¹³ In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them.

¹⁷ And the king of Assyria sent the Tartan, the Rabsaris, and the Rabshakeh [the high officials] from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem with a great army. They went up to Jerusalem, and when they arrived, they came and stood by the canal of the Upper Pool, which is on the highway to the Fuller’s Field.^(A)

¹⁸ When they called for the king, there came out to them Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the king’s household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder.

¹⁹ The Rabshakeh told them, Say to Hezekiah, Thus says the great king of Assyria: What justifies this confidence of yours?

²⁰ You say—but they are empty words—There is counsel and strength for war. Now on whom do you rely, that you rebel against me?

²¹ Behold, you are relying on Egypt, that broken reed of a staff; if a man leans on it, it will pierce his hand. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust and rely on him.

²² But if you tell me, We trust in and rely on the Lord our God, is it not He Whose high places and altars Hezekiah has removed, saying to Judah and Jerusalem, You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem?

²³ So now, make a wager and give pledges to my lord the king of Assyria: I will deliver you 2,000 horses—if you can on your part put riders on them.

²⁴ How then can you beat back one captain among the least of my master’s servants, when your trust is put in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

²⁵ Have I come up without the Lord against this place to destroy it? The Lord said to me, Go up against this land and destroy it.

²⁶ Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah and Shebna and Joah said to the Rabshakeh, We pray you, speak to your servants in the Aramaic (Syrian) language, for we understand it; and do not speak to us in the Jews’ language in the hearing of the people on the wall.

²⁷ But the Rabshakeh said to them, Has my master sent me to your master and you only to say these things? Has he not sent me to the men who sit on the wall [whom Hezekiah has doomed to be forced] to eat their own dung and drink their own urine along with you?

²⁸ Then the Rabshakeh stood and cried with a loud voice in the Jews’ language, Hear the word of the great king of Assyria!

²⁹ Thus says the king: Let not Hezekiah deceive you. For he will not be able to deliver you out of my hand.

³⁰ Nor let Hezekiah make you trust in and rely on the Lord, saying, The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of Assyria’s king.

³¹ Hearken not to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria: Make your peace with me and come out to me, and eat every man from his own vine and fig tree and drink every man the waters of his own cistern,

³² Until I come and take you away to a land like your own, a land of grain and vintage fruit, of bread and vineyards, of olive trees and honey, that you may live and not die. Do not listen to Hezekiah when he urges you, saying, The Lord will deliver us.

³³ Has any one of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

³⁴ Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad [in Syria]? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah [in the Euphrates Valley]? Have they delivered Samaria [Israel’s capital] out of my hand?

³⁵ Who of all the gods of the countries has delivered his country out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

³⁶ But the people were silent and answered him not a word, for Hezekiah had commanded, Do not answer him.

³⁷ Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the royal household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder came to Hezekiah with their clothes rent, and told him what the Rabshakeh had said.

⁹ And this Sennacherib king of Assyria, while he himself with all his forces was before Lachish, sent his servants to Jerusalem, to Hezekiah king of Judah, and to all Judah who were at Jerusalem, saying,

¹⁰ Thus says Sennacherib king of Assyria: On what do you trust, that you remain in the strongholds in Jerusalem?

¹¹ Is not Hezekiah leading you on in order to let you die by famine and thirst, saying, The Lord our God will deliver us out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

¹² Has not the same Hezekiah taken away his high places and his altars, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem, You shall worship before one altar and burn incense upon it?

¹³ Do you not know what I and my fathers have done to all the peoples of other lands? Were the gods of the nations of those lands in any way able to deliver their lands out of my hand?

¹⁴ Who among all the gods of those nations that my fathers utterly destroyed was able to deliver his people out of my hand, that your God should be able to deliver you out of my hand?

¹⁵ So now, do not let Hezekiah deceive or mislead you in this way, and do not believe him, for no god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his people out of my hand or the hand of my fathers. How much less will your God deliver you out of my hand!

¹⁶ And his servants said still more against the Lord God and against His servant Hezekiah.

¹⁷ The Assyrian king also wrote letters insulting the Lord, the God of Israel, and speaking against Him, saying, As the gods of the nations of other lands have not delivered their people out of my hand, so shall not the God of Hezekiah deliver His people out of my hand.

¹⁸ And they shouted it loudly in the Jewish language to the people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, to frighten and terrify them, that they might take the city.

¹⁹ And they spoke of the God of Jerusalem as they spoke of the gods of the peoples of the earth, which are the work of the hands of men.