, in order that they might take the city.^{(M) 19} They spoke of the God of Jerusalem as if he were like the gods of the peoples of the earth, which are the work of human hands.^(N)

Sennacherib’s Defeat and Death

²⁰ Then King Hezekiah and the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz prayed because of this and cried to heaven.^{(O) 21} And the Lord sent an angel who cut off all the mighty warriors and commanders and officers in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned in disgrace to his own land. When he came into the house of his god, some of his own sons struck him down there with the sword.^{(P) 22} So the Lord saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of King Sennacherib of Assyria and from the hand of all his enemies; he gave them rest^[c] on every side. ²³ Many brought gifts to the Lord in Jerusalem and precious things to King Hezekiah of Judah, so that he was exalted in the sight of all nations from that time onward.^(Q)