Isaiah 36–39

CHAPTER 36

Sennacherib Invades Judah

^1aNow it happened in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, that ^bSennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and seized them.

²And the ^aking of Assyria sent Rabshakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a heavy military force. And he stood by the ^bconduit of the upper pool on the highway of the ¹fuller’s field.

³Then ^aEliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and ^bShebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came out to him.

⁴Then ^aRabshakeh said to them, “Say now to Hezekiah, ‘Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, “What is this trust that you have?

⁵“I say, ‘Your counsel and might for the war are only ¹empty words.’ Now in whom do you trust, that ^ayou have rebelled against me?

⁶“Behold, you trust in the ^astaff of this crushed reed, even on Egypt, on which if a man leans, it will go into his ¹hand and pierce it. ^bSo is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him.

⁷“But if you say to me, ‘We trust in Yahweh our God,’ is it not He ^awhose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar’?

⁸“So now, ¹come 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 give riders for them.

⁹“How then can you ¹turn away one ²official of the least of my master’s servants and ^atrust in Egypt for chariots and for horsemen?

¹⁰“So now, have I come up ¹without the approval of Yahweh against this land to make it a ruin? ^aYahweh said to me, ‘Go up against this land and make it a ruin.’”

¹¹Then Eliakim and Shebna and Joah said to Rabshakeh, “Speak now to your servants in ^aAramaic, for we ¹understand it; and do not speak with us in ^2bJudean in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.”

¹²But Rabshakeh said, “Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, doomed to eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?”

¹³Then Rabshakeh stood and ^acried with a loud voice in Judean and said, “Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria.

¹⁴“Thus says the king, ‘Do not let Hezekiah ^adeceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you;

¹⁵and do not let Hezekiah make you ^atrust in Yahweh, saying, “Yahweh will surely deliver us, this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.”

¹⁶‘Do not listen to Hezekiah,’ for thus says the king of Assyria, ‘¹Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat each of his ^avine and each of his fig tree, and drink each of the ^bwaters of his own cistern,

¹⁷until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

¹⁸‘Beware lest Hezekiah mislead you, saying, “^aYahweh will deliver us.” Has any one of the gods of the nations delivered his land from the hand of the king of Assyria?

¹⁹‘Where are the gods of ^aHamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of ^bSepharvaim? And when have they ^cdelivered Samaria from my hand?

²⁰‘Who among all the ^agods of these lands ¹have delivered their land from my hand, that ^bYahweh would deliver Jerusalem from my hand?’”

²¹But they were silent and ^aanswered him not a word, for the king’s commandment was, “Do not answer him.”

²²Then ^aEliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and ^bShebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of Rabshakeh.

CHAPTER 37

Hezekiah Seeks Isaiah’s Help

¹Now it happened that ^awhen King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and entered the house of Yahweh.

²Then he sent ^aEliakim, who was over the household with ^bShebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to ^cIsaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

³And they said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah, ‘This day is a ^aday of distress, reproof, and rejection; for ^bchildren have come to the point of breaking forth, but there is no strength to give birth.

⁴‘Perhaps Yahweh your God will hear the words of Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to ^1areproach the living God, and will reprove the words which Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore, lift up a prayer for ^bthe remnant that is left.’”

⁵So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

⁶And Isaiah said to them, “Thus you shall say to your master, ‘Thus says Yahweh, “^aDo not be afraid because of the words that you have heard, with which the young men of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me.

⁷“Behold, I will put a spirit in him so that he will ^ahear a report and ^breturn to his own land. And I will make him fall by the sword in his own land.” ’ ”

⁸Then Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against ^aLibnah, for he had heard that ¹the king had set out from ^bLachish.

⁹Then he ^aheard them say concerning Tirhakah king of ^1bEthiopia, “He has come out to fight against you.” So he heard it and sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

¹⁰“Thus you shall say to Hezekiah king of ¹Judah, ‘^aDo not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, saying, “Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.”

¹¹‘^aBehold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands, devoting them to destruction. So will you be delivered?

¹²‘Did the gods of ¹those nations, which my fathers have brought to ruin, deliver them, even ^aGozan and ^bHaran and Rezeph and the sons of Eden who were in Telassar?

¹³‘Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, and of Hena and Ivvah?’”

Hezekiah’s Prayer in the Temple

¹⁴Then Hezekiah took the ¹letter from the hand of the messengers and read it, and he went up to the house of Yahweh and ²spread it out before Yahweh.

¹⁵And Hezekiah prayed to Yahweh saying,

¹⁶“O Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, ^awho is enthroned above the cherubim, You are the ^bGod, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. ^cYou have made heaven and earth.

¹⁷“^aIncline Your ear, O Yahweh, and hear; open Your eyes, O Yahweh, and see; and ^blisten to all the words of Sennacherib, who sent them to ^1creproach the living God.

¹⁸“Truly, O Yahweh, the ^akings of Assyria have laid waste to all the countries and their lands

¹⁹and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods but the ^awork of men’s hands, wood and stone. So they have ^bdestroyed them.

²⁰“But now, O Yahweh our God, ^asave us from his hand that ^ball the kingdoms of the earth may know that ¹You are Yahweh, You alone.”

Yahweh’s Answer Through Isaiah

²¹Then ^aIsaiah the son of Amoz sent word to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, ‘Because you have prayed to Me about Sennacherib king of Assyria,

²²this is the word that Yahweh has spoken against him:

“She has despised you and mocked you,

The ^avirgin ^bdaughter of Zion;

She has ^cshaken her head behind you,

The daughter of Jerusalem!

²³“Whom have you ^1areproached and blasphemed?

And against whom have you heightened your voice

And ²haughtily ^blifted up your eyes?

Against the ^cHoly One of Israel!

²⁴“Through your servants you have ¹reproached the Lord,

And you have said, ‘With my many chariots I came up to the heights of the mountains,

To the remotest parts of ^aLebanon;

And I cut down its tall ^bcedars and its choice cypresses.

And I will go to its ²highest peak, its thickest ^cforest.

²⁵‘I dug wells and drank waters,

And ^awith the sole of my feet I dried up

All the rivers of ¹Egypt.’

²⁶“^aHave you not heard?

Long ago I did it;

From days of old I ^bformed it.

Now ^cI have brought it to pass,

That ^dyou should devastate fortified cities into ^eruinous heaps.

²⁷“So their inhabitants were short of power;

They were dismayed and put to shame;

They were as the ^aplant of the field and as the green herb,

As ^bgrass on the rooftops ¹is scorched before it rises.

²⁸“But I ^aknow your sitting down

And your going out and your coming in

And your raging against Me.

²⁹“Because of your raging against Me

And because your ^1apresumptuousness has come up to My ears,

Therefore I will put My ^bhook in your nose

And My ^cbridle in your lips,

And I will turn you back ^dby the way which you came.

³⁰“Then this shall be the sign for you: ¹you will eat this year what ^agrows of its own accord, in the second year what springs from the same, and in the third year sow, reap, plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.

³¹“And the ^asurviving ^bremnant of the house of Judah will again ^ctake root downward and bear fruit upward.

³²“For out of Jerusalem will go forth a ^aremnant and out of Mount Zion ¹survivors. The ^bzeal of Yahweh of hosts will do this.” ’

³³“Therefore, thus says Yahweh concerning the king of Assyria, ‘He will not come to this city or shoot an arrow there; and he will not come before it with a shield or throw up a ^asiege ramp against it.

³⁴‘^aBy the way that he came, by the same he will return, and he will not come to this city,’ declares Yahweh.

³⁵‘Indeed I will ^adefend this city to save it ^bfor My own sake and for My servant David’s sake.’”

The Defeat and Death of Sennacherib

³⁶Then the ^aangel of Yahweh went out and struck 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And ¹the men arose early in the morning, and behold, all of them were dead bodies.

³⁷So Sennacherib king of Assyria set out and ¹returned home and lived at ^aNineveh.

³⁸Now it happened that as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons struck him down with the sword; and they escaped into the land of ^aArarat. And ^bEsarhaddon his son became king in his place.

CHAPTER 38

Hezekiah’s Illness and Recovery

^1aIn those days Hezekiah became ill to the point of death. And ^bIsaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, “Thus says Yahweh, ‘^cSet your house in order, for you shall die and not live.’”

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

³and said, “^aRemember now, O Yahweh, I beseech You, how I have ^bwalked before You in truth…