The Lord Rescues Judah from the Assyrians^(A)

¹³ In Hezekiah’s fourteenth year as king, King Sennacherib of Assyria attacked all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them. ¹⁴ Then King Hezekiah of Judah sent this message to the king of Assyria at Lachish: “I have done wrong. Go away, and leave me alone. I’ll pay whatever penalty you give me.”

So the king of Assyria demanded that King Hezekiah of Judah pay 22,500 pounds of silver and 2,250 pounds of gold. ¹⁵ Hezekiah gave him all the silver that could be found in Yahweh’s temple and in the royal palace treasury. ¹⁶ At that time Hezekiah stripped the gold off the doors and doorposts of Yahweh’s temple. (Earlier Hezekiah had them covered with gold.) He gave the gold to the king of Assyria.

¹⁷ Then the king of Assyria sent his commander-in-chief, his quartermaster, and his field commander with a large army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. They came there and stood at the channel for the Upper Pool on the road to the Laundryman’s Field. ¹⁸ When they called for King Hezekiah, Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace and was the son of Hilkiah, Shebnah the scribe, and Joah, who was the royal historian and the son of Asaph, went out to the field commander.

¹⁹ The field commander said to them, “Tell Hezekiah, ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: What makes you so confident? ²⁰ You give useless advice about getting ready for war. Whom, then, do you trust for support in your rebellion against me? ²¹ Now, look! When you trust Egypt, you’re trusting a broken stick for a staff. If you lean on it, it stabs your hand and goes through it. This is what Pharaoh (the king of Egypt) is like for everyone who trusts him. ²² Suppose you tell me, “We’re trusting Yahweh our Elohim.” He’s the god whose places of worship and altars Hezekiah got rid of. He told Judah and Jerusalem, “Worship at this altar in Jerusalem.”’

²³ “Now, make a deal with my master, the king of Assyria. I’ll give you 2,000 horses if you can put riders on them. ²⁴ How can you defeat my master’s lowest-ranking officers when you trust Egypt for chariots and horses?

²⁵ “Have I come to destroy this place without Yahweh on my side? Yahweh said to me, ‘Attack this country, and destroy it.’”

²⁶ Then Eliakim (son of Hilkiah), Shebnah, and Joah said to the field commander, “Speak to us in Aramaic, since we understand it. Don’t speak to us in the Judean language as long as there are people on the wall listening.”

²⁷ But the field commander asked them, “Did my master send me to tell these things only to you and your master? Didn’t he send me to the men sitting on the wall who will have to eat their own excrement and drink their own urine with you?”

²⁸ Then the field commander stood and shouted loudly in the Judean language, “Listen to the great king, the king of Assyria. ²⁹ This is what the king says: Don’t let Hezekiah deceive you. He can’t rescue you from me. ³⁰ Don’t let Hezekiah get you to trust Yahweh by saying, ‘Yahweh will certainly rescue us, and this city will not be put under the control of the king of Assyria.’ ³¹ Don’t listen to Hezekiah, because this is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me! Come out and give yourselves up to me! Everyone will eat from his own grapevine and fig tree and drink from his own cistern. ³² Then I will come and take you away to a country like your own. It’s a country with grain and new wine, a country with bread and vineyards, a country with olive trees, olive oil, and honey. Live! Don’t die! Don’t listen to Hezekiah when he tries to mislead you by saying to you, ‘Yahweh will rescue us.’ ³³ Did any of the gods of the nations rescue their countries from the king of Assyria? ³⁴ Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Did they rescue Samaria from my control? ³⁵ Did the gods of those countries rescue them from my control? Could Yahweh then rescue Jerusalem from my control?”

³⁶ But the people were silent and didn’t say anything to him because the king commanded them not to answer him.

³⁷ Then Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace and was the son of Hilkiah, Shebna the scribe, and Joah, who was the royal historian and the son of Asaph, went to Hezekiah with their clothes torn in grief. They told him the message from the field commander.

19 When King Hezekiah heard the message, he tore his clothes in grief, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into Yahweh’s temple. ² Then he sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace, Shebna the scribe, and the leaders of the priests, clothed in sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah, son of Amoz.

³ They said to him, “This is what Hezekiah says: Today is a day filled with misery, punishment, and disgrace. We are like a woman who is about to give birth but doesn’t have the strength to do it. ⁴ Yahweh your Elohim may have heard all the words of the field commander. His master, the king of Assyria, sent him to defy Elohim Chay. Yahweh your Elohim may punish him because of the message that Yahweh your Elohim heard. Pray for the few people who are left.”

⁵ So King Hezekiah’s men went to Isaiah. ⁶ Isaiah answered them, “Say this to your master, ‘This is what Yahweh says: Don’t be afraid of the message that you heard when the Assyrian king’s assistants slandered me. ⁷ I’m going to put a spirit in him so that he will hear a rumor and return to his own country. I’ll have him assassinated in his own country.’”

⁸ The field commander returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah. He had heard that the king left Lachish. ⁹ Now, Sennacherib heard that King Tirhakah of Sudan was coming to fight him.

Sennacherib sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying, ¹⁰ “Tell King Hezekiah of Judah, ‘Don’t let the god whom you trust deceive you by saying that Jerusalem will not be put under the control of the king of Assyria. ¹¹ You heard what the kings of Assyria did to all countries, how they totally destroyed them. Will you be rescued? ¹² Did the gods of the nations which my ancestors destroyed rescue Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar? ¹³ Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, and the king of the cities of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?’”

¹⁴ Hezekiah took the letters from the messengers, read them, and went to Yahweh’s temple. He spread them out in front of Yahweh ¹⁵ and prayed to Yahweh, “Yahweh, Elohim of Israel, you are enthroned over the angels.^[a] You alone are Elohim of all the kingdoms of the world. You made heaven and earth. ¹⁶ Turn your ear toward me, Yahweh, and listen. Open your eyes, Yahweh, and see. Listen to the message that Sennacherib sent to defy Elohim Chay. ¹⁷ It is true, Yahweh, that the kings of Assyria have leveled nations.^{[b] 18} They have thrown the gods from these countries into fires because these gods aren’t real gods. They’re only wooden and stone statues made by human hands. So the Assyrians have destroyed them. ¹⁹ Now, Yahweh our Elohim, rescue us from Assyria’s control so that all the kingdoms on earth will know that you alone are Yahweh Elohim.”