Sennacherib Threatens Jerusalem
(2 Kings 18:13–37; 2 Chronicles 32:1–8)

1And it came to pass in the fourteenth … year of king Hezekiah that Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and he captured them. 2And the king of Assyria sent the Rabshakeh† from Lachish to Jerusalem, to king Hezekiah, with a great army; and he stood by the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the Field of Fuller.

3And went out to him Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder.

4And the Rabshakeh said to them, “Say, please, to Hezekiah, thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: ‘What is this confidence with which you are confident? 5You speak† a mere word of the lips is counsel and strength for the battle? Now, in whom are you trusting, that you have rebelled against me?

6Behold, are you trusting in the staff of this broken reed in Egypt, which a man who leans on it, it will go into his palm and pierce it! So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all those trusting in him. 7But if you say to me, ‘In YHWH our God we trust,’ is it not He for whom His high places and His altars, Hezekiah has turned aside, and said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘Before this altar you⁺ shall worship?

8And now, make a wager, please, with my lord the king of Assyria, and I will give to you two thousand horses—if you are able to set for you riders on them. 9And how can you turn back the faces of one among a governor of the least servants of my lord, and place your trust in Egypt for chariot and horsemen? 10And now, was it without YHWH that I came up against this land to destroy it? YHWH has said to me, ‘Go up against this land and destroy it!’”

11And Eliakim said and Shebna and Joah to the Rabshakeh, “Speak, please, to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; and do not speak to us in Hebrew† in the ears of the people who are on the wall.”

12And the Rabshakeh said “Was it to your lord and to you that my master sent me to speak these words? Was it not to the men sitting on the wall who will eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you⁺?”

13And the Rabshakeh stood and called out with a great voice in Hebrew, and he said, “Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria! 14Thus says the king: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you⁺, for he will not be able to deliver you⁺. 15And do not let Hezekiah make you⁺ trust in YHWH, saying, ‘YHWH will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’

16Do not listen to Hezekiah! For thus says the king of Assyria: Make peace with me† and come out to me, and each man will eat from his own vine and each man from his fig tree, and each man will drink the waters of his own cistern, 17until I come and take you⁺ to a land like your⁺ own land—a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

18Lest Hezekiah should incite you⁺ saying, ‘YHWH will surely deliver us.’ Have the gods of the nations delivered every man of his land from the hand of the king of Assyria? 19Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Indeed, have they delivered Samaria from my hand? 20Who among all the gods of these lands are they who have delivered their lands from my hand, that YHWH might deliver Jerusalem from my hand?”

21And they were quiet, and they did not answer him a word; for it was the command of the king saying, “Do not answer him.”

22And came Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder, to Hezekiah with torn clothes, and they declared to him the words of the Rabshakeh.