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Preface
The story of the siege of Jerusalem in 701 BCE is reported
in Isaiah, II Kings, and II Chronicles, and is mentioned or
alluded to elsewhere in the Book of Isaiah. Whether you read
the Isaiah version given here or the II Kings parallel text,
it's clear that God and Isaiah (by association) come out the
heroes, while Hezekiah is seen as little more than a bumbler
whose efforts to save Jerusalem are seen as irrelevant in
the light of God's pre-ordained plan.
Try to withhold judgment on this passage until you've read
the text which follows it from II Chronicles. Composed centuries
later than the Isaiah text, although quite possibly based
on contemporary sources, the II Chronicles version of the
siege offers a completely different view of who was the real
hero, even giving him a brief soliloquy reminiscent of Shakespeare's
Henry V before the Battle of Agincourt.
Isaiah 36:1-37:38
(36:1) In the fourteenth year (of the reign) of Hezekiah,
Sennacherib, King of Assyria, came out against and conquered
all the walled cities of Judah. (36:2) The King of Assyria
sent (the) Ravshaqeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah
with a massive army. He (the Ravshaqeh) stood beside the watercourse
of the Upper Pool by the road of the Fuller's Field. (36:3)
Eliakim, Ben-Hilkiah, who was major domo, Shebna the scribe,
and Yoah, Ben-Asaph, the recorder, went out to (meet) him.
(36:4) (The) Ravshaqeh said to them, "Please say to Hezekiah:
Thus says the Great King the King of Assyria-'What security
is this (in) which you have trusted? (36:5) (What) you say
is but empty words, plans of valor for war! Now on whom have
you placed your trust that you now rebel against me? (36:6)
Look, you have placed your trust on the support of that broken
reed, on Egypt! When a man leans on it, it stabs him in the
hand. That's what Pharaoh, King of Egypt is to all who place
their trust in him!
(36:7) Now if you would say to me--'we have trusted in Adonai
(the Lord) our God'--was it not He whose high places and altars
Hezekiah took away, saying to Judah and Jerusalem--'you shall
worship only before this altar!' (36:8) And now, make a deal,
please, with my lord, the King of Assyria: I will give to
you 2,000 horses; that is, if you can provide riders for them!
(36:9) How can you defeat even a provincial governor, on of
the least of my lord's servants, when you entrust yourselves
to Egypt for chariots and horsemen? (36:10) And now, it without
the Lord that I have come up to this land to ruin it? The
Lord (Himself) said to me: 'Go up to this land and lay it
waste!' "
(36:11) Eliakim, Shebna, and Yoah said to (the) Ravshaqeh:
"Please speak to your servants in Aramaic because we are fluent
in it, and don't speak to us in Judean/Hebrew within earshot
of the people on the wall." (36:12) But (the) Ravshaqeh replied,
"Did my lord send me to your lord and to you to speak these
words, and not to the people sitting on the wall who will
be eating their own shit and drinking their own piss with
you?" (36:13) (The) Ravshaqeh stood and shouted at the top
of his voice in Hebrew and said, "Listen to the words of the
Great King, the King of Assyria.
(36:14) Thus says the King: "Do not let Hezekiah deceive
you, for he cannot deliver you! (36:15) Do not let Hezekiah
convince you to trust the Lord, saying, 'The Lord will surely
save us. This city will not be given into the land of the
King of Assyria!' (36:16) Don't listen to Hezekiah! Thus speaks
the King of Assyria-'make a blessing (do yourselves a favor)
with me and come out to me, so that every man can eat (the
fruit) of his own vine and fig tree and drink (water) from
his own cistern, (36:17) until I come and take you to land
like your land: a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread
and vineyards.
(36:18) Should Hezekiah incite you, saying, 'The Lord will
deliver us! Did the gods of the nations deliver, each his
own land, from the hand of the King of Assyria? (36:19) Where
are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sefarvayim?
Did they deliver Shomron (Israel) from my hand? (36:20) Who
of all the gods of these countries was there who delivered
his country from my hands (to make you think that) Adonai/the
Lord will deliver Jerusalem from my hand?'"
(36:21) But they kept silent and did not answer him a word
because of the order of the king, "You will not answer him."
(36:22) Eliakim Ben-Hilkiah, who was major domo, Shebna the
scribe, and Yoah Ben-Asaph, the recorder went to Hezekiah,
rending their garments. The reported to him the words of (the)
Ravshaqeh. (37:1) On hearing this, King Hezekiah rent his
clothing, covered himself in sackcloth, and went to the Temple.
(37:2) Then he sent Eliakim the major domo, Shebna the scribe,
and the elders of the priests who were dressed in sackcloth
to Isaiah Ben-Amotz, the Prophet. (37:3) They told him what
Hezekiah had said, 'This day is a day of travail, rebuke and
contempt, for infants are at the breach, there is no strength
to deliver them. (37:4) Perhaps the Lord your God hears the
words of (the) Ravshaqeh whom the King of Assyria, his lord,
has sent to taunt the Living God. He will rebuke with the
words which the Lord your God has heard. You will raise up
a prayer for t he remnant which is left (in this city<
1Q DSS).'
(37:5) When the servants of King Hezekiah went to Isaiah,
(37:6) Isaiah said to them, "Thus will you say to your master:
So speaks Adonai/the Lord--'Do not be afraid in the face of
the words which you have heard, with which the followers of
the King of Assyria have reviled me. (37:7) Behold, I am giving
him a notion (premonition). He will hear a rumor. He will
return to his land. The I will make him fall by the sword
in his land.'"
(37:8) The Ravshakeh returned because he had heard that the
King of Assyria had set out from Lachish. He found him (the
king) fighting against Libnah. (37:9) He (the King of Assyria)
had heard a report about Tirhakah, King of Cush (Egypt), saying,
"He has gone out to fight against you." Having heard this,
he returned and sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying, (37:10)
"Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah: 'Do not let your God in
whom you trust deceive you, saying, 'Jerusalem shall not be
given into the hand of the King of Assyria. (37:11) Behold,
you have heard what the Kings of Assyria have done to all
lands, destroying them, but you will be saved? (37:12) Did
the gods of (other) nations which my fathers (predecessors)
destroyed (actually) save them: Gozan, Haran, Resheph, and
the B'nai-Eden who were at Telassar? (37:13) Where is the
king of Hamath? Of Arpad? Of Lair? Of Sefarvayim? Of Hena?
Of Ivvah? (alternative reading: of Shomron/Israel?<IQ Isaiah,
Dead Sea Scr oll, Cave 1).
(37:14) (Then) Hezekiah took the documents from the hand
of the messengers and read them. He went up to the House of
the Lord (the Temple) and Hezekiah spread them out before
the Lord. (37:15) Hezekiah prayed to the Lord: (37:16) "O
Lord of Hosts, God of Israel, seated upon the Cherubim: You
are the God, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth;
You made the heavens and the earth. (37:17) O Lord, incline
your ear and hear! O Lord, open your eyes and see! Hear all
the words of Sennacherib which he sent to revile the Living
God! (37:18) Surely, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid
waste all the peoples and their land, (37:19) and have cast
their gods in the fire because they were not gods, but certainly
the work of the hands of man, (mere) wood and stone. So they
destroyed them. (37:20) But now, O Lord, our God, deliver
us from his hand so that all the kingdoms of the earth may
know that You alone are the Lord (God)."
(37:21) Isaiah, son of Amoz, sent (word) to Hezekiah: "Thus
spoke the Lord, God of Israel, 'Because you have prayed to
me concerning Sennacherib, King of Assyria, <I have hearkened>.
This is the word which the Lord has spoken about him:
She despises you, she scorns you, the virgin daughter of
Zion;
She shakes her head at you, the daughter of Jerusalem.
(37:23) Whom have you reviled and blasphemed?
Against whom have you raised your voice?
You have raised up your eyes on high, toward the Holy One/Place(?)
of Israel!
Through your servants, you have reviled the Lord;
You have said: 'With my many chariots, I have gone up to the
mountain tops, to the farthest parts of Lebanon.
I have cut the tallest cedars, the choicest cypresses.
I have gone to the farthest limit, its dense forest.
(37:25) It is I who have dug and drunk waters.
I lay waste all the streams of Egypt with the sole of my foot.'
(37:26) Did you not hear? From long ago, I accomplished it!
From days of old, I designed it. Now I have brought it to
pass:
Fortified cities are laid waste as devastated heaps.
(37:27) Their inhabitants, feeble of hand (alt: hands cut
off),
dismayed and ashamed,
They were the straw of an (open) field, green shoots of grass,
quickly fading grass on rooftops, blasted before the East
Wind
(37:28) I know your getting up and your sitting down, your
comings
and your goings. (I know) your raging against Me!
(37:29) (Because of your raging against Me), and your arrogance
rising to my ears,
I have put my hook in your nose, and my bit in your mouth.
I will make you turn around and go back the way you came.
(37:30) (Now) let this be a sign for you (people of Judah):
This year, eat the after-growth and in the second year, the
volunteer growth (whatever grows up on its own).
But in the third year, sow and harvest, plant orchards, and
eat their fruits.
(37:31) The spared ones of the House of Judah will continue;
the remnant will take root down below, and will bear fruit
upwards.
(37:32) For a remnant will go forth from Jerusalem, and the
spared
ones from Mt. Zion--the zeal of the Lord of Hosts will bring
it about!"
(37:33) So, the Lord spoke thus concerning the King of Assyria:
'He will not come into the city,
he will not shoot an arrow here, he will not advance a shield,
nor will he pile up siege ramps.
(37:34) By the (same) road on which he came, he shall return.
Into this city he shall not come. It is the utterance of the
Lord!
(37:35) I will defend this city to save it, for My sake and
the sake
of David, my servant.
(37:36) (On that night), a messenger of the Lord went out
and struck the Assyrian encampment, 185,000. (The Judeans
of Jerusalem) arose the next morning to see that they were
all dead carcasses! (37:37) And so Sennacherib, King of Assyria,
went and returned, dwelling in Nineveh. (37:38) Now it came
to pass (while) he was worshipping in the temple of his god,
Nisrok, that Adramelek and Saretzer, his sons, struck him
down by the sword. They escaped to the land of Ararat, and
Esarhaddon, his son, reigned in his place.
Note: The preceding translation was produced by the students
of my Lehrhaus Advanced Biblical Hebrew course in 1996. Our
approach was to translate and debate the grammatical, comparative
textual, historical and archaeological issues associated with
each verse. While some Biblical scholars may debate the final
translation below (we hope they do), we hope our collective
effort will serve as a passable rendering of the text. I would
like to thank the following students who participated in our
Advanced Hebrew course:Jed Appelman, Stephen Agetstein, Rose
Falanga, Jehon Grist, Arnold Kochman, Tom McCarthy, Irwin
Mussen, Cassandra Monteith, Gary Ost, Henry Shay, Cy Silver,
Ann Singer, Charlotte Snider, Julie Tsivia, Martha Ann Wishnev.
II Chronicles 32: 1-22
The Siege of Jerusalem
(32:1) After these faithful acts, Sennacherib the king of
Assyria came and invaded Judah, and laid siege to the fortified
cities with the thought of conquering them. (2) When Hezekiah
saw that Sennacherib had come with the main purpose of making
war on Jerusalem, (3) he consulted with his chiefs and warriors
about closing up the water courses outside the city; they
supported him. (4) A large number of people were brought together
to stop up all the springs and the brook that ran through
the midst of the land, saying, "Why should the kings
of Assyria find abundant water when they come?" (5) He
also went to work with determination and repaired every section
of the wall that was damaged, erected towers upon it, [constructed]
another wall on the outside, strengthened the Millo of the
city of David, and made a large quantity of spears and shields.
(6) He placed military officers in charge of the people, summoned
them to himself on the plaza at the city gate, and spoke directly
to them as follows: "Be strong and courageous, do not
be afraid or tremble before the king of Assyria and all the
multitude accompanying him, for those with us are more than
those with him. (8) He has only human power but we have the
Lord our God to help us and to fight our battle." The
people were encouraged by the words of Hezekiah the king of
Judah.
(9) After this, while he and all his command were at Lachish,
Sennacherib sent his servants to Jerusalem, and Hezekiah and
all Judah at Jerusalem with the following message: (10) Thus
has Sennacherib the king of Assyria said: 'In what do you
put your confidence, you who sit in the fortress of Jerusalem?
(11) Is not Hezekiah deluding you in order to deliver you
to death by famine and thirst when he says, 'The Lord our
God will save us from the hand of the king of Assyria?' (12)
Is Hezekiah not the one who removed his high places and his
altars and said to Judah and Jerusalem, 'Before one altar
you must worship and upon it burn incense'? (13) Don't you
know what I and my fathers did to all the peoples of the lands?
Were the gods of the nations of the lands able at all to deliver
their land from my hand? (14) Who among all the gods of these
nations whom my fathers devoted to destruction was able to
deliver his people from my hand, that your God should be able
to deliver you from my hand? (15) Now, do not let Hezekiah
mislead you; do not let him delude you like this; do not believe
him. No god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his
people from my hand or the hand of my fathers; how much less
can your God deliver you from my hand?'"
(16) His servants spoke still further against the Lord God
and Hezekiah his servant. (17) He also wrote letters to insult
the Lord God of Israel and spoke against him, saying, "As
the gods of the nations of the lands could not deliver their
people from my hand, so the God of Hezekiah cannot deliver
his people from my hand." (18) Then they shouted with
a loud voice in the Jewish language to the people of Jerusalem
who stood on the wall to frighten and terrify them, hoping
to capture the city. (19) They spoke against the God of Jerusalem
as [they had] against the gods of the peoples of the earth
which were the product of men's hands. (20) Then Hezekiah
the king and Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, prayed about
this and cried to the heavens. (21) Then the Lord sent a messenger
who destroyed every might man, leader and captain in the camp
of the king of Assyria; so he had to return to his country
shamefacedly and when he entered the house of his god his
own offs pring there struck him down with the sword. (22)
So the Lord saved Hezekiah and the citizens of Jerusalem from
the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria and from the hand
of all [others] and gave them peace on every side.
Source: Jacob Myers, II Chronicles (Anchor Bible,
vol. 13; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday and Co., 1983), 185-187
(with minor editing).
Clearly, the writer of the II Chronicles passage sees Hezekiah
as the true hero, a worthy descendant of King David himself.
Isaiah is barely mentioned, and then only as someone who prayed
with Hezekiah at an especially dire moment. Although this
is a later text in terms of its final editing, the historical
and archaeological context of this incident would seem to
back Hezekiah's wall and water tunnel building as critical
to the survival of Jerusalem. In the end, the choice of which
story to believe is yours.
If you really enjoy historical detective work, here's a final
challenge: read Sennacherib's own version of this campaign.
Just click on the underlined word Sennacherib when it first
appears in the main text of Part 2 of "Journey Through Jerusalem."
Or just go to the glossary
and look up the article "Sennacherib". Have fun.
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