Study Desk

How then can you drive back a single officer among the least of my master's servants and trust in Egypt for chariots and for horsemen?

"Don't listen to Hezekiah, for this is what the king of Assyria says: ‘Make peace with me and surrender to me. Then every one of you may eat from his own vine and his own fig tree, and every one may drink water from his own cistern

But the people kept silent; they didn't say anything, for the king's command was, "Don't answer him."

They said to him, "This is what Hezekiah says: ‘Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace, for children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver them.

Perhaps Yahweh your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria sent to mock the living God, and will rebuke him for the words that Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore, offer a prayer for the surviving remnant.'"

They have thrown their gods into the fire, for they were not gods but made by human hands—wood and stone. So they have destroyed them.

"This will be the sign for you: This year you will eat what grows on its own, and in the second year what grows from that. But in the third year sow and reap, plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

For a remnant will go out from Jerusalem and survivors, from Mount Zion. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this.

I will defend this city and rescue it for My sake and for the sake of My servant David."

In those days Hezekiah became terminally ill. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came and said to him, "This is what the Lord says: ‘Put your affairs in order, for you are about to die; you will not recover.'"

I will add 15 years to your life. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for My sake and for the sake of My servant David.'"

Then Hezekiah answered, "It's easy for the shadow to lengthen 10 steps. No, let the shadow go back 10 steps."

Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the Lord that you have spoken is good," for he thought: Why not, if there will be peace and security during my lifetime?

He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed and reestablished the altars for Baal. He made an Asherah, as King Ahab of Israel had done; he also worshiped the whole heavenly host and served them.

But no accounting is to be required from them for the money put into their hands since they work with integrity."

"Go and inquire of the Lord for me, the people, and all Judah about the instruction in this book that has been found. For great is the Lord 's wrath that is kindled against us because our ancestors have not obeyed the words of this book in order to do everything written about us."

Say this to the king of Judah who sent you to inquire of the Lord : This is what the Lord God of Israel says: As for the words that you heard,

Then the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest and the priests of the second rank and the doorkeepers to bring out of the Lord 's temple all the articles made for Baal, Asherah, and the whole heavenly host. He burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel.

He also tore down the houses of the male cult prostitutes that were in the Lord 's temple, in which the women were weaving tapestries for Asherah.

The king also defiled the high places that were across from Jerusalem, to the south of the Mount of Destruction, which King Solomon of Israel had built for Ashtoreth, the detestable idol of the Sidonians; for Chemosh, the detestable idol of Moab; and for Milcom, the abomination of the Ammonites.