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?^(A)

¹⁹ 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?^{(A) 20} Do you think that mere words are strategy and power for war? On whom do you now rely, that you have rebelled against me? ²¹ See, you are relying now 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.^{(B) 22} 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 in Jerusalem’?^{(C) 23} 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. ²⁴ 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?^{(D) 25} Moreover, is it without the Lord that I have come up against this place to destroy it? The Lord said to me, ‘Go up against this land, and destroy it.’ ”

²⁶ Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebnah, and Joah said to the Rabshakeh, “Please speak to your servants in the Aramaic language, 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.”^{(E) 27} But the Rabshakeh said to them, “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 to drink their own urine?”

²⁸ Then the Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in the language of Judah, “Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria: ²⁹ Thus says the king: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you out of my hand.^{(F) 30} Do not let Hezekiah make you rely on the Lord by saying, ‘The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’ ³¹ 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,^{(G) 32} 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, a land of olive oil and honey, that you may live and not die. Do not listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you by saying, ‘The Lord will deliver us.’^{(H) 33} Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered its land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?^{(I) 34} Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?^{(J) 35} Who among all the gods of the countries have delivered their countries out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?”

³⁶ But the people were silent and answered him not a word, for the king’s command was, “Do not answer him.” ³⁷ 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.^(K)

¹⁶ These are grumblers and malcontents; they indulge their lusts;^[a] their mouths utter bombastic nonsense, flattering people to their own advantage.^(A)

²² The people kept shouting, “The voice of a god and not of a mortal!” ²³ And immediately, because he had not given the glory to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.^(A)

³⁰ and the king said, “Is this not magnificent Babylon, which I have built as a royal capital by my mighty power and for my glorious majesty?”^(A)

¹⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because it^[a] towered high and set its top among the clouds and its heart was proud of its height,^{(F) 11} I gave it into the hand of the prince of the nations; he has dealt with it as its wickedness deserves. I have cast it out.^{(G) 12} Foreigners from the most terrible of the nations have cut it down and left it. On the mountains and in all the valleys its branches have fallen, and its boughs lie broken in all the watercourses of the land, and all the peoples of the earth went away from its shade and left it.^(H)

¹⁴ All this is in order that no trees by the waters may grow to lofty height or set their tops among the clouds and that no trees that drink water may reach up to them in height.

¹⁵ Thus says the Lord God: On the day it went down to Sheol I closed the deep over it and covered it; I restrained its rivers, and its mighty waters were checked. I clothed Lebanon in gloom for it, and all the trees of the field fainted because of it.^{(K) 16} I made the nations quake at the sound of its fall, when I cast it down to Sheol with those who go down to the Pit, and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that were well watered, were consoled in the world below.^{(L) 17} They also went down to Sheol with it, to those killed by the sword, along with its allies,^[b] those who lived in its shade among the nations.^(M)

¹⁸ Which among the trees of Eden was like you in glory and in greatness? Now you shall be brought down with the trees of Eden to the world below; you shall lie among the uncircumcised, with those who are killed by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his horde, says the Lord God.^(N)

¹¹ See, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, destroying them utterly. Shall you be delivered?^{(A) 12} Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my predecessors destroyed, Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar?^{(B) 13} Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of Laar, Sepharvaim, Hena, or Ivvah?”

Hezekiah’s Prayer

¹⁴ Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; then Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord. ¹⁵ And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord, saying:

¹² When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he^[a] will punish the arrogant boasting of the king of Assyria and his haughty pride.^{(D) 13} For he says: