Beginning
Sennacherib Invades Judah(A)
36 Now it came to pass in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah that Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them. 2 The king of Assyria sent the Rabshakeh[a] from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a great army. And he stood by the conduit of the upper pool in the highway of the fuller’s field. 3 Then Eliakim came to him, the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder.
4 The Rabshakeh said to them:
“Say now to Hezekiah: Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: What confidence is this that you have? 5 I say, Your counsel and strength for war are only empty words. Now on whom do you rely that you rebel against me? 6 You rely on the staff of this broken reed, on Egypt, on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who rely on him. 7 But if you say to me, ‘We trust in the Lord our God,’ is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar’?
8 “Now therefore, come make a bargain with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to set riders on them. 9 How then will you turn away one captain of the least of my master’s servants and rely on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen? 10 Have I now come up without the approval of the Lord against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me, Go up against this land, and destroy it.”
11 Then Eliakim and Shebna and Joah said to the Rabshakeh, “Speak now to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it. And do not speak to us in Hebrew in the ears of the people who are on the wall.”
12 But the Rabshakeh said, “Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to speak these words? Has he not sent me to the men who sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?”
13 Then the Rabshakeh stood and cried out with a loud voice in Hebrew, and said, “Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria. 14 Thus says the king, ‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he shall not be able to deliver you; 15 nor let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord, saying, The Lord will surely deliver us. This city shall not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria.’
16 “Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria: ‘Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat every one of his vine and every one of his fig tree, and drink every one the waters of his own cistern, 17 until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of corn and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
18 “ ‘Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, The Lord will deliver us. Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? 19 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And when have they delivered Samaria out of my hand? 20 Who are they among all the gods of these lands that have delivered their land out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?’ ”
21 But they held their peace, and answered him not a word, for the king’s commandment was, “Do not answer him.”
22 Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of the Rabshakeh.
Isaiah Foretells Deliverance(B)
37 And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard it that he tore his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the Lord. 2 He sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz. 3 They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah: This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy. For children have come to birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth. 4 Perhaps the Lord your God will hear the words of the Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to reproach the living God, and will reprove the words which the Lord your God has heard. Therefore, lift up a prayer for the remnant that is left.”
5 So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah. 6 Isaiah said to them, “Thus you shall say to your master, ‘Thus says the Lord: Do not be afraid of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me. 7 Listen! I will put a spirit in him so that he shall hear a rumor, and return to his own land. And I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.’ ”
8 So the Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah. For he had heard that the king had left Lachish.
9 He heard them say concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, “He has come out to make war with you.” And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying, 10 “Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying: Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, saying, ‘Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’ 11 Certainly you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by utterly destroying them. So shall you be delivered? 12 Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, even Gozan and Harran and Rezeph and the sons of Eden who were in Tel Assar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the kings of the city of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?”
The Prayer of Hezekiah(C)
14 And 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 Hezekiah prayed to the Lord, saying, 16 “O Lord of Hosts, God of Israel, who dwells above the cherubim, You are the God, even You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth. 17 Incline Your ear, O Lord, and hear. Open Your eyes, O Lord, and see, and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to reproach the living God.
18 “Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations and their countries, 19 and have cast their gods into the fire. For they were not gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone. Therefore, they have destroyed them. 20 Now, O Lord our God, save us from his hand that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You alone, Lord, are God.”
The Fall of Sennacherib(D)
21 Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: Because you have prayed to Me about Sennacherib king of Assyria, 22 this is the word which the Lord has spoken against him:
The virgin daughter of Zion
has despised you and mocked you;
the daughter of Jerusalem
has shaken her head at you.
23 Whom have you reproached and blasphemed?
And against whom have you raised your voice,
and lifted up your eyes haughtily?
Against the Holy One of Israel!
24 Through your servants
you have reproached the Lord
and have said,
‘With my many chariots
I have come up to the heights of the mountains,
to the remotest parts of Lebanon;
and I cut down its tall cedars,
and its choice fir trees;
and I will go to its highest peak,
its thickest forest.
25 I have dug wells
and drunk water,
and with the sole of my feet
I have dried up all the rivers of Egypt.’
26 “Have you not heard?
Long ago I have done it,
from ancient times I have formed it.
Now I have brought it to pass,
that you should turn fortified cities
into ruinous heaps.
27 Therefore, their inhabitants were short of strength;
they were dismayed and humiliated;
they were as the grass of the field
and as the green herb,
as the grass on the housetops
is scorched before it is grown up.
28 “But I know your abode,
and your going out and your coming in,
and your rage against Me.
29 Because your rage against Me
and your tumult have come up into My ears,
therefore I will put My hook in your nose,
and My bridle in your lips,
and I will turn you back
on the way by which you came.
30 “This shall be a sign to you:
You shall eat this year what grows of itself,
and the second year what springs from the same,
and in the third year sow and reap
and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.
31 The surviving remnant of the house of Judah
shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.
32 For from Jerusalem shall go out a remnant,
and those who escape out of Mount Zion.
The zeal of the Lord of Hosts
shall do this.
33 “Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria:
He shall not come into this city,
nor shoot an arrow there,
nor come before it with shields,
nor build a siege ramp against it.
34 By the way that he came, by the same shall he return,
and shall not come into this city,
says the Lord.
35 For I will defend this city to save it
for My own sake and for the sake of My servant David.”
36 Then the angel of the Lord went out and struck one hundred eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When others woke up early in the morning, these were all dead bodies. 37 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and returned home and lived in Nineveh.
38 It came to pass as he was worshipping in the house of Nisrok, his god, that Adrammelek and Sharezer, his sons, struck him with the sword, and they escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.
Hezekiah’s Illness(E)
38 In those days Hezekiah was mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him and said to him, “Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die, and not live.”
2 Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord, 3 and said, “Remember now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done what is good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 Then the word of the Lord came to Isaiah, saying: 5 “Go, and say to Hezekiah, Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father: I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears. Surely I will add to your days fifteen years. 6 I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will defend this city.
7 “This shall be a sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do this thing that He has spoken: 8 I will cause the shadow on the sundial, which has gone down with the sun on the sundial of Ahaz, to go back ten steps.” So the sun’s shadow returned ten steps on the sundial by which it had gone down.
9 This is the writing of Hezekiah king of Judah after his illness and recovery:
10 I said: In the middle of my days,
I shall go to the gates of Sheol;
I am to be deprived of the rest of my years.
11 I said, I shall not see the Lord,
even the Lord, in the land of the living;
I shall see man no more
with the inhabitants of the world.
12 My dwelling is pulled up
and removed from me as a shepherd’s tent;
I rolled up my life like a weaver.
He cuts me off from the loom;
from day even to night You make an end of me.
13 I composed my soul until morning,
like a lion, so He breaks all my bones;
from day even to night You make an end of me.
14 Like a crane or a swallow, so I twitter;
I mourn as a dove;
my eyes look wistfully upward.
O Lord, I am oppressed; undertake for me.
15 What shall I say?
For He has spoken to me, and He Himself has done it.
I shall wander about all my years
in the bitterness of my soul.
16 O Lord, by these things men live,
and in all these things is the life of my spirit;
O restore me to health
and make me live!
17 Surely it was for my own peace
that I had great bitterness;
but You have kept my soul
from the pit of corruption,
for You have cast all my sins
behind Your back.
18 For Sheol cannot thank You,
death cannot praise You;
those who go down into the pit
cannot hope for Your faithfulness.
19 It is the living who give thanks to You,
as I do this day;
a father explains to his sons
about Your faithfulness.
20 The Lord shall surely save me;
therefore, we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments
all the days of our lives
in the house of the Lord.
21 For Isaiah had said, “Let them take a cake of figs and lay it on the boil, and he shall recover.”
22 Hezekiah also had said, “What is the sign that I shall go up to the house of the Lord?”
Envoys From Babylon(F)
39 At that time Marduk-Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he had heard that he had been sick and had recovered. 2 Hezekiah was glad and showed them the house of his precious things: the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious ointment, and his whole armory, and all that was found in his treasuries. There was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah did not show them.
3 Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say, and from where did they come to you?”
And Hezekiah said, “They have come to me from a far country, from Babylon.”
4 Then he said, “What have they seen in your house?”
And Hezekiah answered, “All that is in my house they have seen. There is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them.”
5 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord of Hosts. 6 The days are surely coming when all that is in your house, and that which your fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the Lord. 7 And some of your sons who descend from you, whom you shall father, shall be taken away. And they shall become officials in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
8 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord which you have spoken is good.” For he said, “For there shall be peace and truth in my days.”
Comfort for God’s People
40 Comfort, O comfort, My people,
says your God.
2 Speak kindly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that her warfare has ended,
that her iniquity has been pardoned,
that she has received of the hand of the Lord
double for all her sins.
3 The voice of him who cries out,
“Prepare the way of the Lord
in the wilderness,
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.
4 Let every valley be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low,
and let the rough ground become a plain,
and the rough places a plain;
5 then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it.”
6 The voice said, “Cry out.”
And he said, “What shall I cry out?”
All flesh is grass,
and all its loveliness is as the flower of the field.
7 The grass withers, the flower fades
because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it;
surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers, the flower fades,
but the word of our God shall stand forever.
9 O Zion, bearer of good news,
get yourself up onto a high mountain;
O Jerusalem, bearer of good news,
lift up your voice with strength,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the cities of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
10 See, the Lord God will come with a strong hand,
and His arm shall rule for Him;
see, His reward is with Him,
and His recompense before Him.
11 He shall feed His flock like a shepherd;
He shall gather the lambs with His arm,
and carry them in His bosom,
and shall gently lead those that are with young.
12 Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand,
and meted out heaven with the span,
and calculated the dust of the earth by the measure,
and weighed the mountains in scales,
and the hills in a balance?
13 Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord,
or as His counselor has taught Him?
14 With whom did He take counsel, and who instructed Him,
and taught Him in the path of justice,
and taught Him knowledge,
and showed to Him the way of understanding?
15 Certainly the nations are as a drop in a bucket,
and are counted as the small dust of the balance;
He takes up the coastlands as a very little thing.
16 Lebanon is not sufficient to burn,
nor the beasts sufficient as a burnt offering.
17 All nations before Him are as nothing,
and they are counted by Him as less than nothing
and meaningless.
18 To whom then will you liken God?
Or what likeness will you compare to Him?
19 The workman melts a graven image,
and the goldsmith spreads it over with gold,
and casts silver chains.
20 He who is too impoverished for such an offering
chooses a tree that will not rot;
he seeks for himself a skillful workman
to prepare a graven image that shall not totter.
21 Have you not known?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told to you from the beginning?
Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is He who sits upon the circle of the earth,
and the inhabitants are as grasshoppers,
who stretches out the heavens as a curtain,
and spreads them out as a tent to dwell in.
23 He brings the princes to nothing;
He makes the judges of the earth meaningless.
24 Scarcely shall they be planted;
scarcely shall they be sown;
scarcely shall their tree take root in the earth,
when He will also blow on them,
and they will wither,
and the whirlwind will take them away as stubble.
25 To whom then will you liken Me,
that I should be equal to him? says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes on high,
and see who has created these things,
who brings out their host by number;
He calls them all by name,
by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power;
not one of them is missing.
27 Why do you say, O Jacob,
and assert, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
and my justice escapes the notice of my God”?
28 Have you not known?
Have you not heard,
that the everlasting God, the Lord,
the Creator of the ends of the earth,
does not faint, nor is He weary?
His understanding is inscrutable.
29 He gives power to the faint,
and to those who have no might He increases strength.
30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary,
and the young men shall utterly fall,
31 but those who wait upon the Lord
shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings as eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,
and they shall walk and not faint.
The Lord Helps Israel
41 Keep silent before Me, O islands,
and let the peoples renew their strength.
Let them come near, then let them speak;
let us come near together to judgment.
2 Who raised up the righteous man from the east,
called him to His foot,
gave the nations before him,
and made him rule over kings?
He makes them as the dust with his sword,
and as driven stubble with his bow.
3 He pursued them, and passed safely,
by paths his feet have not traveled.
4 Who has performed and done this,
calling the generations from the beginning?
I, the Lord, am the first,
and with the last. I am He.
5 The coastlands saw it and feared,
the ends of the earth were afraid;
they drew near and came.
6 Every one helped his neighbor,
and every one said to his brother, “Be of good courage.”
7 So the carpenter encouraged the goldsmith,
and he who smooths metal with the hammer
encourages him who strikes the anvil,
saying, “It is ready for the soldering”;
and he fastened it with nails so that it should not totter.
8 But you, Israel, are My servant,
Jacob whom I have chosen,
the seed of Abraham, My friend.
9 You whom I have taken from the ends of the earth,
and called from its remotest parts,
and said to you, “You are My servant;
I have chosen you and have not rejected you.”
10 Do not fear, for I am with you;
do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you, I will help you,
yes, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.
11 Certainly all those who were incensed against you
shall be ashamed and humiliated;
they shall be as nothing,
and those who strive with you shall perish.
12 You shall seek them
and shall not find them, even those who contended with you.
Those who war against you
shall be as nothing, as a thing of nonexistence.
13 For I, the Lord your God,
will hold your right hand,
saying to you, “Do not fear;
I will help you.”
14 Do not fear, you worm Jacob,
and you men of Israel.
I will help you, says the Lord
and your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.
15 See, I will make you a new sharp threshing instrument
with double edges;
you shall thresh the mountains, and beat them small,
and shall make the hills as chaff.
16 You shall fan them, and the wind shall carry them away,
and the whirlwind shall scatter them;
and you shall rejoice in the Lord,
and shall glory in the Holy One of Israel.
17 When the poor and needy seek water,
and there is none,
and their tongues fail for thirst,
I, the Lord, will hear them,
I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.
18 I will open rivers in high places,
and fountains in the midst of the valleys;
I will make the wilderness a pool of water,
and the dry land springs of water.
19 I will plant in the wilderness
the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive tree;
I will set in the desert
the fir tree, and the pine, and the box tree together,
20 that they may see, and know,
and consider, and understand together,
that the hand of the Lord has done this,
and the Holy One of Israel has created it.
The Futility of Idols
21 Present your case, says the Lord.
Bring forth your arguments, says the King of Jacob.
22 Let them bring them forth, and show us
what shall happen;
let them show the former things, what they were,
that we may consider them
and know their outcome,
or declare to us things to come.
23 Show the things that are to come hereafter,
that we may know that you are gods;
do good, or do evil,
that we may be dismayed and see it together.
24 Indeed you are nothing,
and your work amounts to nothing;
he who chooses you is an abomination.
25 I have raised up one from the north, and he shall come;
from the rising of the sun he shall call on My name;
and he shall come on princes as on mortar,
and as the potter treads clay.
26 Who has declared from the beginning, that we may know?
And from former times, that we may say, “He is right!”?
There is no one who shows,
no one who declares,
no one who hears your words.
27 Formerly I said to Zion, “Look, here they are,”
and to Jerusalem, “I will give one who brings good news.”
28 But when I look, there is no man,
even among them, and there is no counselor
who, when I ask of them, could answer a word.
29 See, they all are vanity;
their works are nothing;
their molded images are wind and emptiness.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.