Study Desk

^(C1)Now when King Hezekiah heard the report, he ^(C2)tore his clothes, ^(C3)covered himself with sackcloth, and entered the house of the LORD.

Then he sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the household, with Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests, ^(C1)covered with sackcloth, to ^(C2)Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

And they said to him, "This is what Hezekiah says: 'This day is a day of distress, rebuke, and humiliation; for children have come to the point of birth, and there is no strength to deliver them.

'^(C1)Perhaps the LORD your God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent ^(C2)to taunt the living God, and will avenge the words which the LORD your God has heard. Therefore, offer a prayer for ^(C3)the remnant that is ^(F1)left.'"

So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

And Isaiah said to them, "This is what you shall say to your master: 'The LORD says this: "Do not be fearful because of the words that you have heard, with which the ^(C1)servants of the king of Assyria ^(C2)have blasphemed Me.

"Behold, I am going to put a spirit in him so that ^(C1)he will hear news and return to his own land. And ^(C2)I will make him fall by the sword in his own land."'"

Then Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against ^(C1)Libnah, for he had heard that the king had left ^(C2)Lachish.

When he heard them say about Tirhakah king of ^(F1)Cush, "Behold, he has come out to fight you," he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying,

"This is what you shall say to Hezekiah king of ^(F1)Judah: 'Do not ^(C1)let your God in whom you trust deceive you by saying, "^(C2)Jerusalem will not be handed over to the king of Assyria."

'Behold, you yourself have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands, destroying them completely. So will you be saved?

'^(C1)Did the gods of the nations which my fathers destroyed save them: ^(C2)Gozan, ^(C3)Haran, Rezeph, and ^(C4)the sons of Eden who were in Telassar?

'^(C1)Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, and of Hena and Ivvah?'"

Then ^(C1)Hezekiah took the ^(F1)letter from the hand of the messengers and read it, and he went up to the house of the LORD and ^(F2)spread it out before the LORD.

Hezekiah prayed before the LORD and said, "LORD, God of Israel, ^(F1)(C1)enthroned above the cherubim, ^(C2)You are the God, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth.

"^(C1)Incline Your ear, LORD, and hear; ^(C2)open Your eyes, LORD, and see; and listen to the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent ^(C3)to taunt the living God.

"It is true, LORD; the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands,

and have ^(F1)hurled their gods into the fire; ^(C1)for they were not gods, but only the work of human hands, wood and stone. So they have destroyed them.

"But now, LORD our God, please, save us from his hand, ^(C1)so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You alone, ^(C2)LORD, are God."

Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent word to Hezekiah, saying, "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel says: 'Because you have prayed to Me about Sennacherib king of Assyria, ^(C1)I have heard you.'

"This is the word that the LORD has spoken against him: 'She, ^(C1)the virgin daughter of Zion, has shown contempt for you and mocked you; She, the daughter of Jerusalem, ^(C2)has shaken her head behind you!

-'Whom have you ^(C1)taunted and ^(C2)blasphemed? And against whom have you raised your voice, And ^(F1)haughtily raised your eyes? Against the ^(C3)Holy One of Israel!

-'^(C1)Through your messengers you have taunted the Lord, And you have said, "With my many chariots I went up to the heights of the mountains, To the remotest parts of Lebanon; And I cut down its tall cedars and its choicest junipers. And I entered its farthest resting place, its ^(C2)thickest forest.

-"I dug wells and drank foreign waters, And with the soles of my feet I ^(C1)dried up All the streams of Egypt."

'^(C1)Have you not heard? Long ago I did it; From ancient times I planned it. ^(C2)Now I have brought it about, That you would turn fortified cities into ruined heaps.

-'Therefore their inhabitants were ^(F1)powerless, They were shattered and put to shame. They were ^(C1)like the vegetation of the field and the green grass, Like grass on the housetops that is scorched before it has grown.

-'But ^(C1)I know your sitting down, Your going out, your coming in, And your raging against Me.

-'Because of your raging against Me, And because your complacency has come up to My ears, I ^(C1)will put My hook in your nose, And My bridle in your lips, And ^(C2)I will turn you back by the way by which you came.

'Then this shall be ^(C1)the sign for you: ^(F1)you will eat this year what grows of itself, in the second year what grows by itself, and in the third year sow, harvest, plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.

'^(C1)The survivors that are left of the house of Judah will again take root downward and bear fruit upward.

'For out of Jerusalem will go a remnant, and survivors ^(C1)out of Mount Zion. ^(C2)The zeal of ^(F1)the LORD will perform this.

'Therefore this is what the LORD says about the king of Assyria: "^(C1)He will not come to this city nor shoot an arrow there; and he will not come before it with a shield nor heap up an assault ramp against it.

"^(C1)By the way that he came, by ^(F1)the same he will return, and he shall not come to this city,"' declares the LORD.

'^(C1)For I will protect this city to save it for My own sake, and ^(C2)for My servant David's sake.'"

^(C1)Then it happened that night that the angel of the LORD went out and struck 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians; and when the rest got up early in the morning, behold, all of ^(F1)the 185,000 were ^(F2)dead.

So ^(C1)Sennacherib the king of Assyria departed and ^(F1)returned home, and lived at ^(C2)Nineveh.

Then it came about, as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, that ^(F1)(C1)Adrammelech and Sharezer killed him with the sword; and they escaped to ^(C2)the land of Ararat. And his son ^(C3)Esarhaddon became king in his place.

^(C1)In those days Hezekiah became ^(F1)mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him and said to him, "This is what the LORD says: '^(C2)Set your house in order, for you are going to die and not live.'"

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

"Please, LORD, just ^(C1)remember ^(C2)how I have walked before You wholeheartedly and in truth, and have done what is good in Your sight!" And ^(C3)Hezekiah wept ^(F1)profusely.

And even before Isaiah had left the middle courtyard, the word of the LORD came to him, saying,

"Return and say to ^(C1)Hezekiah the leader of My people, 'This is what the LORD, the God of your father David says: "^(C2)I have heard your prayer, ^(C3)I have seen your tears; behold, I am going to heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the LORD.

"And I will add fifteen years to your ^(F1)life, and I will save you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria; and ^(C1)I will protect this city for My own sake and for My servant David's sake."'"

Then Isaiah said, "Take a cake of figs." And they took it and placed it on the inflamed spot, and he recovered.

Now Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "What will be the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I will go up to the house of the LORD on the third day?"

Isaiah said, "^(C1)This shall be the sign to you from the LORD, that the LORD will perform the word that He has spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten steps or go back ten steps?"

So Hezekiah said, "It is easy for the shadow to decline ten steps; no, but have the shadow turn backward ten steps."

Then Isaiah the prophet called out to the LORD, and ^(C1)He brought the shadow on the ^(F1)stairway back ten steps by which it had gone down on the ^(F1)stairway of Ahaz.

^(C1)At that time ^(F1)Berodach-baladan, a son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, because he heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

And Hezekiah listened to ^(F1)them, and showed them ^(C1)all his treasure house, the silver, the gold, the balsam oil, the ^(F2)scented oil, the house of his armor, and everything that was found in his treasuries. There was nothing in his house nor in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.

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

Isaiah said, "What have they seen in your house?" So Hezekiah ^(F1)answered, "They have seen everything that is in my house; there is nothing among my treasuries that I have not shown them."

Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the LORD:

'Behold, the days are coming when ^(C1)everything that is in your house, and what your fathers have stored up to this day, will be carried to Babylon; nothing will be left,' says the LORD.

'And some ^(C1)of your sons who will come from you, whom you will father, will be taken away; and they will become ^(C2)officials in the palace of the king of Babylon.'"

Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD which you have spoken is ^(C1)good." For he ^(F1)thought, "Is it not good, if there will be peace and ^(F2)security in my days?"

^(C1)Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah and all his might, and how he ^(C2)constructed the pool and the conduit and brought water into the city, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

^(C1)So Hezekiah ^(F1)lay down with his fathers, and his son Manasseh became king in his place.

^(C1)Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Hephzibah.

^(C1)He did evil in the sight of the LORD, ^(C2)in accordance with the abominations of the nations whom the LORD ^(F1)dispossessed before the sons of Israel.

For ^(C1)he rebuilt the high places which his father Hezekiah had destroyed; and ^(C2)he erected altars for Baal and made an ^(F1)Asherah, just as Ahab king of Israel had done, and he ^(C3)worshiped all the heavenly ^(F2)lights and served them.

And ^(C1)he built altars in the house of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, "^(C2)In Jerusalem I will put My name."

He built altars for ^(C1)all the heavenly ^(F1)lights in ^(C2)the two courtyards of the house of the LORD.

And ^(C1)he made his son pass through the fire, ^(C2)interpreted signs, practiced divination, and used mediums and spiritists. He did great evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking Him to anger.

Then ^(C1)he put the carved image of Asherah that he had made in the house of which the LORD had said to David and to his son Solomon, "^(C2)In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen from all the tribes of Israel, I will put My name forever.

"And I ^(C1)will not make the feet of Israel wander anymore from the land which I gave their fathers, if only they will take care to act in accordance with everything that I have commanded them, and with all the Law that My servant Moses commanded them."

But they did not listen, and Manasseh ^(C1)encouraged them to do evil, more than the nations whom the LORD eliminated from the presence of the sons of Israel.

Now the LORD spoke through His servants the prophets, saying,

"^(C1)Since Manasseh king of Judah has committed these abominations, ^(C2)having done more evil than all that the Amorites did who were before him, and ^(C3)has also misled Judah into sin ^(C4)with his idols,

therefore this is what the LORD, the God of Israel says: 'Behold, I am bringing such a disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that whoever hears about it, ^(C1)both of his ears will ring.

'^(C1)I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria and the plummet of the house of Ahab, and I will wipe Jerusalem clean just as one wipes a bowl, wiping it and turning it upside down.

'And I will abandon the remnant of My inheritance and hand them over to their enemies, and they will become as plunder and spoils to all their enemies,

because they have done evil in My sight, and have been provoking Me to anger since the day their fathers came from Egypt, even to this day.'"

^(C1)Furthermore, Manasseh shed very much innocent blood until he had filled Jerusalem ^(F1)from one end to another, besides his sin ^(C2)into which he misled Judah, in doing evil in the sight of the LORD.

^(C1)Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh and all that he did, and his sin which he ^(F1)committed, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

^(C1)And Manasseh ^(F1)lay down with his fathers and was buried in the garden of his own house, ^(C2)in the garden of Uzza, and his son Amon became king in his place.

^(C1)Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned for two years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Meshullemeth the daughter of Haruz of Jotbah.

He did evil in the sight of the LORD, ^(C1)just as his father Manasseh had done.

For he walked ^(F1)entirely in the way that his father had walked, and served the idols that his father had served, and worshiped them.

So ^(C1)he abandoned the LORD, the God of his fathers, and did not walk in the way of the LORD.

And ^(C1)the servants of Amon conspired against him and killed the king in his own house.

Then ^(C1)the people of the land ^(F1)killed all those who had conspired against King Amon, and the people of the land made his son Josiah king in his place.

Now the rest of the acts of Amon which he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

He was buried in his grave ^(C1)in the garden of Uzza, and his son Josiah became king in his place.