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ULT ISA Chapter 36

◄ ISA 36 ► ║ ©

36 And it happened in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib, king of Assyria went up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them. 2 Then the king of Assyria sent the chief commander from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a great army. And he stood by the conduit of the upper pool on the highway of the Field of the Fuller. 3 And Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the court, and Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went out to him.

4 And the chief commander said to them, “Please say to Hezekiah,

‘thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, What is this confidence in which you trust? 5 You said mere words of lips are counsel and strength for war. Now in whom are you trusting that you rebel against me? 6 Behold, you are trusting in the staff of this splintered reed, in Egypt, which, when a man leans on it, then it will go into his palm and pierce it. Thus is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him. 7 But if you say to me, “We are trusting in Yahweh our God,” is it not he whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, “You must worship before the face of this altar”?

8 So now, wager, please, with my lord the king of Assyria. And I will give to you 2000 horses, if you are able to set for yourselves riders on them. 9 And how could you drive back the face of one captain of the humblest servants of my lord? But you yourself have trusted in Egypt for chariots and horsemen! 10 And now, have I come up without Yahweh to this land to destroy it? Yahweh said to me, “Go up to this land and destroy it.” ’ ”

11 Then Eliakim and Shebnah and Joah said to the chief commander, “Please speak Aramaic to your servants, for we understand it. And do not speak with us Judean in the ears of the people who are on the wall.”

12 But the chief commander said, “Has my master sent me to your master and to you to speak these words? Is it not to the men who sit on the wall, eating their dung and drinking their urine with you?”

13 Then the chief commander stood and called out in 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 deceive you, for he will not be able to rescue you. 15 And do not let Hezekiah make you trust in Yahweh, saying, “Yahweh will surely rescue 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: ‘Make terms with me and come out to me. Then every man will eat of his vine and every man his fig tree, and every man will drink the water of his cistern 17 until I come and take you away to a land like your land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.’

18 Lest Hezekiah mislead you, saying, ‘Yahweh will rescue us.’ Did the gods of the peoples rescue every man of his land from the hand of the king of Assyria? 19 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And have they rescued Samaria from my hand? 20 Who among all the gods of these lands, who has rescued his land from my hand, as if Yahweh could save Jerusalem from my hand?”

21 But they were silent and did not respond to him a word, for the command of the king was, saying, “Do not answer him.”

22 Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the court, and Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph the recorder came to Hezekiah with clothes torn and reported to him the words of the chief commander.