The Second Book of Kings, starting at chapter 19
{19:1} It happened, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he tore his
clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house
of the LORD. {19:2} 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. {19:3} They said to
him, "Thus says Hezekiah, 'This day is a day of trouble, of rebuke,
and of rejection; for the children have come to the point of birth,
and there is no strength to deliver them. {19:4} It may be the LORD
your God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of
Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke
the words which the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up your
prayer for the remnant that is left.'"
{19:5} So the servants of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah. {19:6}
Isaiah said to them, "Thus you shall tell your master, 'Thus says the
LORD, "Don't be afraid of the words that you have heard, with which
the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. {19:7} Behold,
I will put a spirit in him, and he will hear news, and will return to
his own land. I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land."'"
{19:8} So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring
against Libnah; for he had heard that he had departed from Lachish.
{19:9} When he heard it said of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, "Behold, he
has come out to fight against you, he sent messengers again to
Hezekiah, saying, {19:10} 'Thus you shall speak to Hezekiah king of
Judah, saying, "Don't let your God in whom you trust deceive you,
saying, Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of
Assyria. {19:11} Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have
done to all lands, by destroying them utterly. Will you be delivered?
{19:12} Have the gods of the nations delivered them, which my fathers
have destroyed, Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden
that were in Telassar? {19:13} Where is the king of Hamath, and the
king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and
Ivvah?"'"
{19:14} Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the
messengers, and read it. Then Hezekiah went up to the house of the
LORD, and spread it before the LORD. {19:15} Hezekiah prayed before
the LORD, and said, "LORD, the God of Israel, who sit above the
cherubim, you are the God, even you alone, of all the kingdoms of the
earth. You have made heaven and earth. {19:16} Incline your ear, LORD,
and hear. Open your eyes, LORD, and see. Hear the words of
Sennacherib, with which he has sent to defy the living God. {19:17}
Truly, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and
their lands, {19:18} 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. {19:19} Now therefore, LORD our God, save
us, I beg you, out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may
know that you, LORD, are God alone."
{19:20} Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, "Thus
says the LORD, the God of Israel, 'Whereas you have prayed to me
against Sennacherib king of Assyria, I have heard you. {19:21} This is
the word that the LORD has spoken concerning him: "The virgin daughter
of Zion has despised you and ridiculed you. The daughter of Jerusalem
has shaken her head at you. {19:22} Whom have you defied and
blasphemed? Against whom have you exalted your voice and lifted up
your eyes on high? Against the Holy One of Israel. {19:23} By your
messengers you have defied the Lord, and have said, 'With the
multitude of my chariots, I have come up to the height of the
mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon; and I will cut down its
tall cedars, and its choice fir trees; and I will enter into his
farthest lodging place, the forest of his fruitful field. {19:24} I
have dug and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet will I
dry up all the rivers of Egypt.' {19:25} Haven't you heard how I have
done it long ago, and formed it of ancient times? Now have I brought
it to pass, that it should be yours to lay waste fortified cities into
ruinous heaps. {19:26} Therefore their inhabitants were of small
power. They were dismayed and confounded. They were like the grass of
the field, and like the green herb, like the grass on the housetops,
and like grain blasted before it has grown up. {19:27} But I know your
sitting down, and your going out, and your coming in, and your raging
against me. {19:28} Because of your raging against me, and because
your arrogance 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."
{19:29} "'This shall be the sign to you: You shall eat this year
that which grows of itself, and in the second year that which springs
of the same; and in the third year sow, and reap, and plant vineyards,
and eat its fruit. {19:30} The remnant that has escaped of the house
of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward.
{19:31} For out of Jerusalem a remnant will go out, and out of Mount
Zion those who shall escape. The zeal of the LORD will perform this.'
{19:32} "Therefore thus says the LORD concerning the king of
Assyria, 'He shall not come to this city, nor shoot an arrow there,
neither shall he come before it with shield, nor cast up a mound
against it. {19:33} By the way that he came, by the same shall he
return, and he shall not come to this city,' says the LORD. {19:34}
'For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake, and for my
servant David's sake.'"
{19:35} It happened that night, that the angel of the LORD went out,
and struck one hundred eighty-five thousand in the camp of the
Assyrians. When men arose early in the morning, behold, these were all
dead bodies. {19:36} So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went
and returned, and lived at Nineveh. {19:37} It happened, as he was
worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and
Sharezer struck him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of
Ararat. Esar Haddon his son reigned in his place.
{20:1} In those days was Hezekiah sick to death. Isaiah the prophet
the son of Amoz came to him, and said to him, "Thus says the LORD,
'Set your house in order; for you shall die, and not live.'"
{20:2} Then he turned his face to the wall, and prayed to the LORD,
saying, {20:3} "Remember now, LORD, I beg you, how I have walked
before you in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which
is good in your sight." Hezekiah wept bitterly.
{20:4} It happened, before Isaiah had gone out into the middle part
of the city, that the word of the LORD came to him, saying, {20:5}
"Turn back, and tell Hezekiah the prince of my people, 'Thus says the
LORD, the God of David your father, "I have heard your prayer. I have
seen your tears. Behold, I will heal you. On the third day, you shall
go up to the house of the LORD. {20:6} I will add to your days fifteen
years. I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of
Assyria. I will defend this city for my own sake, and for my servant
David's sake."'"
{20:7} Isaiah said, "Take a cake of figs."
They took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered. {20:8} Hezekiah
said to Isaiah, "What shall be the sign that the LORD will heal me,
and that I shall go up to the house of the LORD the third day?"
{20:9} Isaiah said, "This shall be the sign to you from the LORD,
that the LORD will do the thing that he has spoken: shall the shadow
go forward ten steps, or go back ten steps?"
{20:10} Hezekiah answered, "It is a light thing for the shadow to go
forward ten steps. Nay, but let the shadow return backward ten steps."
{20:11} Isaiah the prophet cried to the LORD; and he brought the
shadow ten steps backward, by which it had gone down on the dial of
Ahaz.
{20:12} At that time Berodach Baladan the son of Baladan, king of
Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah; for he had heard that
Hezekiah had been sick. {20:13} Hezekiah listened to them, and showed
them all the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold,
and the spices, and the precious oil, and the house of his armor, and
all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house,
nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah didn't show them. {20:14} Then
Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah, and said to him, "What did
these men say? From where did they come to you?"
Hezekiah said, "They have come from a far country, even from
Babylon."
{20:15} He said, "What have they seen in your house?"
Hezekiah answered, "They have seen all that is in my house. There is
nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them."
{20:16} Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the LORD. {20:17}
'Behold, the days come, that all that is in your house, and that which
your fathers have laid up in store to this day, shall be carried to
Babylon. Nothing shall be left,' says the LORD. {20:18} 'Of your sons
who shall issue from you, whom you shall father, shall they take away;
and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.'"
{20:19} Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD which
you have spoken is good." He said moreover, "Isn't it so, if peace and
truth shall be in my days?"
{20:20} Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and all his might, and
how he made the pool, and the conduit, and brought water into the
city, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings
of Judah? {20:21} Hezekiah slept with his fathers; and Manasseh his
son reigned in his place.
{21:1} Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign; and he
reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was
Hephzibah. {21:2} He did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD,
after the abominations of the nations whom the LORD cast out before
the children of Israel. {21:3} For he built again the high places
which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he reared up altars for
Baal, and made an Asherah, as did Ahab king of Israel, and worshiped
all the army of the sky, and served them. {21:4} He built altars in
the house of the LORD, of which the LORD said, "I will put my name in
Jerusalem." {21:5} He built altars for all the army of the sky in the
two courts of the house of the LORD. {21:6} He made his son to pass
through the fire, and practiced sorcery, and used enchantments, and
dealt with those who had familiar spirits, and with wizards: he worked
much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger. {21:7} He
set the engraved image of Asherah, that he had made, in the house of
which the LORD said to David and to Solomon his son, "In this house,
and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel,
will I put my name forever; {21:8} neither will I cause the feet of
Israel to wander any more out of the land which I gave their fathers,
if only they will observe to do according to all that I have commanded
them, and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded
them." {21:9} But they didn't listen: and Manasseh seduced them to do
that which is evil more than the nations did whom the LORD destroyed
before the children of Israel. {21:10} The LORD spoke by his servants
the prophets, saying, {21:11} "Because Manasseh king of Judah has done
these abominations, and has done wickedly above all that the Amorites
did, who were before him, and has made Judah also to sin with his
idols; {21:12} therefore thus says the LORD, the God of Israel,
'Behold, I bring such evil on Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears
of it, both his ears shall tingle. {21:13} I will stretch over
Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab;
and I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipes a dish, wiping it and turning
it upside down. {21:14} I will cast off the remnant of my inheritance,
and deliver them into the hand of their enemies. They will become a
prey and a spoil to all their enemies; {21:15} because they have done
that which is evil in my sight, and have provoked me to anger, since
the day their fathers came forth out of Egypt, even to this day.'"
{21:16} Moreover Manasseh shed innocent blood very much, until he
had filled Jerusalem from one end to another; besides his sin with
which he made Judah to sin, in doing that which was evil in the sight
of the LORD. {21:17} Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh, and all
that he did, and his sin that he sinned, aren't they written in the
book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? {21:18} Manasseh slept
with his fathers, and was buried in the garden of his own house, in
the garden of Uzza: and Amon his son reigned in his place. {21:19}
Amon was twenty-two years old when he began to reign; and he reigned
two years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Meshullemeth the
daughter of Haruz of Jotbah. {21:20} He did that which was evil in the
sight of the LORD, as Manasseh his father did. {21:21} He walked in
all the way that his father walked in, and served the idols that his
father served, and worshiped them: {21:22} and he forsook the LORD,
the God of his fathers, and didn't walk in the way of the LORD.
{21:23} The servants of Amon conspired against him, and put the king
to death in his own house. {21:24} But the people of the land killed
all those who had conspired against king Amon; and the people of the
land made Josiah his son king in his place. {21:25} Now the rest of
the acts of Amon which he did, aren't they written in the book of the
chronicles of the kings of Judah? {21:26} He was buried in his tomb in
the garden of Uzza: and Josiah his son reigned in his place.
________________________________________________________________________
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