2 Kings 19:1-37
19 And it came about that as soon as King Hez·e·kiʹah+ heard, he immediately ripped his garments apart+ and covered himself with sackcloth+ and came into the house of Jehovah.+
2 Further, he sent E·liʹa·kim,+ who was over the household, and Shebʹnah+ the secretary and the older men of the priests covered with sackcloth to Isaiah*+ the prophet the son of Aʹmoz.+
3 And they proceeded to say to him: “This is what Hez·e·kiʹah has said, ‘This day is a day of distress+ and of rebuke+ and of scornful insolence;+ for the sons have come as far as the womb’s mouth,+ and there is no power to give birth.+
4 Perhaps Jehovah your God will hear+ all the words of Rabʹsha·keh, whom the king of As·syrʹi·a his lord sent to taunt+ the living God, and he will actually call him to account for the words that Jehovah your God has heard.+ And you must lift up prayer+ in behalf of the remnant+ that are to be found.’”
5 So the servants of King Hez·e·kiʹah came in to Isaiah.+
6 Then Isaiah said to them: “This is what YOU should say to YOUR lord, ‘This is what Jehovah has said:+ “Do not be afraid+ because of the words that you have heard with which the attendants+ of the king of As·syrʹi·a spoke abusively of me.
7 Here I am putting a spirit+ in him, and he must hear a report+ and return to his own land; and I shall certainly cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.”’”+
8 After that Rabʹsha·keh+ returned and found the king of As·syrʹi·a fighting against Libʹnah;+ for he had heard that he had pulled away from Laʹchish.+
9 He heard it said respecting Tir·haʹkah the king of E·thi·oʹpi·a:* “Here he has come out to fight against you.” Therefore he sent messengers+ again to Hez·e·kiʹah, saying:
10 “This is what YOU men should say to Hez·e·kiʹah the king of Judah, ‘Do not let your God in whom you are trusting deceive you,+ saying: “Jerusalem+ will not be given into the hand of the king of As·syrʹi·a.”+
11 Look! You yourself have heard what the kings of As·syrʹi·a did to all the lands by devoting them to destruction;+ and will you yourself be delivered?+
12 Have the gods+ of the nations that my forefathers brought to ruin delivered them, even Goʹzan+ and Haʹran+ and Reʹzeph and the sons of Eʹden+ that were in Tel-asʹsar?+
13 Where is he—the king of Haʹmath+ and the king of Arʹpad+ and the king of the cities of Seph·ar·vaʹim, Heʹna and Ivʹvah?’”+
14 Then Hez·e·kiʹah took the letters out of the hand of the messengers and read them,+ after which Hez·e·kiʹah went up to the house of Jehovah and spread it out before Jehovah.+
15 And Hez·e·kiʹah began to pray+ before Jehovah and say: “O Jehovah the God of Israel,+ sitting upon the cherubs,+ you alone are the [true] God of all the kingdoms+ of the earth.+ You yourself have made the heavens+ and the earth.+
16 Incline your ear, O Jehovah, and hear.+ Open your eyes,+ O Jehovah, and see, and hear the words of Sen·nachʹer·ib that he has sent to taunt+ the living God.*
17 It is a fact, O Jehovah, the kings of As·syrʹi·a have devastated the nations and their land.+
18 And they have consigned their gods to the fire, because they were no gods,*+ but the workmanship of man’s hands,+ wood and stone; so that they destroyed them.
19 And now, O Jehovah our God,+ save us,+ please, out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Jehovah, are God alone.”+
20 And Isaiah the son of Aʹmoz proceeded to send to Hez·e·kiʹah, saying: “This is what Jehovah the God of Israel has said,+ ‘The prayer+ that you have made to me concerning Sen·nachʹer·ib the king of As·syrʹi·a I have heard.+
21 This is the word that Jehovah has spoken against him:
“The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you,+ she has held you in derision.+Behind you the daughter of Jerusalem+ has wagged her head.+
22 Whom have you taunted+ and spoken of abusively?+And against whom have you lifted up your voice+And do you raise your eyes on high?+It is against the Holy One of Israel!+
23 By means of your messengers+ you have taunted Jehovah* and you say,+‘With the multitude* of my war chariots I myself+—I shall certainly ascend the height of mountainous regions,+The remotest parts of Lebʹa·non;+And I shall cut down its lofty cedars,+ its choice juniper trees.+And I will enter its final lodging place, the forest of its orchard.+
24 I myself shall certainly dig and drink strange waters,And I shall dry up with the soles of my feet all the Nile canals of Egypt.’+
25 Have you not heard?+ From remote times it is what I will do.+From bygone days I have even formed it.+Now I will bring it in.+And you will serve to make fortified cities desolate as piles of ruins.+
26 And their inhabitants will be feeble-handed;+They will simply be terrified and will be ashamed.+They must become as vegetation of the field and green tender grass,+Grass of the roofs,+ when there is a scorching before the east wind.+
27 And your sitting quiet and your going out+ and your coming in I well know,+And your exciting yourself against me,+
28 Because your exciting yourself against me+ and your roaring have come up into my ears.+And I shall certainly put my hook in your nose and my bridle between your lips,+And I shall indeed lead you back by the way by which you have come.”+
29 “‘And this will be the sign for you:+ There will be an eating* this year of the growth from spilled kernels,+ and in the second year grain that shoots up of itself; but in the third year sow seed,+ you people, and reap and plant vineyards and eat their fruitage.+
30 And those who escape of the house of Judah, those who are left,+ will certainly take root downward and produce fruitage upward.+
31 For out of Jerusalem a remnant will go forth,+ and those who escape from Mount Zion.+ The very zeal+ of Jehovah of armies* will do this.
32 “‘That is why this is what Jehovah has said concerning the king of As·syrʹi·a:+ “He will not come into this city+ nor will he shoot an arrow+ there nor confront it with a shield nor cast up a siege rampart+ against it.
33 By the way by which he proceeded to come, he will return, and into this city he will not come, is the utterance of Jehovah.+
34 And I shall certainly defend+ this city to save it for my own+ sake and for the sake of David my servant.”’”+
35 And it came about on that night that the angel of Jehovah proceeded to go out and strike down a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp+ of the As·syrʹi·ans.+ When people rose up early in the morning, why, there all of them were dead carcasses.+
36 Therefore Sen·nachʹer·ib+ the king of As·syrʹi·a pulled away and went and returned,+ and he took up dwelling in Ninʹe·veh.+
37 And it came about that as he was bowing down at the house of Nisʹroch+ his god,*+ A·dramʹme·lech and Shar·eʹzer, his sons,* themselves struck him down with the sword,+ and they themselves escaped to the land of Arʹa·rat.*+ And Eʹsar-hadʹdon+ his son began to reign in place of him.
Footnotes
^ Meaning “Salvation of Jehovah.” Heb., Yesha·ʽeyaʹhu; LXX, “Esaias”; Vg, “Isaias.” The first occurrence of this name.
^ “Ethiopia,” LXXVg; Heb., Kush.
^ “Living God.” Heb., ʼElo·himʹ, pl., followed by the sing. adjective chai, “living”; as in vs 4.
^ Or, “not God.” Heb., loʼ ʼelo·himʹ; LXXVg, “no gods.”
^ One of 134 scribal changes from YHWH to ʼAdho·naiʹ. See App 1B.
^ “There will be an eating.” In Heb. this is a verb in the infinitive absolute, indefinite as to time and impersonal.
^ “Jehovah of armies,” MmarginLXXSyVg, many Heb. mss and Isa 37:32. A qere but not kethib (read but not written) where the vowel points for the word “armies” are found without consonants in M.
^ “His god.” Heb., ʼelo·havʹ, pl. of ʼelohʹah, applied to the false god Nisroch to denote excellence.
^ “His sons,” MmarginLXXSyVg, many Heb. mss and Isa 37:38. A qere but not kethib (read but not written). See vs 31 ftn.
^ “Ararat,” MLXXSy; Vg, “the Armenians.”
