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ISAIAH INSTITUTE TRANSLATION

  Isaiah

36

Isaiah 36

The king of Assyria invades many lands and lays siege to a remnant of Jehovah’s people in Jerusalem.

1 In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah’s reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria marched against all the fortified cities of Judea and seized them. 2 And the king of Assyria sent Rabshakeh with a large army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. And he took up a position by the aqueduct of the Upper Reservoir, on the road to the Laundry Plaza. 3 And Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, overseer of the palace, Shebna the secretary, and Joah the son of Asaph, the record keeper, went out to him.
4 And Rabshakeh said to them, Please tell Hezekiah, Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: On what grounds do you behave with such confidence? 5 Do you suppose that in war mere words are sufficient tactics or show of strength? In whom have you put your trust, that you have rebelled against me? 6 It is clear you depend on the support of Egypt, that splintered reed which enters and pierces the palm of any man who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who rely on him! 7 But if you tell me, We rely on Jehovah our God, is he not the one whose shrines and altars Hezekiah abolished, telling Judea and Jerusalem to worship only at this altar? 8 Come now, wager with my lord the king of Assyria: I will give you two thousand horses, if you are able to put riders on them. 9 How then shall you repulse even one of the least of my lord’s servants, depending as you do on Egypt for chariots and horsemen? 10 Moreover, could I have marched against this land and destroyed it without Jehovah? For Jehovah told me to come against this land and destroy it.
11 Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to Rabshakeh, please speak to your servants in Aramaic, which we understand. Do not speak to us in Judean in the ears of the people who are on the wall.
12 But Rabshakeh replied, Did my lord send me to say these things to you and to your lord and not to the men sitting on the wall, who with you are to eat their own dung and drink their own urine?
13 Then Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in Judean, Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria! 14 Thus says the king: Do not let Hezekiah delude you! He cannot deliver you. 15 Do not let Hezekiah make you trust in Jehovah by saying, Jehovah will surely save us; this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.
16 Do not listen to Hezekiah! Thus says the king of Assyria: Make peace with me by coming out to me. Then every one of you will eat from his own vine and his own fig tree and drink water from his own cistern, 17 until I come back and take you to a land like your own, a land of grain and wine, a land of grain fields and vineyards.
18 Beware, lest Hezekiah mislead you by saying, Jehovah will save us. Were any gods of the nations able to save their lands out of the hand of the king of Assyria? 19 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Did they deliver Samaria out of my hand? 20 Who of all the gods of those countries saved his land from my hand, that Jehovah should save Jerusalem from my hand?
21 But they remained silent, replying nothing, for the king had commanded them not to answer him.
22 Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, overseer of the palace, Shebna the secretary, and Joah the son of Asaph, the record keeper, went to Hezekiah with their clothes rent and reported to him the things Rabshakeh had said.



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