2 Kings 18:9-25

Common English Bible

⁹ Assyria’s King Shalmaneser marched against Samaria and attacked it in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Israel’s King Hoshea, Elah’s son. ¹⁰ After three years the Assyrians captured the city. Samaria was captured in Hezekiah’s sixth year, which was Hoshea’s ninth year. ¹¹ Assyria’s king sent Israel into exile to Assyria. He settled them in Halah, in Gozan on the Habor River, and in the cities of the Medes. ¹² All this happened because they wouldn’t listen to the Lord their God. They broke his covenant—all that the Lord’s servant Moses had commanded them. They didn’t listen, and they didn’t do it.

¹³ Assyria’s King Sennacherib marched against all of Judah’s fortified cities and captured them in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah. ¹⁴ Judah’s King Hezekiah sent a message to the Assyrian king at Lachish, saying, “I admit wrongdoing. Please withdraw from me, and I’ll agree to whatever you demand from me.” Assyria’s king required Judah’s King Hezekiah to pay him three hundred kikkars of silver and thirty kikkars of gold. ¹⁵ So Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was in the Lord’s temple and in the palace treasuries. ¹⁶ At that time King Hezekiah had to strip down the doors and doorposts of the Lord’s temple, which he had covered with gold. He gave all of it to the Assyrian king.

¹⁷ Assryia’s king sent his general, his chief officer, and his field commander from Lachish, together with a large army, to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. They went up and arrived at Jerusalem. They stood at the water channel of the Upper Pool, which is on the road to the field where clothes are washed. ¹⁸ Then they called for the king. Hilkiah’s son Eliakim, who was the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary, and Asaph’s son Joah the recorder went out to them.

¹⁹ Then the field commander said to them, “Say to Hezekiah: This is what Assyria’s Great King says: Why do you feel so confident? ²⁰ Do you think that empty words are the same as good strategy and the strength to fight? Who are you trusting in that you now rebel against me? ²¹ It appears that you are trusting in a staff—Egypt—that’s nothing but a broken reed! It will stab the hand of anyone who leans on it! That’s all that Pharaoh, Egypt’s king, is to anyone who trusts in him. ²² Now suppose you say to me, ‘We trust in the Lord our God.’ Isn’t he the one whose shrines and altars Hezekiah removed, telling Judah and Jerusalem, ‘You must worship before this altar in Jerusalem’?

²³ “So now make a wager with my master, Assyria’s king. I’ll give you two thousand horses if you can supply the riders! ²⁴ How will you drive back even the least important official among my master’s servants when you are relying on Egypt for chariots and riders? ²⁵ What’s more, do you think I’ve marched against this place to destroy it without the Lord’s support? It was the Lord who told me, March against this land and destroy it!”