Old/New Testament
Chapter 19
Hezekiah and Isaiah. 1 When King Hezekiah heard this, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and went into the temple of the Lord.
2 He sent Eliakim, the major-domo, Shebna, the scribe, and all of the elders of the priests, all wearing sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz. 3 They said to him, “This is what Hezekiah says: Today is a day of trouble and rebuke and disgrace, as when children come to term but there is not enough strength to deliver them. 4 Perhaps the Lord, your God, will hear the words of the commander whom the king of Assyria, his master, has sent to taunt the living God. Perhaps he will rebuke him for the words which the Lord, your God, has heard. Therefore, raise up a prayer for the survivors who still remain.”
5 When King Hezekiah’s servants came to Isaiah, 6 Isaiah said to them, “This is what you are to tell your master: Thus says the Lord: Do not let the words you have heard, the words by which the king of Assyria blasphemed me, do not let them frighten you. 7 Behold, I will send a spirit into him so that when he hears a certain rumor, he will return to his own land. I will have him cut down by the sword in his own land.”
8 When the commander returned, he heard that the king of Assyria had withdrawn from Lachish and he found him in Libnah. 9 He had heard a report concerning Tirhakah, the king of Ethiopia, saying, “Behold, he has come to fight against you.”
So he once again sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying, 10 “Say this to Hezekiah, the king of Judah: ‘Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you when he tells you that Jerusalem will be delivered out of the hands of the king of Assyria. 11 You have heard what the king of Assyria has done to every land, totally destroying them. Will you then be delivered? 12 Did the gods of the nations that were destroyed by my ancestors deliver them, the gods of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the Edomites who were in Telassar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath? The king of Arpad? The king of the city of Shepharvaim? Of Hena? Of Ivvah?’ ”
14 Hezekiah took the letter from the hand of the messenger and he read it. He then went to the temple of the Lord and he spread it out before the Lord.
15 Hezekiah prayed to the Lord, saying, “O Lord, God of Israel, who dwells between the cherubim, you alone are the God of all of the nations on the earth. You made the heavens and the earth. 16 Bend your ear, O Lord, and hear. Open your eyes, O Lord, and see. Hear the words that Sennacherib has sent to taunt the living God. 17 It is true, O Lord, that the kings of Assyria have destroyed the nations and their lands. 18 They have cast their gods into the flames, for they were not really gods. They were only the work of human hands, made from wood and stone. 19 Now, O Lord, our God, deliver us from out of his hands so that all of the kingdoms upon the earth might know that you, O Lord, are the only God.”
20 Punishment of Sennacherib. Isaiah, the son of Amoz, then sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: ‘I have heard your prayer to me concerning Sennacherib, the king of Assyria.’
21 [a]“This is the word that the Lord has spoken about him:
“The virgin daughter of Zion
despises you and laughs at you.
The daughter of Jerusalem
tosses her head at you.
22 Whom have you taunted and blasphemed?
Against whom have you raised your voice
and lifted your eyes in pride?
Against the Holy One of Israel.
23 You have taunted the Lord through your messengers by saying,
‘I have come up to the heights of the mountains
with many chariots, to the peaks of Lebanon.
I have cut down tall cedars,
choice fir trees.
I have entered its most remote stand,
its finest forests.
24 I have dug wells in foreign lands and drunk the water.
I have dried up the streams of Egypt
with the soles of my feet.’
25 “Have you not heard?
Long ago I established it,
in ancient times I planned it.
Now I have ordained that you break down
fortified cities into piles of ruins.
26 Their inhabitants, having lost their power,
have become dismayed and confounded.
They are like the grass in the field,
like a green plant,
like grass growing on the roof
that is scorched before it can grow.
27 But I know where you live,
your going out, your coming in,
and how you rage against me.
28 The face that you rage against
and your arrogance have reached my ears.
I will put a ring in your nose
and a bridle in your mouth.
I will force you to return the way by which you came.
29 “This will be a sign for you:
This year you will eat what grows by itself,
and the next year you will eat what springs from that.
But in the third year you will sow and reap,
you will plant vineyards and eat its fruit.
30 Once more a remnant of Judah that has escaped
will take root below
and bear fruit above.
31 Out of Jerusalem a remnant will come,
out of Mount Zion survivors.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.
32 “Therefore, thus says the Lord
concerning the king of Assyria:
He will not enter this city,
nor will he shoot an arrow there.
He will not come before it with a shield,
nor will he cast up a siege-work against it.
33 He will return by the way he came,
but he will not enter the city, says the Lord,
34 I will defend this city and save it, for my own sake
and that of David, my servant.”
35 That night an angel of the Lord went out and killed one hundred eighty-five thousand of the Assyrians. 36 Sennacherib, the king of Assyria withdrew, departed, and returned to Nineveh.
37 Once, when he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer cut him down by the sword. They escaped into the land of Armenia, and Esarhaddon reigned in his stead.
Chapter 20
Hezekiah’s Illness. 1 In those days Hezekiah fell ill, and his death was approaching. Isaiah, the son of Amoz, the prophet, came to him and said, “Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you are to die, you will not survive.”
2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed, saying, 3 “Please remember, O Lord, how I walked before you in fidelity and with a perfect heart. I have done what was good in your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 The word of the Lord came to Isaiah before he left the middle courtyard, saying, 5 “Return and tell Hezekiah, the leader of my people: Thus says the Lord, the God of David, your father: I have heard, I have seen your tears. I will heal you today, and the day after tomorrow you will go up to the temple of the Lord. 6 I will add fifteen years to your life. I will deliver you and this city out of the hands of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my own sake and that of David, my servant.”
7 Isaiah said, “Prepare a fig poultice.” They took it and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.
8 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “What is the sign that the Lord will heal me, and on the day after tomorrow I will go up into the temple of the Lord?” 9 Isaiah answered, “This is the sign that you will receive from the Lord that the Lord is going to do what he said: shall the shade climb up ten stairs, or go down ten stairs?”
10 Hezekiah answered, “It is too easy for the shade to go down ten stairs. No, let the shade go back up ten stairs.”
11 Isaiah the prophet cried out to the Lord, and he brought the shade back up the ten stairs that it had gone down on the stairway of Ahaz.
12 At that time Merodach-baladan, the son of Baladan, the king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah for he had heard that Hezekiah was ill. 13 Hezekiah listened to them and showed them his entire treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, and the precious ointments as well as the armory in the treasury. There was nothing in his palace or his dominion that Hezekiah failed to show them.
14 Isaiah the prophet came to Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say to you? Where did they come from?” Hezekiah answered, “They came from a distant land, from Babylon.” 15 He said, “What have they seen in your palace?” Hezekiah answered, “They have seen everything in my palace; they did not miss any of my treasures.”
16 Isaiah the prophet said to Hezekiah, “Listen to the word of the Lord: 17 Behold, the days are coming when everything in your palace, everything that your ancestors collected up to the present, will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, nothing, says the Lord. 18 Some of your sons who come forth from you, whom you begot, will be taken away. They will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
19 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good,” for he thought, “Will there not be peace and security in my days?”
20 Now the rest of the deeds of Hezekiah, his achievements, and how he built a pool and a conduit[b] that brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
21 Hezekiah slept with his fathers, and Manasseh, his son, reigned in his stead.
Chapter 21
Reign of Manasseh. 1 Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah.
2 He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, practicing the abominations of the nations whom the Lord cast out before the Israelites. 3 He rebuilt the high places that Hezekiah, his father, had destroyed. He raised up altars to Baal, and he made an Asherah, just as Ahab, the king of Israel, had done. He also worshiped the hosts of heaven[c] and served them. 4 He built altars in the temple of the Lord of which the Lord had stated, “I will place my name in Jerusalem.” 5 He built altars for the hosts of heaven in the two courts of the temple of the Lord. 6 He burned his son in flames, practiced witchcraft, used divination, and cooperated with mediums and wizards. He did horrible things in the sight of the Lord, provoking the Lord to anger. 7 He set up a carved image of the Asherah in the temple about which the Lord had said to David and to Solomon, his son, “In this temple and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen from out of the tribes of Israel, I will place my name forever, 8 nor will I make the feet of Israel wander from the land that I have given to their fathers if only they will be careful to do everything that I have commanded them, everything according to the law that Moses, my servant, gave them.”
9 But they would not listen, and Manasseh enticed them to do more evil than the nations that the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites had done.
10 The Lord therefore spoke through his servant, the prophets, saying, 11 “Manasseh, the king of Judah, has committed these abominations, doing worse things than the Amorites who preceded him, causing Judah to sin with his idols. 12 Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Behold, I am bringing a terrible disaster upon Jerusalem and Judah that is so bad that the ears of those who hear about it will tingle. 13 [d]I will stretch out over Jerusalem the measuring line that I used against Samaria and the plumb line I used against the house of Ahab. 14 I will wipe out Jerusalem as one wipes out a dish, wiping it out and turning it over. I will abandon the remnant of my inheritance, and I will deliver them into the hands of their enemies. They will be plunder and booty to all of their enemies 15 for they have done what is evil in my sight, provoking me to anger from the day that their fathers came forth from Egypt even up to the present day.”
16 Manasseh had shed so much blood that it covered Jerusalem from one end to the other. He caused Judah to sin, doing what was evil in the sight of the Lord.
17 As for the other deeds of Manasseh, what he did, and the sins that he committed, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
18 Manasseh slept with his fathers, and he was buried in his palace gardens, the Garden of Uzza.
Reign of Amon. Amon, his son, then reigned in his stead. 19 Amon was twenty-two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Meshullemeth. She was the daughter of Haruz from Jotbah.
20 He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, as his father Manasseh had done. 21 He walked in all of the ways of his father. He served the idols that his father had served, and he worshiped them. 22 He abandoned the Lord, the God of his fathers, and he did not walk in the ways of the Lord.
23 Amon’s servants plotted against him, and they killed him in his own palace. 24 The people of the land then plotted against all of those who killed King Ahab, and the people of the land made Josiah, his son, king in his stead.
25 As for the other deeds of Amon, what he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
26 He was buried in his own grave in the Garden of Uzza, and his son Josiah reigned in his stead.
The Savior of the World and the New Worship
Chapter 4
Journeying to Galilee through Samaria.[a] 1 Now when the Lord learned that the Pharisees had been informed that he had more disciples and was baptizing more people than John 2 (although actually it was not Jesus himself but his disciples who were baptizing), 3 he left Judea and set forth for Galilee.
Jesus and the Samaritan Woman.[b] 4 He had to pass through Samaria.[c] 5 So he came to a Samaritan town called Sychar,[d] near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired from his journey, sat down at the well. It was about noon.[e]
7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Give me some water to drink.” 8 His disciples had gone into the town to purchase food. 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew. How can you ask me, a Samaritan woman,[f] for some water to drink?” (Jews do not share anything in common with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus replied,
“If you recognized the gift of God
and who it is that is asking you for something to drink,
you would have asked him
and he would have given you living water.”
11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you do not have a bucket, and the well is deep.[g] Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob who gave us this well and drank from it himself along with his sons and his cattle?” 13 Jesus said to her,
“Everyone who drinks this water
will be thirsty again.
14 But whoever drinks the water that I will give him
will never be thirsty.
The water that I will give him
will become a spring of water within him
welling up to eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I may not be thirsty and have to come here to draw water.”
16 Jesus told her, “Go, call your husband and come back here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the man you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true.”
19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain,[h] but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 Jesus told her,
“Believe me, woman,
the hour is coming
when you will worship the Father
neither on this mountain
nor in Jerusalem.
22 You worship what you do not know;
we worship what we do know,
for salvation is from the Jews.
23 “But the hour is coming,
indeed it is already here,
when the true worshipers
will worship the Father
in Spirit and truth.[i]
Indeed it is worshipers like these
that the Father seeks.
24 God is Spirit,
and those who worship him
must worship in Spirit and truth.”
25 The woman said to him, “I know that the Messiah is coming, the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will reveal everything to us.”[j] 26 Jesus said to her, “I am he,[k] the one who is speaking to you.”
27 At this point, his disciples returned, and they were astonished to find him speaking with a woman, but no one asked, “What do you want from her?” or “Why are you conversing with her?” 28 The woman left behind her water jar and went off to the town, where she said to the people, 29 “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done. Could this be the Christ?” 30 And so they departed from the town and made their way to see him.
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