2 Kings 18-21

II Kings 18

¹And it cometh to pass, in the third year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, reigned hath Hezekiah son of Ahaz king of Judah;

²a son of twenty and five years was he in his reigning, and twenty and nine years he hath reigned in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother is Abi daughter of Zechariah.

³And he doth that which is right in the eyes of Jehovah, according to all that David his father did,

⁴he hath turned aside the high places, and broken in pieces the standing-pillars, and cut down the shrine, and beaten down the brazen serpent that Moses made, for unto these days were the sons of Israel making perfume to it, and he calleth it ‘a piece of brass.'

⁵In Jehovah, God of Israel, he hath trusted, and after him there hath not been like him among all the kings of Judah, nor among any who were before him;

⁶and he cleaveth to Jehovah, he hath not turned aside from after Him, and keepeth His commands that Jehovah commanded Moses.

⁷And Jehovah hath been with him, in every place where he goeth out he acteth wisely, and he rebelleth against the king of Asshur, and hath not served him;

⁸he hath smitten the Philistines unto Gaza, and its borders, from a tower of watchers unto the fenced city.

⁹And it cometh to pass, in the fourth year of king Hezekiah -- it is the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel -- come up hath Shalmaneser king of Asshur against Samaria, and layeth siege to it,

¹⁰and they capture it at the end of three years; in the sixth year of Hezekiah -- it is the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel -- hath Samaria been captureth,

¹¹and the king of Asshur removeth Israel to Asshur, and placed them in Halah, and in Habor by the river Gozan, and in cities of the Medes,

¹²because that they have not hearkened to the voice of Jehovah their God, and transgress His covenant -- all that He commanded Moses, servant of Jehovah -- yea, they have not hearkened nor done it.

¹³And in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah hath Sennacherib king of Asshur come up against all the fenced cities of Judah, and seizeth them,

¹⁴and Hezekiah king of Judah sendeth unto the king of Asshur to Lachish, saying, ‘I have sinned, turn back from off me; that which thou puttest on me I bear;' and the king of Asshur layeth on Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver, and thirty talents of gold,

¹⁵and Hezekiah giveth all the silver that is found in the house of Jehovah, and in the treasures of the house of the king;

¹⁶at that time hath Hezekiah cut off the doors of the temple of Jehovah, and the pillars that Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and giveth them to the king of Asshur.

¹⁷And the king of Asshur sendeth Tartan, and the chief of the eunuchs, and the chief of the butlers, from Lachish, unto king Hezekiah, with a heavy force, to Jerusalem, and they go up and come in to Jerusalem, and they go up, and come in and stand by the conduit of the upper pool that is in the highway of the fuller's field.

¹⁸And they call unto the king, and go out unto them doth Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who is over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the remembrancer.

¹⁹And the chief of the butlers saith unto them, ‘Say, I pray you, unto Hezekiah, Thus said the great king, the king of Asshur, What is this confidence in which thou hast confided?

²⁰Thou hast said: Only a word of the lips! counsel and might are for battle; now, on whom hast thou trusted that thou hast rebelled against me?

²¹‘Now, lo, thou hast trusted for thee on the staff of this broken reed, on Egypt; which a man leaneth on, and it hath gone into his hand, and pierced it! -- so is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all those trusting on him.

²²‘And when ye say unto me, Unto Jehovah our God we have trusted, is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah hath turned aside, and saith to Judah and to Jerusalem, Before this altar do ye bow yourselves in Jerusalem?

²³‘And, now, give a pledge for thee, I pray thee, to my lord the king of Asshur, and I give to thee two thousand horses, if thou art able to give for thee riders on them.

²⁴And how dost thou turn back the face of one captain of the least of the servants of my lord, that thou dost trust for thee on Egypt for chariot, and for horsemen?

²⁵Now, without Jehovah have I come up against this place to destroy it? Jehovah said unto me, Go up against this land, and thou hast destroyed it.'

²⁶And Eliakim son of Hilkiah saith -- and Shebna, and Joah -- to the chief of the butlers, ‘Speak, we pray thee, unto thy servants in Aramaean, for we are understanding, and do not speak with us in Jewish, in the ears of the people who are on the wall.'

²⁷And the chief of the butlers saith unto them, ‘For thy lord, and unto thee, hath my lord sent me to speak these words? is it not for the men, those sitting on the wall to eat their own dung and to drink their own water, with you?'

²⁸And the chief of the butlers standeth and calleth with a great voice in Jewish, and speaketh and saith, ‘Hear ye a word of the great king, the king of Asshur:

²⁹thus said the king, Let not Hezekiah lift you up, for he is not able to deliver you out of his hand;

³⁰and let not Hezekiah make you trust unto Jehovah, saying, Jehovah doth certainly deliver us, and this city is not given into the hand of the king of Asshur.

³¹‘Do not hearken unto Hezekiah, for thus said the king of Asshur, Make with me a blessing, and come out unto me, and eat ye each of his vine, and each of his fig-tree, and drink ye each the waters of his own well,

³²till my coming in, and I have taken you unto a land like your own land, a land of corn and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of oil olive, and honey, and live, and die not; and do not hearken unto Hezekiah, when he persuadeth you, saying, Jehovah doth deliver us.

³³‘Have the gods of the nations delivered at all each his land out of the hand of the king of Asshur?

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

³⁵Who are they among all the gods of the lands that have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah doth deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?'

³⁶And the people have kept silent, and have not answered him a word, for the command of the king is, saying, ‘Do not answer him.'

³⁷And Eliakim son of Hilkiah, who is over the house, cometh in, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah son of Asaph the remembrancer, unto Hezekiah, with rent garments, and they declare to him the words of the chief of the butlers.

II Kings 19

¹And it cometh to pass, at king Hezekiah's hearing, that he rendeth his garments, and covereth himself with sackcloth, and entereth the house of Jehovah,

²and sendeth Eliakim, who is over the house, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covering themselves with sackcloth, unto Isaiah the prophet, son of Amoz,

³and they say unto him, ‘Thus said Hezekiah -- A day of distress, and rebuke, and despising is this day; for come have sons unto the birth, and power there is not to bring forth.

⁴‘It may be Jehovah thy God doth hear all the words of the chief of the butlers with which the king of Asshur his lord hath sent him to reproach the living God, and hath decided concerning the words that Jehovah thy God hath heard, and thou hast lifted up prayer for the remnant that is found.'

⁵And the servants of king Hezekiah come in unto Isaiah,

⁶and Isaiah saith to them, ‘Thus do ye say unto your lord: Thus said Jehovah, Be not afraid because of the words that thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Asshur have reviled Me.

⁷Lo, I am giving in him a spirit, and he hath heard a report, and hath turned back to his land, and I have caused him to fall by the sword in his land.'

⁸And the chief of the butlers turneth back and findeth the king of Asshur fighting against Libnah, for he hath heard that he hath journeyed from Lachish.

⁹And he heareth concerning Tirhakah king of Cush, saying, ‘Lo, he hath come out to fight with thee;' and he turneth and sendeth messengers unto Hezekiah, saying,

¹⁰‘Thus do ye speak unto Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God lift thee up in whom thou art trusting, saying, Jerusalem is not given into the hand of the king of Asshur.

¹¹Lo, thou hast heard that which the kings of Asshur have done to all the lands -- to devote them; and thou art delivered!

¹²did the gods of the nations deliver them whom my fathers destroyed -- Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the sons of Eden, who are in Thelassar?

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

¹⁴And Hezekiah taketh the letters out of the hand of the messengers, and readeth them, and goeth up to the house of Jehovah, and Hezekiah spreadeth it before Jehovah.

¹⁵And Hezekiah prayeth before Jehovah, and saith, ‘O Jehovah, God of Israel, inhabiting the cherubs, Thou art God Himself -- Thyself alone -- to all the kingdoms of the earth: Thou hast made the heavens and the earth.

¹⁶Incline, O Jehovah, Thine ear, and hear; open, O Jehovah, Thine eyes, and see; and hear Thou the words of Sennacherib with which he hath sent him to reproach the living God.

¹⁷‘Truly, O Jehovah, kings of Asshur have laid waste the nations, and their land,

¹⁸and have put their gods into fire, for they are no gods, but work of the hands of man, wood and stone, and destroy them.

¹⁹And now, O Jehovah our God, save us, we pray Thee, out of his hand, and know do all kingdoms of the earth that Thou art Jehovah God -- Thyself alone.'

²⁰And Isaiah son of Amoz sendeth unto Hezekiah, saying, ‘Thus said Jehovah, God of Israel, That which thou hast prayed unto Me concerning Sennacherib king of Asshur I have heard:

²¹this is the word that Jehovah spake concerning him: ‘Trampled on thee -- laughed at thee, Hath the virgin daughter of Zion Behind thee shaken the head -- Hath the daughter of Jerusalem?

²²Whom hast thou reproached and reviled? And against whom lifted up a voice? Yea, thou dost lift up on high thine eyes -- Against the Holy One of Israel!

²³By the hand of thy messengers Thou hast reproached the Lord, and sayest: In the multitude of my chariots I have come up to a high place of mountains -- The sides of Lebanon, And I cut down the height of its cedars, The choice of its firs, And I enter the lodging of its extremity, The forest of its Carmel.

²⁴I have digged, and drunk strange waters, And I dry up with the sole of my steps All floods of a bulwark.

²⁵Hast thou not heard from afar, it I made, From days of old that I formed it? Now I have brought it in, And it becometh a desolation, Ruinous heaps are fenced cities,

²⁶And their inhabitants are feeble-handed, They were broken down, and are dried up, They have been the herb of the field, And the greenness of the tender grass, Grass of the roofs, And blasted corn -- before it hath risen up!

²⁷And thy sitting down, and thy going out, And thy coming in, I have known, And thine anger towards Me;

²⁸Because of thine anger towards Me, And thy noise -- it came up into Mine ears, I have put My hook in thy nose, And My bridle in thy lips, And have caused thee to turn back, In the way in which thou camest.

²⁹And this to thee is the sign, Food of the year is the spontaneous growth, And in the second year the self-produced, And in the third year sow ye, and reap, And plant vineyards, and eat their fruits.

³⁰And it hath continued -- The escaped of the house of Judah That hath been left -- to take root beneath, And hath made fruit upward.

³¹For from Jerusalem goeth out a remnant, And an escape from mount Zion; The zeal of Jehovah of Hosts doth this.

³²Therefore, thus said Jehovah, Concerning the king of Asshur: He doth not come in unto this city, Nor doth he shoot there an arrow, Nor doth he come before it with shield. Nor doth he pour out against it a mount.

³³In the way that he cometh in -- In it he turneth back, And unto this city he doth not come in, The affirmation of Jehovah --

³⁴And I have covered over this city, To save it, for Mine own sake, And for the sake of David My servant.'

³⁵And it cometh to pass, in that night, that a messenger of Jehovah goeth out, and smiteth in the camp of Asshur a hundred eighty and five thousand, and they rise early in the morning, and lo, all of them are dead corpses.

³⁶And Sennacherib king of Asshur journeyeth, and goeth, and turneth back, and dwelleth in Nineveh;

³⁷and it cometh to pass, he is bowing himself in the house of Nisroch his god, and Adramelech and Sharezar his sons have smitten him with the sword, and they have escaped to the land of Ararat, and Esar-Haddon his son reigneth in his stead.

II Kings 20

¹In those days hath Hezekiah been sick unto death, and come unto him doth Isaiah son of Amoz the prophet, and saith unto him, ‘Thus said Jehovah: Give a charge to thy house, for thou art dying, and dost not live.'

²And he turneth round his face unto the wall, and prayeth unto Jehovah, saying,

³‘I pray Thee, O Jehovah, remember, I pray Thee, how I have walked habitually before Thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and that which is good in Thine eyes I have done;' and Hezekiah weepeth -- a great weeping.

⁴And it cometh to pass -- Isaiah hath not gone out to the middle court -- that the word of Jehovah hath been unto him, saying,

⁵‘Turn back, and thou hast said unto Hezekiah, leader of My people: Thus said Jehovah, God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tear, lo, I give healing to thee, on the third day thou dost go up to the house of Jehovah;

⁶and I have added to thy days fifteen years, and out of the hand of the king of Asshur I deliver thee and this city, and have covered over this city for Mine own sake, and for the sake of David My servant.'

⁷And Isaiah saith, ‘Take ye a cake of figs;' and they take and lay it on the boil, and he reviveth.

⁸And Hezekiah saith unto Isaiah, ‘What is the sign that Jehovah doth give healing to me, that I have gone up on the third day to the house of Jehovah?'

⁹And Isaiah saith, ‘This is to thee the sign from Jehovah, that Jehovah doth the thing that He hath spoken -- The shadow hath gone on ten degrees, or it doth turn back ten degrees?'

¹⁰And Hezekiah saith, ‘It hath been light for the shadow to incline ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow turn backward ten degrees.'

¹¹And Isaiah the prophet calleth unto Jehovah, and He bringeth back the shadow by the degrees that it had gone down in the degrees of Ahaz -- backward ten degrees.

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

¹³and Hezekiah hearkeneth unto them, and sheweth them all the house of his treasury, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the good ointment, and all the house of his vessels, and all that hath been found in his treasuries; there hath not been a thing that Hezekiah hath not shewed them, in his house, and in all his dominion.

¹⁴And Isaiah the prophet cometh in unto king Hezekiah, and saith unto him, ‘What said these men? and whence come they unto thee?' And Hezekiah saith, ‘From a land afar off they have come -- from Babylon.'

¹⁵And he saith, ‘What saw they in thy house?' and Hezekiah saith, ‘All that is in my house they saw; there hath not been a thing that I have not shewed them among my treasures.'

¹⁶And Isaiah saith unto Hezekiah, ‘Hear a word of Jehovah:

¹⁷Lo, days are coming, and borne hath been all that is in thy house, and that thy father have treasured up till this day, to Babylon; there is not left a thing, said Jehovah;

¹⁸and of thy sons who go out from thee, whom thou begettest, they take away, and they have been eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.'

¹⁹And Hezekiah saith unto Isaiah, ‘Good is the word of Jehovah that thou hast spoken;' and he saith, ‘Is it not -- if peace and truth are in my days?'

²⁰And the rest of the matters of Hezekiah, and all his might, and how he made the pool, and the conduit, and bringeth in the waters to the city, are they not written on the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Judah?

²¹And Hezekiah lieth with his fathers, and reign doth Manasseh his son in his stead.

II Kings 21

¹A son of twelve years is Manasseh in his reigning, and fifty and five years he hath reigned in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother is Hephzi-Bah;

²and he doth the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah, according to the abominations of the nations that Jehovah dispossessed from the presence of the sons of Israel,

³and he turneth and buildeth the high places that Hezekiah his father destroyed, and raiseth altars for Baal, and maketh a shrine, as did Ahab king of Israel, and boweth himself to all the host of the heavens, and serveth them.

⁴And he hath built altars in the house of Jehovah, of which Jehovah said, ‘In Jerusalem I put My name.'

⁵And he buildeth altars to all the host of the heavens in the two courts of the house of Jehovah;

⁶and he hath caused his son to pass through fire, and observed clouds, and used enchantment, and dealt with a familiar spirit and wizards; he hath multiplied to do the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah -- to provoke to anger.

⁷And he setteth the graven image of the shrine that he made in the house of which Jehovah said unto David and unto Solomon his son, ‘In this house, and in Jerusalem, that I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I put My name -- to the age;

⁸and I do not add to cause the foot of Israel to move from the ground that I gave to their fathers, only, if they observe to do according to all that I commanded them, and to all the law that My servant Moses commanded them.'

⁹And they have not hearkened, and Manasseh causeth them to err, to do the evil thing above the nations that Jehovah destroyed from the presence of the sons of Israel.

¹⁰And Jehovah speaketh by the hand of his servants the prophets, saying,

¹¹‘Because that Manasseh king of Judah hath done these abominations -- he hath done evil above all that the Amorites have done who are before him, and causeth also Judah to sin by his idols;

¹²therefore thus said Jehovah, God of Israel, Lo, I am bringing in evil on Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever heareth of it, tingle do his two ears.

¹³And I have stretched out over Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab, and wiped Jerusalem as one wipeth the dish -- he hath wiped, and hath turned it on its face.

¹⁴‘And I have left the remnant of Mine inheritance, and given them into the hand of their enemies, and they have been for a prey and for a spoil to all their enemies,

¹⁵because that they have done the evil thing in Mine eyes, and are provoking Me to anger from the day that their fathers came out of Egypt, even unto this day.'

¹⁶And also, innocent blood hath Manasseh shed very much, till that he hath filled Jerusalem -- mouth to mouth; apart from his sin that he hath caused Judah to sin, to do the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah.

¹⁷And the rest of the matters of Manasseh, and all that he did, and his sin that he sinned, are they not written on the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Judah?

¹⁸And Manasseh lieth with his fathers, and is buried in the garden of his house, in the garden of Uzza, and reign doth Amon his son in his stead.

¹⁹A son of twenty and two years is Amon in his reigning, and two years he hath reigned in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother is Meshullemeth daughter of Haruz of Jotbah,

²⁰and he doth the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah, as did Manasseh his father,

²¹and walketh in all the way that his father walked in, and serveth the idols that his father served, and boweth himself to them,

²²and forsaketh Jehovah, God of his fathers, and hath not walked in the way of Jehovah.

²³And the servants of Amon conspire against him, and put the king to death in his own house,

²⁴and the people of the land smite all those conspiring against king Amon, and the people of the land cause Josiah his son to reign in his stead.

²⁵And the rest of the matters of Amon that he did, are they not written on the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Judah?

²⁶and one burieth him in his burying-place in the garden of Uzza, and reign doth Josiah his son in his stead.