2 Kings 19

Isaiah Reassures Hezekiah

1 ^aAs soon as King Hezekiah heard it, ^bhe tore his clothes and ^ccovered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the Lord. 2And he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the secretary, and the senior priests, ^dcovered with sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz. 3They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah, This day is a day of distress, of rebuke, and of disgrace; children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth. 4 ^eIt may be that the Lord your God heard all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent ^fto mock the living God, and will rebuke the words that the Lord your God has heard; therefore lift up your prayer for ^gthe remnant that is left.” 5When the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah, 6Isaiah said to them, “Say to your master, ‘Thus says the Lord: Do not be afraid because of the words that you have heard, with which ^hthe servants of the king of Assyria have ⁱreviled me. 7Behold, I will put a spirit in him, so that ^jhe shall hear a rumor and return to his own land, and I will make him ^kfall by the sword in his own land.’”

Sennacherib Defies the Lord

8The Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria fighting against ^lLibnah, for he heard that the king had left ^mLachish. 9 ⁿNow the king heard concerning Tirhakah king of Cush, “Behold, he has set out to fight against you.” So he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying, 10“Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah king of Judah: ‘Do not let your God ^oin whom you trust deceive you by promising that ^pJerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. 11Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, devoting them to destruction. And shall you be delivered? 12 ^qHave the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my fathers destroyed, ^rGozan, ^sHaran, Rezeph, and the people of ^tEden who were in Telassar? 13 ^uWhere is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, the king of Hena, or the king of Ivvah?’”

Hezekiah’s Prayer

14Hezekiah received ^vthe letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; and Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord. 15And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said: “O Lord, the God of Israel, ^wenthroned above the cherubim, ^xyou are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. 16 ^yIncline your ear, O Lord, and hear; ^zopen your eyes, O Lord, and see; and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent ^aato mock the living God. 17Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands 18and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, ^abbut the work of men’s hands, wood and stone. Therefore they were destroyed. 19So now, O Lord our God, save us, please, from his hand, ^acthat all the kingdoms of the earth may know that ^adyou, O Lord, are God alone.”

Isaiah Prophesies Sennacherib’s Fall

20Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Your prayer to me about Sennacherib king of Assyria ^aeI have heard. 21This is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him:

“She despises you, she scorns you—
^afthe virgin daughter of Zion;
she ^agwags her head behind you—
the daughter of Jerusalem.
22 “Whom have you ^ahmocked and ^aireviled?
Against whom have you raised your voice
and lifted your eyes to the heights?
Against ^ajthe Holy One of Israel!
23 ^akBy your messengers you have mocked the Lord,
and you have said, ^al‘With my many chariots
I have gone up the heights of the mountains,
to the far recesses of ^amLebanon;
I felled its tallest cedars,
its choicest cypresses;
I entered its farthest lodging place,
its most ^anfruitful forest.
24I dug wells
and drank foreign waters,
and I dried up with the sole of my foot
all the streams ^aoof Egypt.’
25 “Have you not heard
that ^apI determined it long ago?
I planned from days of old
what ^aqnow I bring to pass,
that you should turn fortified cities
into heaps of ruins,
26while their inhabitants, shorn of strength,
are dismayed and confounded,
and have become ^arlike plants of the field
and like tender grass,
like grass on the housetops,
blighted before it is grown.
27 “But I know your sitting down
^asand your going out and coming in,
and your raging against me.
28Because you have raged against me
and your complacency has come into my ears,
I will ^atput my hook in your nose
and my bit in your mouth,
and ^auI will turn you back on the way
by which you came.
29“And this shall be ^avthe sign for you: this year eat what grows of itself, and in the second year what springs of the same. Then in the third year sow and reap and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit. 30 ^awAnd the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward. 31For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and out of Mount Zion ^axa band of survivors. ^ayThe zeal of the Lord will do this.

32“Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria: He shall not come into this city or shoot an arrow there, or come before it with a shield or ^azcast up a siege mound against it. 33 ^baBy the way that he came, by the same he shall return, and he shall not come into this city, declares the Lord. 34 ^bbFor I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake ^bcand for the sake of my servant David.”

35And that night ^bdthe angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies. 36Then Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went home and lived at ^beNineveh. 37And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, ^bfAdrammelech and Sharezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword and escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.