Day 132 of 365

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

²He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah.

³He did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done.

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

⁵He trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel; so that after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor among them that were before him.

⁶For he joined with the Lord; he did not depart from following him, but kept his commandments, which the Lord commanded Moses.

⁷The Lord was with him; wherever he went forth he prospered: and he rebelled against the king of Assyria, and did not serve him.

⁸He struck the Philistines to Gaza and its borders, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city.

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

¹⁰At the end of three years they took it: in the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken.

¹¹The king of Assyria carried Israel away to Assyria, and put them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes,

¹²because they did not obey the voice of the Lord their God, but transgressed his covenant, even all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded, and would not hear it, nor do it.

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

¹⁴Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria to Lachish, saying, "I have offended; return from me. That which you put on me, I will bear." The king of Assyria appointed to Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold.

¹⁵Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was found in the house of the Lord, and in the treasures of the king's house.

¹⁶At that time, Hezekiah cut off the gold from the doors of the Lord's temple, and from the pillars which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria.

¹⁷The king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rabsaris and Rabshakeh from Lachish to king Hezekiah with a great army to Jerusalem. They went up and came to Jerusalem. When they had come up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is in the highway of the fuller's field.

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

¹⁹Rabshakeh said to them, "Say now to Hezekiah, 'Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, "What confidence is this in which you trust?

²⁰You say (but they are but vain words), 'There is counsel and strength for war.' Now on whom do you trust, that you have rebelled against me?

²¹Now, behold, you trust in the staff of this bruised reed, even in Egypt. If a man leans on it, it will go into his hand, and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust on him.

²²But if you tell me, 'We trust in the Lord our God;' isn't that he whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, 'You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem?'

²³Now therefore, please give pledges to my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able on your part to set riders on them.

²⁴How then can you turn away the face of one captain of the least of my master's servants, and put your trust on Egypt for chariots and for horsemen?

²⁵Have I now come up without the Lord against this place to destroy it? The Lord said to me, 'Go up against this land, and destroy it.'"'"

²⁶Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and Shebnah, and Joah, said to Rabshakeh, "Please speak to your servants in the Syrian language; for we understand it. Do not speak with us in the Jews' language, in the hearing of the people who are on the wall."

²⁷But Rabshakeh said to them, "Has my master sent me to your master, and to you, to speak these words? Hasn't he sent me to the men who sit on the wall, to eat their own dung, and to drink their own water with you?"

²⁸Then Rabshakeh stood, and cried with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and spoke, saying, "Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria.

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

³⁰Neither let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord, saying, "The Lord will surely deliver us, and this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria."

³¹Do not listen to Hezekiah.' For thus says the king of Assyria, 'Make your peace with me, and come out to me; and everyone of you eat of his vine, and everyone of his fig tree, and everyone drink the waters of his own cistern;

³²until 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 trees and of honey, that you may live, and not die. Do not listen to Hezekiah, when he persuades you, saying, "The Lord will deliver us."

³³Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

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

³⁵Who are they among all the gods of the countries, that have delivered their country out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?'"

³⁶But the people held their peace, and answered him not a word; for the king's commandment was, "Do not answer him."

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

¹It happened, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he tore his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the Lord.

²He sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz.

³They said to him, "Thus says Hezekiah, 'This day is a day of trouble, of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to deliver them.

⁴It may be the Lord your God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which the Lord your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.'"

⁵So the servants of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

⁶Isaiah said to them, "Thus you shall tell your master, 'Thus says the Lord, "Do not be afraid of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.

⁷Behold, I will put a spirit in him, and he will hear news, and will return to his own land. I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land."'"

⁸So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah; for he had heard that he had departed from Lachish.

⁹When he heard it said of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, "Behold, he has come out to fight against you, he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying,

¹⁰'Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, "Do not let your God in whom you trust deceive you, saying, Jerusalem 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, by destroying them utterly. Will you be delivered?

¹²Have the gods of the nations delivered them, which my fathers have destroyed, Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden that were in Telassar?

¹³Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and Ivvah?"'"

¹⁴Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it. Then Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord, and spread it before the Lord.

¹⁵Hezekiah prayed before the Lord, and said, "The Lord, the God of Israel, who sit above the cherubim, you are the God, even you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth.

¹⁶Incline your ear, Lord, and hear. Open your eyes, Lord, and see. Hear the words of Sennacherib, with which he has sent to defy the living God.

¹⁷Truly, Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands,

¹⁸and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore they have destroyed them.

¹⁹Now therefore, the Lord our God, save us, I beg you, out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, Lord, are God alone."

²⁰Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, "Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, 'Whereas you have prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria, I have heard you.

²¹This is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him: "The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you and ridiculed you. The daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at you.

²²Whom have you defied and blasphemed? Against whom have you exalted your voice and lifted up your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel.

²³By your messengers you have defied the Lord, and have said, 'With the multitude of my chariots, I have come up to the height of the mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon; and I will cut down its tall cedars, and its choice fir trees; and I will enter into his farthest lodging place, the forest of his fruitful field.

²⁴I have dug and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet will I dry up all the rivers of Egypt.'

²⁵Haven't you heard how I have done it long ago, and formed it of ancient times? Now have I brought it to pass, that it should be yours to lay waste fortified cities into ruinous heaps.

²⁶Therefore their inhabitants were of small power. They were dismayed and confounded. They were like the grass of the field, and like the green herb, like the grass on the housetops, and like grain blasted before it has grown up.

²⁷But I know your sitting down, and your going out, and your coming in, and your raging against me.

²⁸Because of your raging against me, and because your arrogance has come up into my ears, therefore will I put my hook in your nose, and my bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way by which you came."

²⁹"'This shall be the sign to you: You shall eat this year that which grows of itself, and in the second year that which springs of the same; and in the third year sow, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat its fruit.

³⁰The remnant that has escaped of the house of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward.

³¹For out of Jerusalem a remnant will go out, and out of Mount Zion those who shall escape. The zeal of the Lord will perform this.'

³²"Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, 'He shall not come to this city, nor shoot an arrow there, neither shall he come before it with shield, nor cast up a mound against it.

³³By the way that he came, by the same shall he return, and he shall not come to this city,' says the Lord.

³⁴'For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake, and for my servant David's sake.'"

³⁵It happened that night, that the angel of the Lord went out, and struck one hundred eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians. When men arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies.

³⁶So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and lived at Nineveh.

³⁷It happened, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer struck him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Ararat. Esar Haddon his son reigned in his place.

¹In those days was Hezekiah sick to death. Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him, and said to him, "Thus says the Lord, 'Set your house in order; for you shall die, and not live.'"

²Then he turned his face to the wall, and prayed to the Lord, saying,

³"Remember now, Lord, I beg you, how I have walked before you in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in your sight." Hezekiah wept bitterly.

⁴It happened, before Isaiah had gone out into the middle part of the city, that the word of the Lord came to him, saying,

⁵"Turn back, and tell Hezekiah the prince of my people, 'Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father, "I have heard your prayer. I have seen your tears. Behold, I will heal you. On the third day, you shall go up to the house of the Lord.

⁶I will add to your days fifteen years. I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my own sake, and for my servant David's sake."'"

⁷Isaiah said, "Take a cake of figs." They took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.

⁸Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "What shall be the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up to the house of the Lord the third day?"

⁹Isaiah said, "This shall be the sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that he has spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten steps, or go back ten steps?"

¹⁰Hezekiah answered, "It is a light thing for the shadow to go forward ten steps. Nay, but let the shadow return backward ten steps."

¹¹Isaiah the prophet cried to the Lord; and he brought the shadow ten steps backward, by which it had gone down on the dial of Ahaz.

¹²At that time Berodach Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah; for he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

¹³Hezekiah listened to them, and showed them all the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious oil, and the house of his armor, and all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah did not show them.

¹⁴Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah, and said to him, "What did these men say? From where did they come to you?" Hezekiah said, "They have come from a far country, even from Babylon."

¹⁵He said, "What have they seen in your house?" Hezekiah answered, "They have seen all that is in my house. There is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them."

¹⁶Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the Lord.

¹⁷'Behold, the days come, that all that is in your house, and that which your fathers have laid up in store to this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left,' says the Lord.

¹⁸'Of your sons who shall issue from you, whom you shall father, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.'"

¹⁹Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the Lord which you have spoken is good." He said moreover, "Isn't it so, if peace and truth shall be in my days?"

²⁰Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and all his might, and how he made the pool, and the conduit, and brought water into the city, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

²¹Hezekiah slept with his fathers; and Manasseh his son reigned in his place.

¹Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign; and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Hephzibah.

²He did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, after the abominations of the nations whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel.

³For he built again the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he reared up altars for Baal, and made an Asherah, as did Ahab king of Israel, and worshiped all the army of the sky, and served them.

⁴He built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord said, "I will put my name in Jerusalem."

⁵He built altars for all the army of the sky in the two courts of the house of the Lord.

⁶He made his son to pass through the fire, and practiced sorcery, and used enchantments, and dealt with those who had familiar spirits, and with wizards: he worked much evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger.

⁷He set the engraved image of Asherah, that he had made, in the house of which the Lord said to David and to Solomon his son, "In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will I put my name forever;

⁸neither will I cause the feet of Israel to wander any more out of the land which I gave their fathers, if only they will observe to do according to all that I have commanded them, and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded them."

⁹But they did not listen: and Manasseh seduced them to do that which is evil more than the nations did whom the Lord destroyed before the children of Israel.

¹⁰The Lord spoke by his servants the prophets, saying,

¹¹"Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations, and has done wickedly above all that the Amorites did, who were before him, and has made Judah also to sin with his idols;

¹²therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, 'Behold, I bring such disaster on Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears shall tingle.

¹³I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab; and I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down.

¹⁴I will cast off the remnant of my inheritance, and deliver them into the hand of their enemies. They will become a prey and a spoil to all their enemies;

¹⁵because they have done that which is evil in my sight, and have provoked me to anger, since the day their fathers came forth out of Egypt, even to this day.'"

¹⁶Moreover Manasseh shed innocent blood very much, until he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another; besides his sin with which he made Judah to sin, in doing that which was evil in the sight of the Lord.

¹⁷Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh, and all that he did, and his sin that he sinned, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

¹⁸Manasseh slept with his fathers, and was buried in the garden of his own house, in the garden of Uzza: and Amon his son reigned in his place.

¹⁹Amon was twenty-two years old when he began to reign; and he reigned two years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Meshullemeth the daughter of Haruz of Jotbah.

²⁰He did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, as Manasseh his father did.

²¹He walked in all the way that his father walked in, and served the idols that his father served, and worshiped them:

²²and he forsook the Lord, the God of his fathers, and did not walk in the way of the Lord.

²³The servants of Amon conspired against him, and put the king to death in his own house.

²⁴But the people of the land killed all those who had conspired against king Amon; and the people of the land made Josiah his son king in his place.

²⁵Now the rest of the acts of Amon which he did, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

²⁶He was buried in his tomb in the garden of Uzza: and Josiah his son reigned in his place.