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2 Kings 18:1-37 — Hezekiah King of Judah; Assyria Threatens Jerusalem

2Kgs.18.1-37

¹In the third year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, Hezekiah son of Ahaz king of Judah began to reign. ²He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Abi daughter of Zechariah. ³He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that David his father had done. ⁴He removed the high places, shattered the sacred pillars, cut down the Asherah pole, and crushed the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had been burning incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan . ⁵He trusted in the LORD, the God of Israel, so that there was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him. ⁶He clung to the LORD; he did not turn away from following him, but kept his commandments, which the LORD had commanded Moses. ⁷And the LORD was with him; wherever he went he prospered. He rebelled against the king of Assyria and would not serve him. ⁸He struck down the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territory, from watchtower to fortified city. ⁹And in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it. ¹⁰At the end of three years they captured it. In the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken. ¹¹The king of Assyria exiled Israel to Assyria and settled them in Halah, in Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes. ¹²This happened because they did not obey the voice of the LORD their God, but transgressed his covenant—all that Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded. They neither listened nor did it. ¹³In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them. ¹⁴Then Hezekiah king of Judah sent word to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, 'I have done wrong; withdraw from me. Whatever you impose on me I will bear.' So the king of Assyria imposed on Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold. ¹⁵Hezekiah gave him all the silver found in the house of the LORD and in the treasuries of the king’s house. ¹⁶At that time Hezekiah stripped the doors of the temple of the LORD and the doorframes that Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave them to the king of Assyria. ¹⁷Then the king of Assyria sent Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem with a great army. They went up and came to Jerusalem, and when they arrived they stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is on the highway to the Fuller’s Field. ¹⁸When they called for the king, Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebnah the scribe and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went out to them. ¹⁹Rabshakeh said to them, 'Say now to Hezekiah, “Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: What is this confidence in which you trust?”' ²⁰You say—yet they are only words of the lips—'There is counsel and strength for war.' Now in whom do you trust, that you have rebelled against me? ²¹Now look, you are trusting in this broken reed of a staff, in Egypt, which will go into a man’s hand and pierce it if he leans on it. Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him. ²²But if you say to me, 'We trust in the LORD our God,' is it not he whose high places and altars Hezekiah removed, saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, 'You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem'? ²³Come now, make a wager with 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 repulse a single captain among the least of my master’s servants, when you trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen? ²⁵Now was it apart from the LORD that I came up against this place to destroy it? The LORD said to me, 'Go up against this land and destroy it.' ²⁶Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebnah, and Joah said to Rabshakeh, 'Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it. Do not speak with us in Judean in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.' ²⁷But Rabshakeh said to them, 'Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to speak these words, and not to the men sitting on the wall, who with you will eat their own dung and drink their own urine ?' ²⁸Then Rabshakeh stood and cried out with a loud voice in Judean: '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 from his hand. ³⁰And do not let Hezekiah make you trust in the LORD, saying, 'The LORD will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.' ³¹Do not listen to Hezekiah, for thus says the king of Assyria: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then each of you will eat from his own vine and his own fig tree, and each will drink the water 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 oil and honey, that you may live and not die. And do not listen to Hezekiah, for he is misleading you when he says, 'The LORD will deliver us.' ³³Has any god of the nations ever delivered his land from the hand of the king of Assyria? ³⁴Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria from my hand? ³⁵Who among all the gods of the lands has delivered his land from my hand, that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem from my hand? ³⁶But the people were silent and did not answer him a word, for the king’s command was, 'Do not answer him.' ³⁷Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebnah the scribe and Joah son of Asaph the recorder came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of Rabshakeh.

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4/11/2026

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