Chronological

37 ¶ And it came to pass when king Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the LORD.

² And he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests covered with sackcloth unto Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz.

³ And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble and of rebuke and of blasphemy, for the sons are come to the breaking of the water, and there is no strength in her who is to bring them forth.

⁴ It may be the LORD thy God will hear the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to blaspheme the living God and to reprove with the words which the LORD thy God has heard; therefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that is still left.

⁵ So the slaves of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

⁶ And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say unto your master, Thus saith the LORD, Do not be afraid of the words that thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.

⁷ Behold, that I am sending a spirit in him, and he shall hear a rumour and return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.

⁸ ¶ So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah, for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish.

⁹ And he heard say concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, He is come forth to make war with thee. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

¹⁰ Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Do not let thy God, in whom thou dost trust, deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

¹¹ Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly, and shalt thou be delivered?

¹² Have the gods of the Gentiles delivered those whom my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan and Haran and Rezeph and the sons of Eden which were in Telassar?

¹³ Where is the king of Hamath and the king of Arphad and the king of the city of Sepharvaim Hena, and Ivah?

¹⁴ And Hezekiah took the letters from the hand of the messengers and read them; and Hezekiah went up unto the house of the LORD and spread them before the LORD.

¹⁵ And Hezekiah prayed unto the LORD, saying,

¹⁶ O LORD of the hosts, God of Israel, that dwellest between the cherubim, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; thou hast made the heavens and earth.

¹⁷ Incline thine ear, O LORD, and hear; open thine eyes, O LORD, and see and hear all the words of Sennacherib, who has sent his messengers to blaspheme the living God.

¹⁸ Of a truth, 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 no 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 that thou art the LORD, even thou only.

²¹ ¶ Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent unto Hezekiah, saying, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Whereas thou hast prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria:

²² This is the word which the LORD has spoken concerning him, Has he despised thee? Has he laughed thee to scorn O virgin daughter of Zion? Has he shaken his head behind thy back O daughter of Jerusalem?

²³ Whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice and lifted up thine eyes on high? even against the Holy One of Israel.

²⁴ By the hand of thy slaves thou hast reproached the Lord, and hast said, By the multitude of my chariots I shall come up to the height of the mountains to the sides of Lebanon, and I will cut down the tall cedars thereof and the choice fir trees thereof; and I will enter into the height of his border and the forest of his Carmel.

²⁵ I have dug and drunk water; and with the sole of my feet shall I dry up all the rivers of sustenance.

²⁶ Hast thou not heard long ago how I have done it and of ancient times that I have formed it? Now I have brought it to pass, that thou should be to lay waste defenced cities into ruinous heaps.

²⁷ And their inhabitants, of little strength, dismayed and confounded shall be as the grass of the field and as the green shrub as the grass on the housetops, that before it comes to maturity it is dried up.

²⁸ I have understood thy state, thy going out and thy coming in, and thy rage against me.

²⁹ Because thy rage against me, and thy tumult, is come up into my ears, therefore I will put my hook in thy nose and my bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou didst come.

³⁰ And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such as grows of itself; and the second year that which springs of the same: and in the third year ye shall sow and shall reap and shall plant vineyards and shall eat the fruit thereof.

³¹ And the remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward:

³² For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant and from Mount Zion shall come an escape; the zeal of the LORD of the hosts shall do this.

³³ Therefore thus saith 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 cast a bank against it.

³⁴ By the way that he came, by the same shall he return and shall not come into this city, saith the LORD.

³⁵ For I will defend this city to save it for my own sake and for my slave David’s sake.

³⁶ Then the angel of the LORD went forth and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand; and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.

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

³⁸ And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Ararat and Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.

38 ¶ In those days was Hezekiah sick unto death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz came unto him and said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Set thine house in order, for thou shalt die and not live.

² Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall and prayed unto the LORD,

³ And said, Remember now, O LORD, I beseech thee, how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Hezekiah wept sore.

⁴ Then came the word of the LORD to Isaiah, saying,

⁵ Go and say to Hezekiah, Thus saith the LORD, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer; I have seen thy tears behold, I will add unto thy days fifteen years.

⁶ And I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will defend this city.

⁷ And this shall be a sign unto thee from the LORD that the LORD will do this thing that he has spoken:

⁸ Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, which is gone down in the sun dial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward. So the sun returned ten degrees, by which degrees it was gone down.

⁹ ¶ The writing of Hezekiah king of Judah, when he had been sick and was recovered of his sickness:

¹⁰ I said in the cutting off of my days; I shall go to the gates of Sheol: I am deprived of the residue of my years.

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

¹² My dwelling place has been moved and is removed from me as a shepherd’s tent; he has cut off my life like a weaver: he has cut me off with sickness: between the day and the night thou shalt consume me.

¹³ I reckoned that I had until morning. As a lion, he broke all my bones: from the morning even unto the night thou shalt make an end of me.

¹⁴ Like a crane or a swallow, so did I complain; I mourned as a dove; I raised my eyes upward, O LORD, I am suffering violence; comfort me.

¹⁵ What shall I say? He has both spoken unto me, and he himself has done it; I shall walk softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

¹⁶ O Lord, even unto all those that shall live, in these fifteen years I shall proclaim the life of my spirit in them and how thou caused me to sleep, and afterwards hast given me life.

¹⁷ Behold, for peace I had great bitterness; but it has pleased thee to deliver my life from the pit of corruption, for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.

¹⁸ For the grave shall not confess thee, nor shall death praise thee; nor shall those that go down into the pit wait for thy truth.

¹⁹ He who lives, he who lives, even he shall confess thee, as I do this day; the father to the sons shall make known thy truth.

²⁰ The LORD is ready to save me: therefore we will sing our psalms in the house of the LORD all the days of our life.

²¹ Isaiah then said, Let them take a lump of figs and lay it for a plaster upon the boil and he shall be healed.

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

39 ¶ At that time Merodachbaladan, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and presents to Hezekiah, for he had heard that he had been sick and was recovered.

² And Hezekiah rejoiced with them and showed them the house of his precious things, the silver and the gold and the spices and the precious ointments and all the house of his weapons and all that was found in his treasures; there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.

³ Then Isaiah the prophet came unto king Hezekiah and said unto him, What did these men say? and from where did they come unto thee? And Hezekiah said, They are come from a far country unto me, even from Babylon.

⁴ Then said he, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All that is in my house have they seen; there is nothing among my treasures that I have not showed them.

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

⁶ Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day shall be carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD.

⁷ And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

⁸ Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, Good is the word of the LORD which thou hast spoken. He said moreover, At least there shall be peace and truth in my days.

To the Overcomer on Neginoth, A Psalm or Song of Asaph.

¹ ¶ In Judah is God known; his name is great in Israel.

² In Salem also is his tabernacle and his dwelling place in Zion.

³ There he broke the arrows of the bow, the shield, and the sword, and the war. Selah.

⁴ Thou art more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey.

⁵ The stouthearted are spoiled; they have slept their sleep; and nothing was found in the hands of the men of might.

⁶ At thy rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the chariot and horse are cast into a dead sleep.

⁷ ¶ Thou, even thou, art to be feared, and who may stand in thy sight when once thou art angry?

⁸ From the heavens thou didst cause judgment to be heard; the earth feared and was still,

⁹ when thou didst arise unto judgment, O God, to save all the meek of the earth. Selah.

¹⁰ Surely the wrath of man shall cause praise to come unto thee; the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.

¹¹ Vow and pay unto the LORD your God; let all that be round about him bring presents unto him that ought to be feared.

¹² He shall cut off the spirit of princes; he is terrible to the kings of the earth.