2 Reis 18

¹ Now it came to pass in the third year of Hoshea the son of Elah, king of Israel, that Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign.

² He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah.

³ And he did what was right in the eyes of Jehovah, according to all that his father David had done.

⁴ He removed the high places and broke the sacred pillars, chopped down the groves and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made; for until those days the children of Israel burned incense to it, and called it Nehushtan.

⁵ He trusted in Jehovah the God of Israel, so that after him was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, nor who were before him.

⁶ For he clung to Jehovah; he did not turn aside from following after Him, but kept His commandments, which Jehovah had commanded Moses.

⁷ Jehovah was with him; he prospered wherever he went. And he rebelled against the king of Assyria and did not serve him.

⁸ He struck the Philistines, as far as Gaza and its territory, from watchtower to fortified city.

⁹ And it came to pass in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea the son of Elah, king of Israel, that Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it.

¹⁰ And at the end of three years they took it. In the sixth year of Hezekiah, that is, the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was captured.

¹¹ And the king of Assyria carried Israel away captive to Assyria, and led them to Halah and the Habor, the River of Gozan, and to the cities of the Medes,

¹² because they had not obeyed the voice of Jehovah their God, but transgressed His covenant and all that Moses the servant of Jehovah had commanded; they had neither heeded nor done them.

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

¹⁴ And Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, I have done wrong; turn away from me; whatever you impose upon me I will endure. And the king of Assyria assessed Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold.

¹⁵ And Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was found in the house of Jehovah and in the treasuries of the king’s house.

¹⁶ At that time Hezekiah stripped the gold from the doors of the temple of Jehovah, and from the pillars which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria.

¹⁷ And the king of Assyria sent Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh from Lachish, with great forces against Jerusalem, to King Hezekiah. And they went up and came to Jerusalem. And when they had come up, they went and stood by the aqueduct of the upper pool, which was on the highway to the Fuller’s Field.

¹⁸ And when they had called out to the king, Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, Shebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder, came out to them.

¹⁹ And Rabshakeh said to them, Say now to Hezekiah, Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: What confidence is this in which you have trusted?

²⁰ You have spoken of having counsel and power for war; but they are mere words of the lips. And in whom have you trusted, that you have rebelled against me?

²¹ Now behold, you have trusted in the staff of this broken reed, Egypt, on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all those trusting in him.

²² But if you say to me, We have trusted in Jehovah our God, is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has removed, and has said to Judah and Jerusalem, You shall bow down before this altar in Jerusalem?

²³ Now therefore, I urge you, give a pledge to my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses; if you are able on your part to put riders on them!

²⁴ How then will you turn away the face of one governor of the least of my master’s servants, and put your trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

²⁵ Have I now come up without Jehovah against this place to destroy it? Jehovah has said to me, Go up against this land, and destroy it.

²⁶ Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, Shebna, and Joah said to Rabshakeh, Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; and do not speak to us in the Jewish language in the hearing of the people on the wall.

²⁷ But Rabshakeh said to them, Has my master sent me to your master and to you to speak these words, and not also to the men who sit on the wall, who will eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?

²⁸ Then Rabshakeh stood and called out with a loud voice in the Jewish language, and spoke, saying, Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria!

²⁹ Thus says the king: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he shall not be able to deliver you out of his hand;

³⁰ nor let Hezekiah make you trust in Jehovah, saying, Jehovah will rescue to deliver us; this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

³¹ Do not listen to Hezekiah; for thus says the king of Assyria: Make a peace treaty and come out to me; and every one of you shall eat from his own vine and every one from his own fig tree, and every one of you shall drink the waters of his own cistern;

³² until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive groves and honey, that you may live and not die. But do not listen to Hezekiah, lest he persuade you, saying, Jehovah will deliver us.

³³ Have any of the gods of the nations at all delivered its land from the hand of the king of Assyria?

³⁴ Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim and Hena and Ivah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?

³⁵ Who among all the gods of the lands have delivered their lands out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

³⁶ But the people kept quiet and answered him not a word; for the king’s commandment was, Do not answer him.

³⁷ Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, Shebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn, and reported to him the words of Rabshakeh.