Isaiah 37 · The Lantern

Isaiah’s Message of Deliverance

And it happened, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD.

And he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz.

And they said to him, Thus says Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of blasphemy: for the children have come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth.

It may be the LORD your God will hear the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to reproach the living God, and will reprove the words which the LORD your God has heard: therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.

So the servants of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

And Isaiah said to them, Thus shall you say to your master, Thus says the LORD, Be not afraid of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.

Look, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumor, and return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.

Sennacherib’s Blasphemous Letter

So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah: for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish.

And he heard say concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, He has come forth to make war with you. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

Thus shall you speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Let not your God, in whom you trust, deceive you, saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

Look, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly; and shall you be delivered?

Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden which were in Telassar?

Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arphad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah?

Hezekiah’s Prayer

And Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up to the house of the LORD, and spread it before the LORD.

And Hezekiah prayed to the LORD, saying,

O LORD of hosts, God of Israel, that dwell between the cherubim, you are the God, even you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth: you have made heaven and earth.

Incline your ear, O LORD, and hear; open your eyes, O LORD, and see: and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which has sent to reproach the living God.

Of a truth, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations, and their countries,

And have cast their gods into the fire: for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone: therefore they have destroyed them.

Now therefore, O LORD our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you are the LORD, even you only.

Sennacherib’s Fall Prophesied

Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus says the LORD God of Israel, Whereas you have prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria:

This is the word which the LORD has spoken concerning him; The virgin, the daughter of Zion, has despised you, and laughed you to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at you.

Whom have you reproached and blasphemed? and against whom have you exalted your voice, and lifted up your eyes on high? even against the Holy One of Israel.

By your servants have you reproached the Lord, and have said, By the multitude of my chariots have I come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon; and I will cut down its tall cedars, and its choice fir trees: and I will enter into the height of his border, and the forest of his Carmel.

I have dug, and drunk water; and with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of the besieged places.

Have you not heard long ago, how I have done it; and of ancient times, that I have formed it? now have I brought it to pass, that you should be to lay waste defenced cities into ruinous heaps.

Therefore their inhabitants were of small power, they were dismayed and confounded: they were as the grass of the field, and as the green herb, as the grass on the housetops, and as grain blasted before it be grown up.

But I know your dwelling, and your going out, and your coming in, and your rage against me.

Because your rage against me, and your tumult, has come up into my ears, therefore will I put my hook in your nose, and my bridle in your lips, and I will turn you back by the way by which you came.

And this shall be a sign to you, You shall eat this year such as grows of itself; and the second year that which springs of the same: and in the third year sow you, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat its fruit.

And the remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward:

For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and they that escape out of mount Zion: the zeal of the LORD of hosts shall do this.

Therefore thus says the LORD concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shields, nor cast a bank against it.

By the way that he came, by the same shall he return, and shall not come into this city, says the LORD.

For I will defend this city to save it for my own sake, and for my servant David’s sake.

Jerusalem Delivered from the Assyrians

Then the angel of the LORD went forth, and struck in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, look, they were all dead corpses.

So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.

And it happened, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons struck him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia: and Esar-haddon his son reigned in his place.