Beginning

36 Now in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them.^(A)

² And the king of Assyria sent the Rabshakeh [the military official] from Lachish [the Judean fortress commanding the road from Egypt] to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem with a great army. And he stood by the canal of the Upper Pool on the highway to the Fuller’s Field.

³ Then came out to meet him Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the [royal] household, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the recording historian.

⁴ And the Rabshakeh said to them, Say to Hezekiah, Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: What reason for confidence is this in which you trust?

⁵ Do you suppose that mere words of the lips can pass for warlike counsel and strength? Now in whom do you trust and on whom do you rely, that you rebel against me?^(B)

⁶ Behold, you trust in the staff of this bruised and broken reed, Egypt, which will pierce the hand of any man who leans on it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust and rely on him.

⁷ But if you say to me, We trust in and rely on the Lord our God—is it not He Whose high places and Whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, You shall worship before this altar?^(C)

⁸ Now therefore, I pray you, make a wager with my master the king of Assyria and give him pledges, and I will give you two thousand horses—if you are able on your part to put riders on them.

⁹ How then can you repulse the attack of a single captain of the least of my master’s servants, when you put your reliance on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen?

¹⁰ Moreover, is it without the Lord that I have now come up 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, We pray you, speak to your servants in the Aramaic or Syrian language, for we understand it; and do not speak to us in the language of the Jews in the hearing of the people on the wall.

¹² But the Rabshakeh said, Has my master sent me to speak these words only to your master and to you? Has he not sent me to the men 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 cried with a loud voice in the language of the Jews: Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria!

¹⁴ Thus says the king: Let not Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you.

¹⁵ Nor let Hezekiah make you trust in and rely on the Lord, saying, The Lord will surely deliver us; this city will 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 from his own vine and every one from his own fig tree and drink every one the water of his own cistern,

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 Beware lest Hezekiah persuade and mislead you by saying, The Lord will deliver us. Has any one of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

¹⁹ Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad [in Syria]? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim [a place from which the Assyrians brought colonists to inhabit evacuated Samaria]? And have [the gods] delivered Samaria [capital of the ten northern tribes of Israel] out of my hand?

²⁰ Who among all the gods of these lands has delivered his land out of my hand, that [you should think that] the Lord can deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

²¹ But they kept still and answered him not a word, for the king’s [Hezekiah’s] command was, Do not answer him.

²² Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph, the recording historian came to Hezekiah with their clothes rent, and told him the words of the Rabshakeh [the Assyrian military official].

37 And when King Hezekiah heard it, he rent his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the Lord.^(D)

² And he sent Eliakim, who was over the [royal] household, and Shebna the secretary, and the older priests, clothed with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

³ And they said to him, Thus says Hezekiah: This day is a day of trouble and distress and of rebuke and of disgrace; for children have come to the birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth.

⁴ It may be that the Lord your God will hear the words of the Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria, his master, has sent to mock, reproach, insult, and defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which the Lord your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant [of His people] that is left.

⁵ So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

⁶ And Isaiah said to them, You shall say to your master, Thus says the Lord: Do not be afraid because of the words which you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have reviled and blasphemed Me.

⁷ Behold, I will put a spirit in him so that he will 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 fighting against Libnah [a fortified city of Judah]; for he had heard that the king had departed from Lachish.

⁹ And [Sennacherib king of Assyria] heard concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, He has come forth to make war with you. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

¹⁰ Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah king of Judah: Let not your God in Whom you trust deceive you by saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

¹¹ Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, destroying them utterly. And shall you be delivered?

¹² Have the gods of the nations delivered those whom my predecessors have destroyed, as ^[a]Gozan, Haran [of Mesopotamia], Rezeph, and the children of Eden who were in Telassar?

¹³ Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad [of northern Syria], and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, the king of Hena, or the king of Ivvah?

¹⁴ And Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it. And Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord.^(E)

¹⁵ And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord:

¹⁶ O Lord of hosts, God of Israel, Who [in symbol] are enthroned above the cherubim [of the ark in the temple], You are the God, 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 mock, reproach, insult, and defy the living God.

¹⁸ It is true, Lord, that the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations and their lands

¹⁹ And have cast the gods of those peoples 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 therefore, O Lord our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know (understand and realize) that You are the Lord, even You only.

²¹ Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Because you have prayed to Me against Sennacherib king of Assyria,^(F)

²² This is the word which the Lord has spoken concerning him: The Virgin Daughter of Zion has despised you and laughed you to scorn; the Daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head behind you.

²³ Whom have you mocked and reviled [insulted and blasphemed]? And against Whom have you raised your voice and haughtily lifted your eyes? Against the Holy One of Israel!

²⁴ By your servants you have mocked, reproached, insulted, and defied the Lord, and you have said, With my many chariots I have gone up to the height of the mountains, to the inner recesses of Lebanon. I cut down its tallest cedars and its choicest cypress trees; I came to its remotest height, its most luxuriant and dense forest;

²⁵ I dug wells and drank foreign waters, and with the sole of my feet I have dried up all the rivers [the Nile streams] of Egypt.

²⁶ [But, says the God of Israel] have you not heard that I purposed to do it long ago, that I planned it in ancient times? Now I have brought it to pass, that you [king of Assyria] should [be My instrument to] lay waste fortified cities, making them ruinous heaps.

²⁷ Therefore their inhabitants had little power, they were dismayed and confounded; they were like the grass of the field and like the green herb, like the grass on the housetops and like a field of grain blasted before it is grown or is in stalk.

²⁸ But I [the Lord] know your sitting down and your going out and your coming in and your raging against Me.

²⁹ Because your raging against Me and your arrogance and careless ease have come to My ears, therefore will I put My hook in your nose and My bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way you came.

³⁰ And [now, Hezekiah, says the Lord] this shall be the sign [of these things] to you: you shall eat this year what grows of itself, and in the second year that which springs from the same. And in the third year sow and reap, and plant vineyards and eat the fruit of them.

³¹ And the remnant that has survived of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

³² For out of Jerusalem will go forth a remnant, and a band that survives out of Mount Zion. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

³³ Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria: He shall not come into this city or shoot an arrow here or come before it with shield or cast up a siege mound against it.

³⁴ By the way that he came, by the same way he shall return, and he 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 And the ^[b]Angel of the Lord went forth, and ^[c]slew 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians; and when [the living] arose early in the morning, behold, all these were dead bodies.^(G)

³⁷ So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and returned and dwelt at Nineveh.

³⁸ And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons killed him with the sword, and they escaped into the land of Armenia or Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.

38 In those days King Hezekiah of Judah became ill and was at the point of death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him and said, Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.^(H)

² Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord

³ And said, Remember [earnestly] now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in faithfulness and in truth, with a whole heart [absolutely devoted to You], and have done what is good in Your sight. And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

⁴ Then came the word of the Lord 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; behold, I will ^[d]add to your life fifteen years.

⁶ And I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city [Jerusalem].

⁷ And this will be the sign to you from the Lord that the Lord will do this thing that He has spoken:

⁸ Behold, I will turn the shadow [denoting the time of day] on the steps or degrees, which has gone down on the steps or sundial of Ahaz, backward ten steps or degrees. And the sunlight turned back ten steps on the steps on which it had gone down.

⁹ This is the writing of Hezekiah king of Judah after he had been sick and had recovered from his sickness:

¹⁰ I said, In the noontide and tranquillity of my days I must depart; I am to pass through the gates of Sheol (the place of the dead), deprived of the remainder of my years.

¹¹ I said, I shall not see the Lord, even the Lord, in the land of the living; I shall behold man no more among the inhabitants of the world.

¹² My [fleshly] dwelling is plucked up and is removed from me like a shepherd’s tent. I have rolled up my life as a weaver [rolls up the finished web]; [the Lord] cuts me free from the loom; from day to night You bring me to an end.

¹³ I thought and quieted myself until morning. Like a lion He breaks all my bones; from day to night You bring me to an end.

¹⁴ Like a twittering swallow or a crane, so do I chirp and chatter; I moan like a dove. My eyes are weary and dim with looking upward. O Lord, I am oppressed; take my side and be my security [as of a debtor being sent to prison].

¹⁵ But what can I say? For He has both spoken to me and He Himself has done it. I must go softly [as in solemn procession] all my years and my sleep has fled because of the bitterness of my soul.

¹⁶ O Lord, by these things men live; and in all these is the life of my spirit. O give me back my health and make me live!

¹⁷ Behold, it was for my peace that I had intense bitterness; but You have loved back my life from the pit of corruption and nothingness, for You have cast all my sins behind Your back.

¹⁸ For Sheol (the place of the dead) cannot confess and reach out the hand to You, death cannot praise and rejoice in You; they who go down to the pit cannot hope for Your faithfulness [to Your promises; their probation is at an end, their destiny is sealed].

¹⁹ The living, the living—they shall thank and praise You, as I do this day; the father shall make known to the children Your faithfulness and Your truth.

²⁰ The Lord is ready to save (deliver) me; therefore we will sing my songs with [my] stringed instruments all the days of our lives in the house of the Lord.

²¹ Now Isaiah had said, Let them take a cake of figs and lay it for a plaster upon the boil, that he may recover.

²² Hezekiah also had said, What is the sign that I shall go up to the house of the Lord?

39 At that time Merodach-baladan son of Baladan king of Babylon sent [messengers with] letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he had heard that he had been sick and had recovered.^(I)

² And Hezekiah was glad and welcomed them and showed them the house of his spices and precious things—the silver, the gold, the spices, the precious ointment, all the house of his armor and his jewels, 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 came Isaiah the prophet to King Hezekiah and said to him, What did these men say? From where did they come to you? And Hezekiah said, They came to me from a far country, even from Babylon.

⁴ Then Isaiah said, What have they seen in your house? And Hezekiah answered, They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them.

⁵ Then said Isaiah to Hezekiah, Hear the word of the Lord of hosts:

⁶ Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, and that which your predecessors have stored up till this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the Lord.

⁷ And some of your own sons who are born to you shall be taken away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

⁸ Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah, The word of the Lord which you have spoken is good. And he added, For there will be peace and faithfulness [to His promises to us] in my days.

40 Comfort, comfort My people, says your God.

² Speak tenderly to the heart of Jerusalem, and cry to her that her time of service and her warfare are ended, that [her punishment is accepted and] her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received [punishment] from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.

³ A voice of one who cries: Prepare in the wilderness the way of the Lord [clear away the obstacles]; make straight and smooth in the desert a highway for our God!^(J)

⁴ Every valley shall be lifted and filled up, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the crooked and uneven shall be made straight and level, and the rough places a plain.

⁵ And the glory (majesty and splendor) of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it.^(K)

⁶ A voice says, Cry [prophesy]! And I said, What shall I cry? [The voice answered, Proclaim:] All flesh is as frail as grass, and all that makes it attractive [its kindness, its goodwill, its mercy from God, its glory and comeliness, however good] is transitory, like the flower of the field.

⁷ The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely [all] the people are like grass.

⁸ The ^[e]grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.^(L)

⁹ O you who bring good tidings to Zion, get up to the high mountain. O you who bring good tidings to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with strength, lift it up, be not afraid; say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God!^(M)

¹⁰ Behold, the Lord God will come with might, and His arm will rule for Him. Behold, His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him.^(N)

¹¹ He will feed His flock like a shepherd: He will gather the lambs in His arm, He will carry them in His bosom and will gently lead those that have their young.

¹² Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, marked off the heavens with a [nine-inch] span, enclosed the dust of the earth in a 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?^(O)

¹⁴ With whom did He take counsel, that instruction might be given Him? Who taught Him the path of justice and taught Him knowledge and showed Him the way of understanding?

¹⁵ Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are counted as small dust on the scales; behold, He takes up the isles like a very little thing.

¹⁶ And all Lebanon’s [forests] cannot supply sufficient fuel, nor all its wild beasts furnish victims enough to burn sacrifices [worthy of the Lord].

¹⁷ All the nations are as nothing before Him; they are regarded by Him as less than nothing and emptiness (waste, futility, and worthlessness).

¹⁸ To whom then will you liken God? Or with what likeness will you compare Him?^(P)

¹⁹ The graven image! A workman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts silver chains for it.

²⁰ He who is so impoverished that he has no offering or oblation or rich gift to give [to his god is constrained to make a wooden offering, an idol; so he] chooses a tree that will not rot; he seeks out a skillful craftsman to carve and set up an image that will not totter or deteriorate.

²¹ [You worshipers of idols, you are without excuse.] Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? [These things ought to convince you of God’s omnipotence and of the folly of bowing to idols.] Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?^(Q)

²² It is God Who sits above the circle (the horizon) of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; it is He Who stretches out the heavens like [gauze] curtains and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in,

²³ Who brings dignitaries to nothing, Who makes the judges and rulers of the earth as chaos (emptiness, falsity, and futility).

²⁴ Yes, these men are scarcely planted, scarcely are they sown, scarcely does their stock take root in the earth, when [the Lord] blows upon them and they wither, and the whirlwind or tempest takes them away like 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? He Who brings out their host by number and calls them all by name; through the greatness of His might and because He is strong in power, not one is missing or lacks anything.

²⁷ Why, O Jacob, do you say, and declare, O Israel, My way and my lot are hidden from the Lord, and my right is passed over without regard from my God?

²⁸ Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not faint or grow weary; there is no searching of His understanding.

²⁹ He gives power to the faint and weary, and to him who has no might He increases strength [causing it to multiply and making it to abound].^(R)

³⁰ Even youths shall faint and be weary, and [selected] young men shall feebly stumble and fall exhausted;

³¹ But those who wait for the Lord [who expect, look for, and hope in Him] shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up [close to God] as eagles [mount up to the sun]; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint or become tired.^(S)

41 Listen in silence before Me, O islands and regions bordering on the sea! And let the people gather and renew their strength [for the argument; let them offer their strongest arguments]! Let them come near, then let them speak; let us come near together for judgment [and decide the point at issue between us concerning the enemy advancing from the east].

² Who has roused up one [Cyrus] from the east, whom He calls in righteousness to His service and whom victory meets at every step? He [the Lord] subdues nations before him and makes him ruler over kings. He turns them to dust with the sword [of Cyrus], and to driven straw and chaff with his bow.^(T)

³ He [Cyrus] pursues them and passes safely and unhindered, even by a way his feet had not trod and so swiftly that his feet do not touch the ground.

⁴ Who has prepared and done this, calling forth and guiding the destinies of the generations [of the nations] from the beginning? I, the Lord—the first [existing before history began] and with the last [an ever-present, unchanging God]—I am He.

⁵ The islands and coastlands have seen and fear; the ends of the earth tremble. They draw near and come;

⁶ They help every one his neighbor and say to his brother [in his tiresome idol making], Be of good courage!

⁷ So the carpenter encourages the goldsmith, and he who smooths [the metal] with the hammer [encourages] him who smites the anvil, saying of the soldering, That is good! And he fastens it with nails so that it cannot be moved.

⁸ But you, Israel, My servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham My friend,^(U)

⁹ You whom I [the Lord] have taken from the ends of the earth and have called from the corners of it, and said to you, You are My servant—I have chosen you and not cast you off [even though you are exiled].

¹⁰ Fear not [there is nothing to fear], for I am with you; do not look around you in terror and be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen and harden you to difficulties, yes, I will help you; yes, I will hold you up and retain you with My [victorious] right hand of rightness and justice.^(V)

¹¹ Behold, all they who are enraged and inflamed against you shall be put to shame and confounded; they who strive against you shall be as nothing and shall perish.

¹² You shall seek those who contend with you but shall not find them; they who war against you shall be as nothing, as nothing at all.

¹³ For I the Lord your God hold your right hand; I am the Lord, Who says to you, Fear not; I will help you!

¹⁴ Fear not, you worm Jacob, you men of Israel! I will help you, says the Lord; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁵ Behold, I will make you to be a new, sharp, threshing instrument which has teeth; you shall thresh the mountains and beat them small, and shall make the hills like chaff.

¹⁶ You shall winnow them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the tempest or whirlwind shall scatter them. And you shall rejoice in the Lord, you shall glory in the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁷ The poor and needy are seeking water when there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. I the Lord will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.

¹⁸ I will open rivers on the bare heights, 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 wild olive; I will set the cypress in the desert, the plane [tree] and the pine [tree] together,

²⁰ That men may see and know and consider and understand together that the hand of the Lord has done this, that the Holy One of Israel has created it.

²¹ [You idols made by men’s hands, prove your divinity!] Produce your cause [set forth your case], says the Lord. Bring forth your strong proofs, says the King of Jacob.

²² Let them bring them forth and tell us what is to happen. Let them tell us the former things, what they are, that we may consider them and know the outcome of them; or declare to us the things to come.

²³ Tell us the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods; yes, do good or do evil [something or other], that we may stare in astonishment and be dismayed as we behold [the miracle] together!

²⁴ Behold, you [idols] are nothing, and your work is nothing! The worshiper who chooses you is an abomination [extremely disgusting and shamefully vile in God’s sight].^(W)

²⁵ I have raised up and impelled to action one from the north ^[f][Cyrus], and he comes; from the rising of the sun he calls upon My name [recognizing that his victories have been granted to him by Me]. And he shall tread upon rulers and deputies as upon mortar and as the potter treads clay. [He comes with the suddenness of a comet, but none of the idol oracles of the nations has anticipated it.]^(X)

²⁶ [What idol] has declared this from the beginning, that we could know? And beforetime, that we could say that he is [unquestionably] right? Yes, there is none who declares it, yes, there is none who proclaims it; yes, [for the truth is, O you dumb idols] there is none who hears you speak!

²⁷ I [the Lord] first gave to Zion the announcement, Behold, [the Jews will be restored to their own land, and the man Cyrus shall be raised up who will deliver them] behold them! And to Jerusalem I gave a herald [Isaiah] bringing the good news.^(Y)

²⁸ For I look [upon the heathen prophets and the priests of pagan practices] and there is no man among them [who could predict these events], and among these [idols] there is no counselor who, when I ask of him, can answer a word.

²⁹ Behold, these [pagan prophets and priests] are all emptiness (falseness and futility)! Their works are worthless; their molten images are empty wind (confusion and waste).