32 After all those acts of faithfulness, the Assyrian King Sennacherib (Heb. Sanheriv) invaded Yehudah. He besieged the fortified cities and prepared to capture them for himself. 2 When King Hizkiyah saw the Sennacherib had entered the country and clearly intended to attack Yerushalem, 3 he consulted with his officials and army leaders about blocking up the springs outside the city, and they helped him. 4 Many people gathered and blocked the springs from feeding the stream that flowed through the area, saying, “Why should the Assyrian kings come and find plenty of water?” 5 Then he strengthened his fortifications, repairing broken sections of the wall, and built towers and an outer wall. He strengthened the supporting wall on the east side of ‘The City of David’. He also manufactured many weapons and shields, 6 and he appointed army commanders and assembled them at the plaza by the city gate, and encouraged them with these words, 7 “Be strong and be courageous. Don’t be scared or discouraged because of the Assyrian king, or by his massive army, because we have someone on our side who’s more powerful than him. 8 They can only rely on human strength, but we have our god Yahweh to help us and fight our battles for us.” So the people took strength from King Hizkiyah’s encouragement.

9 Later, when Assyrian King Sennacherib with his army was surrounding Lakish city, he sent some servants to Yerushalem to Yehudah’s King Hizkiyah and all the residents, saying, 10 “I Sennacherib, the king of Assyria am asking what you’re all trusting in as you’re remaining there in Yerushalem while it’s besieged? 11 Hizkiyah tells you, ‘Our god Yahweh will rescue us from the Assyrian king,’ but he’s misleading you and you’ll all die of hunger and thirst! 12 Wasn’t it Hizkiyah who removed his hilltop shrines and his altars, and told the people of Yerushalem and all Yehudah, telling you all to only bow down at one altar and offer sacrifices on it. 13 Don’t you people know what my ancestors and I have done to the peoples from other countries? Were any of their gods able to save them from me? 14 Which one out of the gods of those nations which my ancestors destroyed shows a precedent that your god can rescue anyone from me? 15 So don’t let Hizkiyah deceive you or mislead you like this. Don’t believe him because no god of any nation or kingdom has been able to save his people from my ancestors or from me. So your god certainly won’t be able to protect you from my army.

16 Then Sennacherib’s servants said even more against the god Yahweh, and against his servant Hizkiyah, 17 plus he wrote letters insulting Yisrael’s god Yahweh and speaking against him, writing, “Just like the gods of the other nations couldn’t save their people from me, so too Hizkiyah’s god won’t be able to protect his people from my strength.” 18 Then the Assyrians shouted loud threats in Hebrew to the people of Yerushalem who were on the wall to try to frighten and terrify them so they could capture the city—19 telling them Yerushalem’s god was just another god made by people and just as useless as the gods of other countries.

20 Then King Hizkiyah and Yeshayah (son of the prophet Amots) called out to the heavens requesting God’s help, 21 and Yahweh sent a messenger who destroyed the powerful warriors, and the leaders and chiefs in the Assyrian army, and then their king had to return home in shame. When he went into the temple of his god, some of his sons ran him through with a sword.

22 So that’s how Yahweh saved Hizkiyah and Yerushalem’s inhabitants from the Assyrian King Sennacherib, and from the power of other nations, and he gave them peace on all sides. 23 Many people came to Yerushalem to bring offerings for Yahweh and valuable gifts for Yehudah’s King Hizkiyah, and after all that, he was highly respected by the other nations.

13 In the fourteenth year of King Hizkiyah’s reign, Assyrian King Sanheriv attacked all the fortified cities in Yehudah and captured them. 14 So King Hizkiyah of Yehudah sent messengers to the Assyrian king at Lakish, saying, “I apologise for my mistake. Stop attacking me and I’ll give you whatever you demand of us.” Then the Assyrian king demanded a tribute of ten tonnes of gold and ten tonnes of silver. 15 So Hizkiyah gave him all the silver out of the temple and from the palace treasuries. 16 He cut the doors off Yahweh’s temple and the pillars that he’d overlaid gold onto, and gave them to the Assyrian king.

17 However, the Assyrian king still sent his general and some of his top officials from Lakish to King Hizkiyah in Yerushalem. They arrived at Yerushalem with a large army and camped by the aquifer supplying the upper pool that was near the field where the people washed their clothes. 18 They called out to the king, and Hilkiyyah’s son Elyakim who was the palace manager, and the scribe Shebna, and Asaf’s son Yoah the secretary, went out to them.

19 Then the top Assyrian commander said to them, “Now, tell Hizkiyah that the great Assyrian king asks him who he think’s he’s trusting in. 20 He claims to be powerful enough to fight us. Who is he trusting to help you all that gives you confidence to rebel against us? 21 Listen, your king’s trusting in a broken stick to lean on which will just splinter and pierce his hand. That’s what King Far-oh of Egypt is like to everyone who puts their trust in him. 22 Ah, but he might tell me that he’s trusting in your god Yahweh to help you all. If so, I’d ask him if he isn’t the one whose hilltop shrines King Hizkiyah demolished when he told you people in Yerushalem and all Yehudah that you have to worship at the altar there?

23 “So now ask your king if he’ll make a deal with my master, the king of Assyria: He’ll give you two thousand horses, on the condition that you can supply two thousand horsemen who can ride them. 24 If you can’t do that, how could you all possibly repel even one of our army units? Haha, but of course you trust in Egypt to supply chariots and horsemen. 25 Do you think that we’ve come here to destroy this place without Yahweh’s permission? No, no, it was Yahweh himself who told us to attack and destroy you.”

26 But Elyakim and Shebna and Yoah asked the Assyrian commander, “Please speak Aramaic to your servants because we understand it. Don’t speak our language because our people on the nearby city wall will be able to understand it.”

27 “Ha ha, do you think my master sent this message just to you three and your king?” he replied. “No, don’t you think that this message is also for the hungry people sitting on the wall who’ll soon have to eat their own dung and drink their own urine along with you?”

28 Then he stood up and called out loudly in Hebrew, “Everyone listen to what the great king from Assyria says: 29 He’s warning you all not to let Hizkiyah deceive you, because he’s unable to save you all from our army. 30 And don’t let him force you all to trust in Yahweh thinking that we won’t capture your city and that Yahweh will somehow rescue you all. 31 Don’t listen to Hizkiyah because the Assyrian king is offering you all a chance to come out of the city and surrender. In exchange for saving me some trouble, you’ll be able to drink fresh water again and enjoy the fruit off your own trees out here 32 until he comes here. Then he’ll take you to another country like your own—with grain and wine, and bread and vineyards, olive oil and honey. That way you’ll live and not die of starvation. So don’t listen to Hizkiyah when he misleads you saying that Yahweh will rescue you all.” 33 Did the gods of any of the other countries rescue their people from the power of the Assyrian king? 34 Where were the gods of Hamat and Arpad? Where were the gods of Sefarvayim, Hena, and Ivvah? Were they able to save Shomron from the king’s power? 35 From all the other countries, which of their gods was able to save their people, that might give confidence that Yahweh might be able to rescue Yerushalem from the king’s power?”

36 But the people on the wall listening remained silent—they didn’t say a word because the king had already ordered them not to answer the Assyrians. 37 Then Hilkiyyah’s son Elyakim the palace manager, Shebna the scribe and Asaf’s son Yoah the secretary went back in the city to Hizkiyah, tearing their clothes as they went, and they relayed the words of the chief commander to him.

20 Then Amots’s son Yeshayah (Isaiah) sent this message to Hizkiyah: Yisrael’s God Yahweh says, “Because you prayed to me concerning the Assyrian King Sanheriv, I have listened. 21 This is what Yahweh says about that king:

Tsiyyon’s daughter despises you and derides you.

≈Yerushalem’s daughter shakes her head at you.

22 Who did you think you were teasing and insulting?

Who did you think you were shouting at?

Did you raise your eyebrows against Yisrael’s holy one?

23 You sent messengers that mocked me.

You said that you went over the highest mountains with your many chariots.

≈That you went to the highest parts of Lebanon and harvested its tallest cedars—its best trees.

That you’ve been to the end of the inhabited world with its densest forest.

24 You said that you’ve dug wells far away and drunk their water,

yet with your own feet you dried up all of Egypt’s rivers.

25 Haven’t you heard that I made plans long ago—

that what I previously planned, I’m now making it happen?

Fortified cities will collapse into heaps of rubble.

26 Their inhabitants will be powerless—dismayed and ashamed.

They’ll be as vulnerable as plants in the countryside,

or like the grass that grows on the rooftops—

they wilt and wither before they can grow tall. DOUBLE-CHECK

27 Yes, I know when you sit down and when you go out.

When you come in and rage against me.

28 Because you’ve raged against me and your arrogance has come to my ears,

I’ll put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth,

and I’ll lead you back on the road that you came here on.

29 “So this will be a sign to you Hizkiyah:

This year you’ll eat what grew by itself,

and next year whatever seeded by itself,

but in the third year you’ll sow crops and plant vineyards, and eat what you harvest.

30 Yehudah’s surviving descendants will send their roots downwards and will produce fruit above,

31 because a remnant will survive Yerushalem’s siege,

≈and Mt. Tsiyyon will have survivors

because Yahweh’s enthusiasm will make sure it happens.

32 “So this is what Yahweh says to the Assyrian king:

He won’t enter this city or shoot an arrow into it.

He won’t push a large shield towards it or make a ramp up into it.

33 He’ll return on the same road that he arrived on,

and Yahweh declares that he won’t enter this city,

34 because Yahweh will defend this city

to save it for his own sake

and for the sake of his servant David.”

35 That very night, Yahweh sent an angel out to kill 185,000 warriors, so when the army got up early the next morning there were dead bodies all over the place. 36 So the Assyrian King Sanheriv pulled out and went back to live in Nineveh. 37 While he was bowing in the temple of his god Nisrok, Adrammelek and Sharezer ran him through with a sword before escaping to the Ararat region, and so his son Esarhaddon replaced him as king.