Isaiah 36:1-37:38 Now it is coming, in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, that up comes Sennacherib, king of Assyria, against all the defended cities of Judah, and is taking them."

CLV⁽ⁱ⁾ ¹ Now it is coming, in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, that up comes Sennacherib, king of Assyria, against all the defended cities of Judah, and is taking them." ² And the king of Assyria is sending the grand cupbearer from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah, with a very heavy army. And he is standing in the trench of the uppermost reservoir, in the highway of the field of the launderer." ³ And faring forth to him is Eliakim, son of Hilkiah, who is over the household, and Shebna, the scribe, and Joah, son of Asaph, the recorder." ⁴ And saying to them is the grand cupbearer, "Say, pray, to Hezekiah, `Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, "What trust is this in which you trust? ⁵ You say, yea, a word of the lips, `Counsel and mastery for war.' Now, on whom do you trust, that you revolt against me? ⁶ Behold! You trust on a staff, this bruised reed, on Egypt, which, when a man is supported by it, then it enters into his palm and pierces it. So is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to all those trusting in him." ⁷ `"And, in case you are saying to me, `In Yahweh, our Elohim, we trust,' is it not He Whose fane heights and altars Hezekiah took away when he is saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, `Before this altar shall you worship in Jerusalem'"? ⁸ `And now, pray, give hostages to my lord, the king of Assyria, and I will give to you two thousand horses, if you can put your riders on them." ⁹ Then how will you reverse the face of one viceroy of my lord's small servants? Yet you yourself are trusting on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen. ¹⁰ `And now, apart from Yahweh, did I come up against this land to ruin it? Yahweh said to me, "Go up to this land to ruin it."'" ¹¹ And saying are Eliakim, and Shebna and Joah to the grand cupbearer, "Speak, pray, with your servants, with us in Syrian, for we have hearers, and you must not speak these words to us in Jewish. And why are you speaking in the ears of the people, these mortals who are sitting on the wall? ¹² Yet saying is the grand cupbearer, "Is it to your lord and to you that my lord sends me to speak these words? Not to the mortals sitting on the wall, that shall eat their own excrement and drink their urine, with you? ¹³ And the grand cupbearer is standing and calling in a loud voice in Jewish, and saying, "Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria." ¹⁴ Thus saith the king of Assyria, `Hezekiah must not lure you by words, for he cannot rescue you." ¹⁵ Nor must Hezekiah make you trust in Yahweh, by saying, "Rescue, yea rescue us will Yahweh, and this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria." ¹⁶ You must not hearken to Hezekiah.' "For thus says the king of Assyria, `Make of me a blessing, and fare forth to me, and eat, each man of his vine and each man of his fig tree, and drink, each man the waters of his cistern, ¹⁷ till I come and take you to a land as your land, to a land of grain and grape juice, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olives, fresh oil and honey, and you shall live and not die. And you must not be hearkening to Hezekiah, ¹⁸ lest Hezekiah shall incite you, saying, "Yahweh will rescue you.Did the elohim of the nations rescue any man's land from the hand of the king of Assyria? ¹⁹ Where are the elohim of Hamath and Arphad? Where are the elohim of Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivah? And where are the elohim of the land of Samaria? And when have they rescued Samaria from my hand? ²⁰ Which, among all the elohim of these lands, have rescued their land from my hand, assuring you that Yahweh will rescue Jerusalem from my hand?'" ²¹ Yet they are silent, and do not answer him a word, for it is the instruction of the king, saying, "You shall not answer him." ²² And coming are Eliakim, son of Hilkiah, who is over the household, and Shebna, the scribe, and Joah, son of Asaph, the recorder, to Hezekiah, with torn garments, and they are telling him the words of the grand cupbearer." ³⁷ ¹ And coming is it, as King Hezekiah hears it, that he is tearing his garments, and covering himself with sackcloth, and entering the house of Yahweh." ² And he is sending Eliakim, who is over the household, and Shebna, the scribe, and the elders of the priests, who are covering themselves with sackcloth, to Isaiah, son of Amoz, the prophet." ³ And they are saying to him, "Thus says Hezekiah, `A day of distress and correction and spurning is this day, for sons have come unto the breaking forth, yet there is no vigor to bear." ⁴ Perhaps Yahweh, your Elohim, will hear the words of the grand cupbearer, whom the king of Assyria, his lord, sends to reproach the living Elohim, and He will correct him, in view of the words which Yahweh, your Elohim, hears, and you will lift up a prayer to Yahweh, your Elohim, about the remnant that is being found in this city.'" ⁵ And coming are the servants of King Hezekiah to Isaiah. ⁶ And saying to them is Isaiah, "Thus shall you say to your lord, `Thus says Yahweh, "You must not fear, in view of the words which you have heard, with which the lads of the king of Assyria taunt Me." ⁷ Behold Me putting in him a spirit, and he will hear a report and return to his land. And I will fell him by the sword in his land."'" ⁸ And the grand cupbearer is returning and finding the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah, for he had heard that he had decamped from Lachish." ⁹ And hearing is the king of Assyria concerning Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia, saying, "He fares forth to fight you.When hearing this, he returns, and is sending messengers to Hezekiah, saying, ¹⁰ Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah, saying, `You must not be lured by your Elohim, in Whom you are trusting, saying, "Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria." ¹¹ Behold! You hear what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands to doom them. And shall you be rescued? ¹² Have the elohim of the nations rescued them, those who my forefathers ruined, Gozan and Haran and Rezeph and the sons of Eden who were in Thelassar, the land of Teman? ¹³ Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arphad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, and Hena and Ivah and Samaria?'" ¹⁴ And Hezekiah is taking the scrolls from the hand of the messengers and is reading them. And he is going up to the house of Yahweh. And Hezekiah is spreading them before Yahweh. ¹⁵ And Hezekiah is praying to Yahweh, saying, ¹⁶ Yahweh of hosts, the Elohim of Israel, dwelling between the cherubim, You are He Who is the Elohim; You alone are for all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made the heavens and the earth." ¹⁷ Stretch out Your ear, Yahweh, and hear! Unclose Your eyes, Yahweh, and see! And hear all the words of Sennacherib, which he sent to reproach the living Elohim." ¹⁸ Truly, Yahweh, the kings of Assyria did drain all the nations, and their land, ¹⁹ and put their elohim into the fire, for no elohim are they, but rather the make of human hands, wood and stone, and they are destroying them." ²⁰ And now, Yahweh, our Elohim, pray, save us, from his hand, and all the kingdoms of the earth shall know that You, Yahweh, are Elohim, You alone." ²¹ And sending is Isaiah, son of Amoz, to Hezekiah, saying, "Thus says Yahweh, the Elohim of Israel, `What you pray to Me as to Sennacherib, king of Assyria, have I heard.'" ²² This is the word which Yahweh Elohim speaks concerning him:"She despises you! She derides you! The virgin daughter of Zion. Behind you her head wags! The daughter of Jerusalem." ²³ Whom do you reproach and taunt? And against Whom do you raise high your voice? And you are lifting up your eyes to the height against the Holy One of Israel? ²⁴ By the hand of your servants, your messengers, you reproach my Lord! And saying are you, `With a multitude of my chariots I go up the height of the mountains, the flanks of Lebanon, and I will cut the altitude of its cedars, its choice firs, and I will enter the height of its end, the wildwood of its crop land." ²⁵ I scoop and drink waters that are alien, and I will drain with the sole of my footfalls all the waterways of the besieged.'" ²⁶ Have you not heard from afar that it was made by Me? From days aforetime also, I formed it. Now will I bring it, and coming are you to cause tumult, to besieged mounds, defended cities." ²⁷ And their dwellers are shorthanded; they are dismayed and ashamed. They become herbage of the field and green verdure, grass of the housetops, and blasted before raised." ²⁸ Your rising and your sitting and your faring forth and your coming in I know, and your perturbance against Me." ²⁹ Because your perturbance against Me and your tumult ascends in My ears, so I will place My gaff in your nose, and My bit in your lips, and I will reverse you by the way in which you came." ³⁰ And this is the sign for you:Eat for the year the self-sown, and in the second year the spontaneous growth. Yet in the third year, sow and reap, and plant vineyards and eat their fruit." ³¹ And, in addition, the delivered of the house of Judah, the remnant finds root downward, and yields fruit upward, ³² for from Jerusalem shall fare forth a remnant, and the delivered from mount Zion. The zeal of Yahweh of hosts will do this." ³³ Wherefore, thus says Yahweh as to the king of Assyria:"He shall not come into this city, and not direct an arrow there, and he shall not precede it with a shield, and he shall not pour out against it an earthwork." ³⁴ By the way which he came, by it shall he return. Yet into this city he shall not enter,averring is Yahweh." ³⁵ And I am a protection over this city, to save it on My Own account, and on account of David, My servant." ³⁶ And faring forth is a messenger of Yahweh and smiting in the Assyrian camp a hundred and eighty five thousand. And the king is rising early in the morning--and behold! All of them are corpses--dead! ³⁷ And decamping, and going, and returning is Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and he is dwelling in Nineveh." ³⁸ And he is coming to worship in the house of Nisroch, his elohim, and Adrammelech and Sharezer, his sons, smite him with the sword. Yet they escape into the land of Ararat, and reigning is Esarhaddon, his son, in his stead."