When king Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into Yahweh’s house.
Parallel Translations
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When king Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into Yahweh’s house.
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And it came to pass, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD.
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And it came to pass, when king Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD.
Cross-references (18)
Passages linked to 2 Kings 19:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 1 Kings 21:27 When Ahab heard those words, he tore his clothes, and put sackcloth on his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly.
- 2 Kings 18:37 Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, came with Shebna the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder, to Hezekiah with their clothes torn, and told him Rabshakeh’s words.
- Genesis 37:34 Jacob tore his clothes, and put sackcloth on his waist, and mourned for his son many days.
- 2 Chronicles 32:20-22 Hezekiah the king and Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz, prayed because of this, and cried to heaven. Yahweh sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty men of valor, and the leaders and captains, in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned with shame of face to his own land. When he had come into the house of his god, those who came out of his own body killed him there with the sword. Thus Yahweh saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria and from the hand of all others, and guided them on every side.
- Job 1:20-21 Then Job arose, and tore his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down on the ground, and worshiped. He said, “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked will I return there. Yahweh gave, and Yahweh has taken away. Blessed be Yahweh’s name.”
- Isaiah 37:1-7 When king Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into Yahweh’s house. 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. They said to him, “Hezekiah says, ‘Today is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the birth, and there is no strength to give birth. It may be Yahweh your God will hear the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.’ ” So the servants of king Hezekiah came to Isaiah. Isaiah said to them, “Tell your master, ‘Yahweh says, “Don’t be afraid of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me. 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.” ’ ”
- 1 Samuel 4:12 A man of Benjamin ran out of the army and came to Shiloh the same day, with his clothes torn and with dirt on his head.
- 1 Kings 21:29 “See how Ahab humbles himself before me? Because he humbles himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days; but I will bring the evil on his house in his son’s day.”
- 2 Kings 5:7 When the king of Israel had read the letter, he tore his clothes, and said, “Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man sends to me to heal a man of his leprosy? But please consider and see how he seeks a quarrel against me.”
- 2 Kings 6:30 When the king heard the words of the woman, he tore his clothes. Now he was passing by on the wall, and the people looked, and behold, he had sackcloth underneath on his body.
- 2 Chronicles 7:15-16 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to prayer that is made in this place. For now I have chosen and made this house holy, that my name may be there forever; and my eyes and my heart will be there perpetually.
- Ezra 9:3 When I heard this thing, I tore my garment and my robe, and pulled the hair out of my head and of my beard, and sat down confounded.
- Esther 4:1-4 Now when Mordecai found out all that was done, Mordecai tore his clothes, and put on sackcloth with ashes, and went out into the middle of the city, and wailed loudly and bitterly. He came even before the king’s gate, for no one is allowed inside the king’s gate clothed with sackcloth. In every province, wherever the king’s commandment and his decree came, there was great mourning among the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing; and many lay in sackcloth and ashes. Esther’s maidens and her eunuchs came and told her this, and the queen was exceedingly grieved. She sent clothing to Mordecai, to replace his sackcloth; but he didn’t receive it.
- Psalms 35:13 But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth. I afflicted my soul with fasting. My prayer returned into my own bosom.
- Jeremiah 36:24 The king and his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, and didn’t tear their garments.
- Jonah 3:8 but let them be covered with sackcloth, both man and animal, and let them cry mightily to God. Yes, let them turn everyone from his evil way, and from the violence that is in his hands.
- Matthew 11:21 “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works had been done in Tyre and Sidon which were done in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
- Matthew 26:65 Then the high priest tore his clothing, saying, “He has spoken blasphemy! Why do we need any more witnesses? Behold, now you have heard his blasphemy.
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 2Ki 19:1 And it came to pass, when king…
2Ki 19:1 And it came to pass, when king Hezekiah heard [it], that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD.
Ver. 1. And it came to pass, when king Hezekiah heard it.] And a great deal more, against the Lord and himself, than is recorded in the former chapter. See 2Ch 32:16. It is easy to wag a wicked tongue; these dead dogs will be barking and blaspheming without measure, till God please to gag them. Hezekiah hasteth hereupon to God’s house, there to say, as Abisha once did to David, Why should these dead dogs curse my Lord the King of glory? As for Rabshakeh, he seems to say unto him, Sirrah, we will complain of you to one that shall shortly take you to task.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain The contents of Rabshakeh's speech being brought to Hezekiah,…
The contents of Rabshakeh's speech being brought to Hezekiah, one would have expected (and it is likely Rabshakeh did expect) that he would call a council of war and it would be debated whether it was best to capitulate or no. Before the siege, he had taken counsel with his princes and his mighty men, Ch2 32:3. But that would not do now; his greatest relief is that he has a God to go to, and what passed between him and his God on this occasion we have here an account of.
I. Hezekiah discovered a deep concern at the dishonour done to God by Rabshakeh's blasphemy. When he heard it, though at second hand, he rent his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth, Kg2 19:1. Good men were wont to do so when they heard of any reproach cast on God's name; and great men must not think it any disparagement to them to sympathize with the injured honour of the great God. Royal robes are not too good to be rent, nor royal flesh too good to be clothed with sackcloth, in humiliation for indignities done to God and for the perils and terrors of his Jerusalem. To this God now called, and was displeased with those who were not thus affected. Isa 22:12-14, Behold joy and gladness, slaying oxen and killing sheep, though it was a day of trouble and perplexity in the valley of vision (Kg2 19:5), which refers to this very event. The king was in sackcloth, but many of his subjects were in soft clothing.
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II. He went up to the house of the Lord, according to the example of the psalmist, who, when he was grieved at the pride and prosperity of the wicked, went into the sanctuary of God and there understood their end, Psa 73:17. He went to the house of God, to meditate and pray, and get his spirit into a sedate composed frame, after this agitation. He was not considering what answer to return to Rabshakeh, but refers the matter to God. "Thou shalt answer, Lord, for me." - Herbert. In the house of the Lord he found a place both of rest and refuge, a treasury, a magazine, a council-chamber, and all he needed, all in God. Note, When the church's enemies are very daring and threatening it is the wisdom and duty of the church's friends to apply to God, appeal to him, and leave their cause with him.
III. He sent to the prophet Isaiah, by honourable messengers, in token of the great respect he had for him, to desire his prayers, Kg2 19:2-4. Eliakim and Shebna were two of those that had heard the words of Rabshakeh and were the better able both to acquaint and to affect Isaiah with the case. The elders of the priests were themselves to pray for the people in time of trouble (Joe 2:17); but they must go to engage Isaiah's prayers, because he could pray better and had a better interest in heaven. The messengers were to go in sackcloth, because they were to represent the king, who was so clothed.
1. Their errand to Isaiah was, "Lift up thy prayer for the remnant that is left, that is, for Judah, which is but a remnant now that the ten tribes are gone - for Jerusalem, which is but a remnant now that the defenced cities of Judah are taken." Note, (1.) It is very desirable, and what we should be desirous of when we are in trouble, to have the prayers of our friends for us. In begging to have them we honour God, we honour prayer, and we honour our brethren. (2.) When we desire the prayers of others for us we must not think we are excused from praying for ourselves. When Hezekiah sent to Isaiah to pray for him he himself went into the house of the Lord to offer up his own prayers. (3.) Those who speak from God to us we should in a particular manner desire to speak to God for us. He is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, Gen 20:7. The great prophet is the great intercessor. (4.) Those are likely to prevail with God that lift up their prayers, that is, that lift up their hearts in prayer. (5.) When the interests of God's church are brought very low, so that there is but a remnant left, few friends, and those weak and at a loss, then it is time to lift up our prayer for that remnant.
2. Two things are urged to Isaiah, to engage his prayers for them: - (1.) Their fears of the enemy (Kg2 19:3): "He is insolent and haughty; it is a day of rebuke and blasphemy. We are despised. God is dishonoured. Upon this account it is a day of trouble. Never were such a king and kingdom so trampled on and abused as we are: our soul is exceedingly filled with the contempt of the proud, and it is a sword in our bones to hear them reproach our confidence in God, and say, Where is now your God? and, which is worst of all, we see not which way we can help ourselves and get clear of the reproach. Our cause is good, our people are faithful; but we are quite overpowered with numbers. The children are brought to the birth; now is the time, the critical moment, when, if ever, we must be relieved. One successful blow given to the enemy would accomplish our wishes. But, alas! we are not able to give it: There is not strength to bring forth. Our case is as deplorable, and calls for as speedy help, as that of a woman in travail, that is quite spent with her throes, so that she has not strength to bear the child. Compare with this Hos 13:13. We are ready to perish; if thou canst do any thing, have compassion upon us and help us." (2.) Their hopes in God. To him they look, on him they depend, to appear for them. One word from him will turn the scale, and save the sinking remnant. If he but reprove the words of Rabshakeh (that is, disprove them, Kg2 19:4) - if he undertake to convince and confound the blasphemer - all will be well. And this they trust he will do, not for their merit's sake, but for his own honour's sake, because he has reproached the living God, by levelling him with deaf and dumb idols. They have reason to think the issue will be good, for they can interest God in the quarrel. Psa 74:22, Arise O God! plead thy own cause. "He is the Lord thy God," say they to Isaiah - "thine, whose glory thou art concerned for, and whose favour thou art interested in. He has heard and known the blasphemous words of Rabshakeh, and therefore, it may be, he will hear and rebuke them. We hope he will. Help us with thy prayers to bring the cause before him, and then we are content to leave it with him."
IV. God, by Isaiah, sent to Hezekiah, to assure him that he would glorify himself in the ruin of the Assyrians. Hezekiah sent to Isaiah, not to enquire concerning the event, as many did that sent to the prophets (Shall I recover? or the like), but to desire his assistance in his duty. It was this that he was solicitous about; and therefore God let him know what the event should be, in recompence of his care to do his duty, Kg2 19:6, Kg2 19:7. 1. God interested himself in the cause: They have blasphemed me. 2. He encouraged Hezekiah, who was much dismayed: Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard; they are but words (though swelling and fiery words), and words are but wind. 3. He promised to frighten the king of Assyria worse than Rabshakeh had frightened him: "I will send a blast upon him (that pestilential breath which killed his army), upon which terrors shall seize him and drive him into his own country, where death shall meet him." This short threatening from the mouth of God would do execution, when all the impotent menaces that came from Rabshakeh's mouth would vanish into air.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard…
And it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard it,.... The report of Rabshakeh's speech, recorded in the preceding chapter:
that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth; rent his clothes because of the blasphemy in the speech; and he put on sackcloth, in token of mourning, for the calamities he feared were coming on him and his people: and he went into the house of the Lord; the temple, to pray unto him. The message he sent to Isaiah, with his answer, and the threatening letter of the king of Assyria, Hezekiah's prayer upon it, and the encouraging answer he had from the Lord, with the account of the destruction of the Assyrian army, and the death of Sennacherib, are the same "verbatim" as in Isa 37:1 throughout; and therefore the reader is referred thither for the exposition of them; only would add what Rauwolff (t) observes, that still to this day (1575) there are two great holes to be seen, wherein they flung the dead bodies (of the Assyrian army), one whereof is close by the road towards Bethlehem, the other towards the right hand against old Bethel.
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(t) Travels, par. 3. ch. 22. p. 317.
Next: 2 Kings Chapter 20
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Hezekiah sends to Isaiah to desire his prayers, ver.…
Hezekiah sends to Isaiah to desire his prayers, ver. 1-5. And receives from him an answer of peace, ver. 6, 7. Sennacherib sends a threatening letter to Hezekiah, ver. 8-13 Who recommends his case to God, ver. 14-19. God by Isaiah sends him a comfortable message, ver. 20-34. The army of the Assyrians is destroyed, ver. 35-37
Rent his cloaths, &c. - Great men must not think it any disparagement to them, to sympathize with the injured honour of the great God.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Hezekiah is greatly distressed, and sends to Isaiah to…
CHAPTER XIX
Hezekiah is greatly distressed, and sends to Isaiah to pray for
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him, 1-4.
Isaiah returns a comfortable answer, and predicts the
destruction of the king of Assyria and his army, 5-8.
Sennacherib, hearing that his kingdom was invaded by the
Ethiopians, sends a terrible letter to Hezekiah, to induce
him to surrender, 9-13.
Hezekiah goes to the temple, spreads the letter before the
Lord, and makes a most affecting prayer, 14-19.
Isaiah is sent to him to assure him that his prayer is heard;
that Jerusalem shall be delivered; and that the Assyrians
shall be destroyed, 20-34.
That very night a messenger of God slays one hundred and
eighty-five thousand Assyrians, 35.
Sennacherib returns to Nineveh, and is slain by his own sons,
36, 37.
NOTES ON CHAP. XIX
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain 2Ki 19:1. When Hezekiah heard it, he rent his…
2Ki 19:1. When Hezekiah heard it, he rent his clothes — Good men were wont to do so, when they heard of any reproach cast on God’s name; and great men must not think it any disparagement to them to sympathize with the injured honour of the great God.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Hezekiah, like his officers, probably rent his clothes on…
Hezekiah, like his officers, probably rent his clothes on account of Rab-shakeh’s blasphemies: and he put on sackcloth in self-humiliation and in grief. The only hope left was in Yahweh, for Egypt could not be trusted to effect anything of importance. Rab-shakeh’s boldness had told upon Hezekiah. He was dispirited and dejected. He perhaps began to doubt whether he had done right in yielding to the bolder counsels of Eliakim and Isaiah. He had not lost his faith in God; but his faith was being severely tried. He wisely went and strove by prayer to strengthen it.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain HEZEKIAH’S GRIEF AND MESSAGE TO ISAIAH, 2Ki_19:1-5.
HEZEKIAH’S GRIEF AND MESSAGE TO ISAIAH, 2Ki_19:1-5.
1. Rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth — Customary signs of deep distress and grief.
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Went into the house of the Lord — For it was supposed that Jehovah’s eyes were upon that place night and day. Compare 2Ki_19:14 and 1Ki_8:29.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain Ch. 2Ki_19:1-7. Hezekiah sends messengers to Isaiah. Isaiah’s answer…
Ch. 2Ki_19:1-7. Hezekiah sends messengers to Isaiah. Isaiah’s answer in the name of the Lord. (Not in Chronicles. Isa_37:1-7)
1. Hezekiah … covered himself with sackcloth] No doubt the words which his messengers reported were such as to tell upon the king, especially that saying of Rab-shakeh ‘The Lord said unto me, Go up against this place and destroy it’. The king was struck with horror as much as his counsellors. But he feels that he has in his council one who has long been known as God’s messenger to Judah. So while he himself falls to humiliation and prayer, going for that purpose into the house of the Lord, he sends his servants to enquire of the prophet what hope there is amid the terrible attack which may very soon be upon them.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (1) Went into the house of the Lord.—To humble…
XIX.
(1) Went into the house of the Lord.—To humble himself before Jehovah and pray for help. (Comp. 2Ch_32:20.)
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Vers. 1-37. SECOND EXPEDITION OF SENNACHERIB AGAINST HEZEKIAH (continued).…
Vers. 1-37. SECOND EXPEDITION OF SENNACHERIB AGAINST HEZEKIAH (continued). The chapter falls into four portions:
(1) The sequel to the embassy of Rabshakeh (vers. 1-8);
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(2) the insulting letter of Sennacherib (vers. 9-14);
(3) Hezekiah"s prayer, and God"s answer to it by the mouth of Isaiah (vers. 15-34); and
(4) the destruction of Sennacherib"s host, his hurried flight, and his murder at Nineveh by his sons (vers. 35-37). The narrative runs parallel with that in Isaiah 37., with which it corresponds almost word for word.
And it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes following the example of his chief officers, who came into his presence "with their clothes rent" (see 2Ki_18:37) and covered himself with sackcloth. A sign of grief and self-humiliation (Gen_37:34; 2Sa_3:31 2Sa_21:10; 1Ki_20:31; 2Ki_6:30, etc.) It was natural that the king should be even more strongly affected than his ministers. And went into the house of the Lord; to open his griefs, ask counsel, and beg for aid.
Vers. 1-35. The wisdom of trust in God, and the foolishness of trust in self.
The contrast between the devout, God-fearing, God-trusting Hezekiah, and the proud, self-trusting, self-asserting Sennacherib is one of the most striking and instructive in Scripture. The two are set one over against the other in the most graphic way.
I THE PICTURE OF HEZEKIAH shows him:
1. Jealous of Gods honor. Sennacherib"s words against God strike him with horror, appear to him such shocking blasphemy, that he rends his clothes and covers himself with sackcloth (ver. 1), as if he would wipe out the insult offered to God by one of his creatures" arrogancy, by causing to be presented before him the profoundest self-abasement and self-humiliation on the part of another.
2. Sensible of his own weakness. The day is "a day of trouble, of rebuke, and of contumely." Israel is despised, insulted, disgraced, and yet can do nothing. The time of her utmost trial has come, and she has "no strength" to carry her through the crisis.
3. Trustful in Gods power to save. If God will, Hezekiah does not doubt he can "reprove" Sennacherib"s words disperse them, scatter them, show them to be vain words, words of naught.
4. Reliant on the power of prayer. "Wherefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that are left." Prayer is the only key that can unlock a door of escape. He himself resorts to prayer (ver. 15), and he exhorts Isaiah to do the same. If he himself is sinful, Isaiah is a righteous man, God"s prophet, and "the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much". (Jam_5:16)
II THE PICTURE OF SENNACHERIB shows him:
1. A hater and reviler of God. "Let not thy God... deceive thee" (ver. 10). As though God ever deceived, as though he were not the Truth itself. Sennacherib represents him as either a poor braggart who could not do what he had promised, or a malevolent being intentionally beguiling men, to their ruin. "Jehovah," he says, "has sent him against Jerusalem," has bidden him "go up and destroy it, (2Ki_18:25) while at the same time he was deluding Hezekiah with promises of deliverance.
2. Absolutely confident in his own strength. Who can stand against the Assyrians? Who has ever been able to resist them? "Hath any of the gods of the nations delivered at all his land out of the hand of the King of Assyria?" (ver. 33). And if not, "shalt thou be delivered?" He sets his own strength against Hezekiah"s weakness (vers. 23, 24), and regards himself as irresistible. His will is law. What can hinder it? Not armies least of all Egyptian armies not mountains, not rivers, not deserts. Intoxicated with success, he thinks there is no power equal to him either in earth or heaven. The gods of the nations have all failed. Hezekiah"s God will fail equally.
3. Secure of the future, and without any thought of suing for Divine aid. Why should Sennacherib sue? Success had always attended him in the past; surely "tomorrow would be as today," only "yet more abundant." He does not appear to give even his own gods a thought. Conventional ascription of his victories to Asshur may be found in his inscriptions; but, as Isaiah lays bare to us the workings of his innermost soul (ver. 23, 24), there is no leaning on any higher power, no recognition of anything behind his own greatness and material strength, no suspicion even of the possibility of a reverse. He is a god to himself; he commands the future; everything must necessarily go well with him. The event shows the wisdom of Hezekiah"s trust and the utter folly of Sennacherib"s. "Out of the depths" Hezekiah "cries unto the Lord," and "the Lord hears his voice." "With the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption." Hezekiah may in the past have wavered, have listened to evil counselors, have paid his court to Pharaoh, and put his trust in the broken reed Egypt; but now, at any rate, he has repented of such evil courses, he has put them away from him, and thrown himself wholly upon God. His words (vers. 15-19) have the unmistakable ring of sincerity and truth. To God he looks, and to him only. His strength is become perfected in his weakness; with the result that God hears his prayer (ver. 20), and grants the unparalleled deliverance related in ver. 35. Sennacherib, on the other hand, finds in a moment the whole ground of his self-confidence fail. It was as the master of many legions that he had thought to bend all things to his will. Bereft of his legions, he is nothing. Today a mighty conqueror carrying everything before him, unfeignedly astonished that any one should dare to disobey his commands; on the morrow he is a wretched fugitive, hurrying homewards as fast as his chariot-steeds will bear him, only anxious to escape from the foes whom he so lately despised, and to bury his shame and his disgrace within the walls of his distant palace. In his pride and his self-trust he had thrown out a challenge to God. God took up the challenge, and struck him down to the earth. The circumstances of the catastrophe are unique in the world"s history; but the lesson is one that the events of history have taught again and again. At the height of his pride and arrogancy and self-trust, the ungodly conqueror is stricken with failure, humiliated, beaten down to the ground, shown that, after all, he is a mere man, and that the fates of nations are not in his power, but in the hand of One whose name is "the Most High," and who ruleth in all the kingdoms of the earth.
HOMILIES BY C.H. IRWIN. Vers. 1-7. A good man"s prayers sought.
Hezekiah is in deep distress of spirit at the haughty, defiant, confident tone of Rabshakeh. He wants help in his trouble. He sends not to his men of war, not to his statesmen, for advice, but to the man of God.
I CHARACTER GIVES CONFIDENCE. Isaiah was known to live near to God. Therefore Hezekiah had confidence in him. Here is a good test of the character of your companions and associates. Would you go to them in time of trouble? Would you expect them to give you any comfort? Would you tell them the inner secrets of your heart? If not, is it not because you have no confidence in them? Their character does not command your respect. Choose the company, seek the counsel, of good. men.
II CHARACTER GIVES POWER IN PRAYER. "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." The man who expects an answer to his prayers is the man who habitually lives near to God. Mary Queen of Scots said she feared the prayers of John Knox more than an army of ten thousand men. Therefore:
1. Live near to God if you would influence others. Power for service comes from fellowship with God. Men like Isaiah have that quiet power that enables them to inspire others with confidence. "Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard" (ver. 6). So with St. Paul on his perilous voyage to Rome. "I exhort you to be of good cheer: for there shall be no loss of any man"s life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, saying, Fear not, Paul Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer: for I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told me.
2. Live near to God if you would have power in prayer. The man who prays most is the man who knows the power of prayer.
Thrice blest whose lives are faithful prayers, Whose loves in higher love endure; What souls possess themselves so pure, Or is there blessedness like theirs?
HOMILIES BY D. THOMAS Vers. 1-37. A nation"s calamities, counselor, and God.
it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes," etc. Our purpose in our sketches on this book has not allowed us to inquire into all the minute particulars of the characters or events recorded, or into the authorship of the book, or into the right of the prophet or prophets so frequently to say, "Thus saith the Lord," but simply in the briefest way to develop for practical purposes the truths either expressed or suggested. In this chapter we have three momentous events recorded the terrible calamity to which Jerusalem was exposed; the utter destruction of the Assyrian army; and the death of Sennacherib the Assyrian despot. The whole should be read in connection with Isaiah 37.
We have here for notice four subjects of thought the exposure of a nation to an overwhelming calamity; the blessing to a nation of a ruler who looks to Heaven for help; the advantage to a nation of a truly wise counselor; and the strength of a nation that has the true God on its side.
I THE EXPOSURE OF A NATION TO AN OVERWHELMING CALAMITY.
1. The nature of the threatened calamity. It was the invasion of the King of Assyria. This was announced in startling terms and in a haughty and ruthless spirit by the messengers of Sennacherib. "Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah King of Judah, saying, Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be delivered into the hand of the King of Assyria. Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, by destroying them utterly: and shalt thou be delivered? Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed?" (vers. 10-13). The danger was near at hand. Sennacherib was on his way with his hundred and four score and five thousand men. The tramplings of the war-horses and the rattling of the amour would soon be heard in Jerusalem. The utter destruction of the city was contemplated, and seemed rapidly approaching. In a far worse position was the kingdom of Judah at this moment than was England when the Spanish Armada was approaching our shores.
2. The influence of the threatened calamity.
(1) It struck the kingdom with a crushing terror. "And it came to pass, 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, which 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 unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble" (vers. 1-3). The rending of the "clothes" and the arraying in "sackcloth" were symbols to express the horror of the heart.
(2) It struck the kingdom with a helpless feebleness. "This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth" (ver. 3). "The image is that of a parturient woman whose strength is exhausted, whose powers are paralyzed, at the moment when she required to put forth a vigorous effort. The expression in which the message was conveyed to the prophet described, by a strong figure, the desperate condition of the kingdom, together with the utter inability of the people to help themselves; and it intimated also a hope that the blasphemous defiance of Jehovah"s power by the impious Assyrian might lead to some direct interposition for the vindication of his honor and supremacy to all heathen gods." Here is utter national helplessness in a terrible national calamity.
II THE BLESSING TO A NATION OF A RULER WHO LOOKS TO HEAVEN FOR HELP. What, in the wretched condition of his country, does King Hezekiah do? He invokes the merciful interposition of Heaven. When the messengers came to Hezekiah with a threatening letter from the King of Assyria (see vers. 10-13), what did the monarch do? He took it into the house of the Lord, and there prayed. "And Hezekiah received the letter of the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up into the house of the Lord, and spread it before the Lord. And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord, and said, O Lord God of Israel," etc. (vers. 1419). In this wonderful prayer:
1. He adores the God whom Sennacherib had blasphemed. He addresses him as the "God of all the kingdoms of the earth," the Maker of "heaven and earth," the one and only Lord.
2. He implores the Almighty for his own sake to deliver the country. "Now therefore, O Lord our God, I beseech thee, save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the Lord God, even thou only." "The best pleas in prayer," says an old author, "am those that are taken from God"s own honor; therefore the Lord"s prayer begins with "Hallowed be thy Name," and concludes, "Thine be the glory. Who is the greatest human king? Not the man who relies on his own power and skill to protect his nation from danger, and seeks to secure it in the possession and enjoyment of all its rights; nor the king who looks to his armies and navies in time of need; but he who practically realizes his dependence upon the "Lord" that made heaven and earth, Reverence for the Infinite is the soul of true royalty.
III THE ADVANTAGE TO A NATION OF A TRULY WISE COUNSELLOR. Apart from his inspiration, Isaiah may be fairly taken in this case as the representative of a wise counselor, and that for two reasons.
1. He looked to heaven rather than to earth for his wisdom. "Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, That which thou hast prayed to me against Sennacherib King of Assyria I have heard. This is the word that the Lord hath spoken concerning him" (vers. 20, 21). The counsel which he had to give he here declares to have come from the Lord. God of Israel. How the wisdom was conveyed to him, whether by an outward voice or an inner vision, does not appear; he had it from heaven. He only is the true counselor of men who gets his wisdom from above. Whence do the advisers of sovereigns get their instructions? From hoary precedents or the fallible conclusions of their own feeble minds; and not directly from above. Hence the incessant blunders of cabinets, and the scandal in these days of one political party denouncing the blunders and professing to correct the mistakes of the other.
2. He received from heaven he communicated to men. In the communication:
(1) "Sennacherib is apostrophized in a highly poetic strain admirably descriptive of the turgid vanity, haughty pretensions, and heartless impiety of this despot. "The virgin the daughter of Zion hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee," etc. (vers. 21-28).
(2) Hezekiah himself is personally addressed, and a sign given him of coming deliverance. He is told that for two years the presence of the enemy would interrupt the peaceful pursuits of husbandry, but in the third year the people would be in circumstances to till the earth, plant the vineyards, and reap the fruits, as formerly. "And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such things as grow of themselves, and in the second year that which springeth of the same; and in the third year sow ye, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruits thereof," etc. (vers. 29-31).
(3) The issue of Sennacherib"s invasion is announced. "Thus saith the Lord concerning the King of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it. By the way that he came, by the same shall he return," etc. (vers. 32-34) (Dr. Jamieson). Such was the communication which, in language passionate, poetic, and powerful, Isaiah made to this perplexed and terrified nation. It involves two things:
(a) the deliverance of his country;
(b) the ruin of the despot.
IV THE STRENGTH OF A NATION THAT HAS GOD ON ITS SIDE. Who delivered the imperiled nation? Who overwhelmed the despot? "The zeal of the Lord of hosts." "And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred four score and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses," etc. (vers. 35-37). Who was the "angel of the Lord"? Was it some transcendent personality, or some tremendous force in nature, such as a pestiferous blast, or an electric bolt? It matters not; the "angel" was but the instrument in the hand of God.
1. How swiftly was the deliverance effected! "That night." What a night was that! one of the most memorable nights of the world. Perhaps the whole was effected even in one single hour, or even in one instant of that night.
2. How terrible the ruin which that deliverance effected! "A hundred four score and five thousand men" destroyed. At night, a glittering array; in the morning, "dead corpses.
Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, " That host with their banners at sunset were seen: Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown, That host on the morrow lay wither"d and strown.
How rapidly God can do his work! he can annihilate a universe in the twinkling of an eye. Behold a mystery! Why should these hundred and eighty five thousand be thus destroyed on account of the conduct of one man Sennacherib?
God is his own Interpreter, And he will make it plain?
The forty-sixth psalm is supposed to be the triumphant outburst of the delivered people. "God is our Refuge and Strength, a very present Help in trouble. The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted." This Sennacherib, this ruthless despot, does not seem to have fallen with the others. His body was not found amongst the dead corpses. Albeit, he did not escape. "So Sennacherib King of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh. And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his God, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword: and they escaped into the land of Armenia. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead" (vers. 36, 37). What greater calamity could befall a man than to be murdered by his own sons? D.T.
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
Vers. 1-7. Hezekiah and Isaiah.
The messengers whom Hezekiah had sent having returned and reported to him the words of Rabshakeh, (2Ki_18:37) the king was plunged in unspeakable distress. We have now to observe his behavior in his trouble.
I HEZEKIAH"S GRIEF.
1. He assumed the signs of deepest mourning. The messengers had come to him with their clothes rent. Hezekiah now rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth. His humiliation was sincere. The words he had heard had knocked from under him his last hope of help from man. He felt that God"s "chastisement" (ver. 3) was upon him, and that God alone could deliver. This moment of the realization of his helplessness was also the moment of the return of God"s favor to him. To this point it had been God"s aim to bring him, and now that he threw himself in his utter weakness on God"s strength, deliverance was assured.
2. He sought God in his sanctuary. He "went into the house of the Lord." Thither also Asaph had gone in his hour of trouble, and there his difficulties were removed. (Psa_73:17) Hezekiah no doubt sought the sanctuary for purposes of prayer. We see him do the same thing on receipt of Sennacherib"s letter (ver. 14). We have every encouragement to come to God with our troubles, (Psa_91:15) and nothing soothes the heart like pouring out all our sorrows before him. (Php_4:6, 7) Prayer is the soul"s best resort in times of extremity.
II THE DEPUTATION TO ISAIAH. In addition to praying himself to God, Hezekiah sent an honorable deputation to Isaiah, to request his intercession for the city.
1. He sends to Gods prophet. Possibly for some time Hezekiah and Isaiah had not seen much of each other. The prophet"s counsels had proved distasteful. His denunciations of the alliance with Egypt cannot have been received with favor. (Isa 30) His advice certainly had not been taken; nor can it have been with his approval that Hezekiah made his ill-fated submission to Sennacherib. Now, in the hour of trouble, Hezekiah sends once more to him. He sends his highest officers the same who had conferred with Rabshakeh and the elders of the priests. All went covered with sackcloth, in token of their grief, penitence, and humiliation of heart. This is what often happens. God"s servants are not appreciated till the hour of real need comes; then men are glad to get their counsels and their prayers. It would be well if, in the conduct of state affairs, respect were paid to the counsels of religion earlier. It would save many a bitter hour afterwards.
2. He makes full confession of his sad estate. A crisis had come in which there was no ray of human hope. From Hezekiah"s side it was a day of "trouble of deep distress and mortification; from God"s side it was a day of "chastisement"; (Hos_5:2, "I am a Rebuker of them all from the side of the Assyrian, it was a day of "blasphemy of impious vaunting against Jehovah. And like a woman in pains of childbirth, without strength for delivery, they had no means of bringing themselves out of their perilous position. "The metaphor expresses in the most affecting manner, the ideas of extreme pain, imminent danger, critical emergency, utter weakness, and entire dependence on the aid of others" (Alexander). The spirit of self-trust is now utterly slain. In making this confession, Hezekiah owned that Isaiah was right, and he had all along been wrong.
3. He entreats the prophets prayers. Hezekiah"s one hope now was that, for his own glory"s sake, Jehovah would "reprove" the blasphemous words which Rabshakeh had uttered, and he besought Isaiah to lift up his prayer for the remnant of Jews still left. It is a true instinct of the soul which leads us to seek the intercession on our behalf of those who stand nearer to God than ourselves. "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous Than availeth. (Jam_5:16) Thus Pharaoh besought Moses to intercede for; (Exo_8:8, 28 10:16) Moses on various occasions interceded for the people (Exo_32:30-33; Deu_9:12-20) Elijah interceded for the land of Israel; (1Ki_18:11-45) the high priest interceded for the tribes; and Christ now intercedes for us. (1Jn_2:1) We cannot lay too much stress on the power of prayer, nor be too anxious to get an interest in the prayers of the holy. Hezekiah did well in joining with his own prayers this request for the intercession of Isaiah.
III THE PROPHET"S REPLY. We have already and frequently seen how ready God is to respond to the faintest movements of the soul towards him. The prophet did not send those who now sought him away without comfort. He gave them:
1. A word of encouragement. "Be not afraid," etc. In his own heroic trust Isaiah had never faltered. Such trust is contagious. The words Which Isaiah spoke would send a new thrill of hope to the hearts of the messengers. How marvelous a thing is faith in God! How it supports a man"s own soul, lifts him above ordinary, and even extraordinary, discouragements, and makes him firm as a rock when others are trembling and despairing around! (cf. Ps 46)
2. An assurance of deliverance. In the name of God, Isaiah was able to give them, further, an assurance that "Sennacherib would do them no hurt. God would put a spirit in him, and would cause him to hear tidings which would make him depart into his own laud, and there he would perish with the sword. Nothing is said as yet of the destruction of the army, unless, indeed, it is the tidings of that which Sennacherib was to hear. Another boasting message of Sennacherib and another prayer of Hezekiah come in between this promise and the final and fuller one. J.O.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard…
2Ki_19:1-37
And it came to pass when King Hezekiah heard it, he rent his clothes.
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A nations calamities, counsellor, and God
I. The exposure of a nation to an overwhelming calamity.
1. The nature of the threatened calamity. It was the invasion of the king of Assyria. This was announced in startling terms and in a haughty and ruthless spirit by Rab-shakeh.
2. The influence of the threatened calamity.
(1) It struck the kingdom with a crushing terror.
(2) It struck the kingdom with a helpless feebleness.
II. The blessing to a nation of a ruler who looks to heaven for help. What, in the wretched condition of his country, does King Hezekiah do? He invokes the merciful interposition of heaven. In this wonderful prayer
(1) He adores the God whom Sennacherib had blasphemed.
(2) He implores the Almighty for His own sake to deliver the country.
III. The advantage to a nation of a truly wise counsellor. Whether Isaiah was a Divinely inspired man, and had a right in any especial sense to say, Thus saith the Lord, or not, he may be fairly taken in this ease as the representative of a wise counsellor, and that for two reasons:--
1. He looked to heaven rather than to earth for his wisdom.
2. What he received from heaven he communicated to men. In the communication
(1) Sennacherib is apostrophised in a highly poetic strain admirably descriptive of the turgid vanity, haughty pretensions, and heartless impiety of this despot.
(2) Hezekiah himself is personally addressed, and a sign given him of coming deliverance.
(3) The issue of Sennacheribs invasion is announced. Such was the communication which in language passionate, poetic, and powerful, Isaiah made to this perplexed and terrified nation. It involves two things: The deliverance of his country; the ruin of the despot.
IV. The strength of a nation that has God on its side. Who delivered the imperilled nation? Who overwhelmed the despot? The zeal of the Lord of hosts.
1. How swiftly was the deliverance effected. That night.
2. How terrible the ruin which that deliverance effected--An hundred fourscore and five thousand men destroyed. (David Thomas, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain
THE GREAT DELIVERANCE
B.C. 701
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2Ki_19:1-37
"There brake He the arrows of the bow, the shield, the sword, and the battle."
- Psa_76:3.
"And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword Hath melted like snow at the glance of the Lord."
- BYRON.
"Vuolsi cosi cola dove si puote Cio che si vuole: e piu non dimandare."
- DANTE.
"Through love, through hope, through faiths transcendent dower, We feel that we are greater than we know."
- WORDSWORTH.
"God shall help her, and that when the morning dawns."
Psa_46:5
IN spite of the humble submission of Hezekiah, it is a surprise to learn from Isaiah that Sennacherib-after he had accepted the huge fine and fixed the tribute, and departed to subdue Lachish-broke his covenant. {Isa_33:8} He sent his three chief officers-the Turtan, or commander-in-chief, whose name seems to have been Belemurani; {Isa_20:1} the Rabsaris, or chief eunuch; and the Rabshakeh, or chief captain-from Lachish to Hezekiah, with a command of absolute, unconditional surrender, to be followed by deportation. By this conduct Sennacherib violated his own boast that he was "a keeper of treaties." Yet it is not difficult to conjecture the reason for his change of plan. He had found it no easy matter to subdue even the very minor fortress of Lachish; how unwise, then, would it be for him to leave in his rear an uncaptured city so well fortified as Jerusalem! He was advancing towards Egypt. It was obviously a strategic error to spare on his route a hostile and almost impregnable stronghold as a nucleus for the plans of his enemies. Moreover, he had heard rumors that Tirhakah, the third and last Ethiopian king of Egypt, was advancing against him, and it was most important to prevent any junction between his forces and those of Hezekiah. He could not come in person to Jerusalem, for the siege of Lachish was on his hands; but he detached from his army a large contingent under his Turtan, to win the Jews by seductive promises, or to subdue Jerusalem by force. Once more, therefore, the Holy City saw beneath her often-captured walls the vast beleaguering host, and "governors and rulers clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all of them desirable young men." Isaiah describes to us how the people crowded to the house-tops, half dead with fear, weeping and despairing, and crying to the hills to cover them, and bereft of their rulers, who had been bound by the archers of the enemy in their attempt to escape. They gazed on the quiver bearing warriors of Elam in their chariots, and the serried ranks of the shields of Kir, and the cavalry round the gates. And he tells us how, as so often occurs at moments of mad hopelessness, many who ought to have been crying to God in sackcloth and ashes gave themselves up, on the contrary, to riot and revelry, eating flesh, and drinking wine, and saying: "Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die." {Isa_22:1-13} The king alone had shown patience, calmness, and active foresight; and he alone, by his energy and faith, had restored some confidence to the spirits of his fainting people. Although the city had been refortified by the king, and supplied with water, the hearts of the inhabitants must have sunk within them when they saw the Assyrian army investing the walls, and when the three commissioners-taking their station "by the conduit of the upper pool which is in the highway of the fullers field"-summoned the king to hear the ultimatum of Sennacherib. The king did not in person obey the summons; but he, too, sent out his three chief officers. They were Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, who, as the chamberlain (al-hab-baith), was a great prince (nagid); Shebna, who had been degraded, perhaps at the instance of Isaiah, from the higher post, and was now secretary (sopher); and Joah, son of Asaph, the chronicler (mazkir), to whom we probably owe the minute report of the memorable scene. No doubt they went forth in the pomp of office-Eliakim with his robe, and girdle, and key. The Rabshakeh proved himself, indeed, "an affluent orator," and evinced such familiarity with the religious politics of Judah and Jerusalem, that this, in conjunction with his perfect mastery of Hebrew, gives color to the belief that he was an apostate Jew. He began by challenging the idle confidence of Hezekiah, and his vain words that he had counsel and strength for the war. Upon what did he rely? On the broken and dangerous bulrush of Egypt? It would out pierce his hand! On Jehovah? But Hezekiah had forfeited his protection by sweeping away His bamoth and His altars! Why, let Hezekiah make a wager; and if Sennacherib furnished him with two thousand horses, he would be unable to find riders for them! How, then, could he drive back even the lowest of the Assyrian captains? And was not Jehovah on their side? It was He who had bidden them destroy Jerusalem!
That last bold assertion, appealing as it did to all that was erroneous and abject in the minds of the superstitious, and backed, as it was, by the undeniable force of the envoys argument, smote so bitterly on the ear of Hezekiahs courtiers that they feared it would render negotiation impossible. They humbly entreated the orator to speak to "his servants" in the Aramaic language of Assyria, which they understood, and not in Hebrew, which was the language of all the Jews who stood in crowds on the walls. Surely this was a diplomatic embassy to their king, not an incitement to popular sedition!
The answer of the Rabshakeh was truly Assyrian in its utterly brutal and ruthless coarseness. Taking up his position directly in front of the wall, and ostentatiously addressing the multitude, he ignored the representatives of Hezekiah. Who were they? asked he. His master had not sent him to speak to them, or to their poor little puppet of a king, but to the people on the wall, the foul garbage of whose sufferings of thirst and famine they should share. And to all the multitude the great kings message was:-Do not be deceived. Hezekiah cannot save you. Jehovah will not save you. Come to terms with me, and give me hostages and pledges and a present, and then live in happy peace and plenty until I come and deport you to a land as fair and fruitful as this. How should Jehovah deliver them? Had any of the gods of the nations delivered them out of the hands of the King of Assyria? "Where are the gods of Hamath, and of Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? Have the gods of Samaria delivered Samaria out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?"
It was a very powerful oration, but the orator must have been a little disconcerted to find that it was listened to in absolute silence. He had disgracefully violated the comity of international intercourse by appealing to subjects against their lawful king; yet from the starving people there came not a murmur of reply. Faithful to the behest of their king in the midst of their misery and terror, they answered not a word. Agamemnon is silent before the coarse jeers of Thersites. "The sulfurous flash dies in its own smoke, only leaving a hateful stench behind it!" And in this attitude of the people there was something very sublime and very instructive. Dumb, stricken, starving, the wretched Jews did not answer the envoys taunts or menaces, because they would not. They were not even in those extremities to be seduced from their allegiance to the king whom they honored, though the speaker had contemptuously ignored his existence. And though the Rabshakeh had cut them to the heart with his specious appeals and braggart vaunts, yet "this clever, self-confident, persuasive personage, with two languages on his tongue, and an army at his back," could not shake the confidence in God, which, however unreasonable it might seem, had been elevated into a conviction by their king and their prophet. The Rabsak had tried to seduce the people into rebellion, but he had failed. They were ready to die for Hezekiah with the fidelity of despair. The mirage of sensual comfort in exiled servitude should not tempt them from the scorched wilderness from which they could still cry out for the living God.
Yet the Assyrians words had struck home into the hearts of his greatest hearers, and therefore how much more into those of the ignorant multitudes! Eliakim and Shebna and Joah came to Hezekiah with their clothes rent, and told him the words of the Rabshakeh. And when the king. heard it, when he found that even his submission had been utterly in vain, he too rent his clothes, and put on sackcloth, {1Ki_20:32; 2Ki_6:30} and went into the only place where he could hope to find comfort, even into the house of the Lord, which he had cleansed and restored to beauty, although afterwards he had been driven to despoil it. Needing an earthly counselor, he sent Eliakim and Shebna and the elders of the priests to Isaiah. They were to tell him the outcome of this day of trouble, rebuke, and contumely; and since the Rabshakeh had insulted and despised Jehovah, they were to urge the prophet to make his appeal to Him, and to pray for the remnant which the Assyrians had left.
The answer of Isaiah was a dauntless defiance. If others were in despair, he was not in the least dismayed. "Be not afraid"-such was his message-"of the mere words with which the boastful boys of the King of Assyria have blasphemed Me. Behold, I will put a spirit in him, and he shall hear a rumor, and shall return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land."
Much crestfallen at the total and unexpected failure of the embassy, and of his own heart-shaking appeals, the Rabshakeh returned. But meanwhile Sennacherib had taken Lachish, and marched to Libnah (Tel-es-Safia), which he was now besieging. There it was that he heard the "rumor" of which Isaiah had spoken-the report, namely, that Tirhakah, the third king of the Ethiopian dynasty of Pharaohs, was advancing in person to meet him. This was B.C. 701, and it is perhaps only by anticipation that Tirhakah is called "King" of Ethiopia. He was only the general and representative of his father Shabatok, if (as some think) he did not succeed to the throne till 698.
It was impossible for Sennacherib under these circumstances to return northwards to Jerusalem, of which the siege would inevitably occupy some time. But he sent a menacing letter, reminding Hezekiah that neither king nor god had ever yet saved any city from the hands of the Assyrian destroyers. Where were the kings, he asked again, of Hamath, Arpad, Sepharvaim, Hena, Ivvah? What had the gods of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the children of Eden in Telassar done to save their countries from Sennacheribs ancestors, when they had laid them under the ban?
Again the pious king found comfort in Gods Temple. Taking with him the scornful and blasphemous letter, he spread it out before Jehovah in the Temple with childlike simplicity, that Jehovah might read its insults and be moved by this dumb appeals Then both he and Isaiah cried mightily to God, "who sitteth above the cherubim," admitting the truth of what Sennacherib had said, and that the kings of Assyria had destroyed the nations, and burnt their vain gods in the fire. But of what significance was that? Those were but gods of wood and stone, the works of mens hands. But Jehovah was the One, the True, the Living God. Would He not manifest among the nations His eternal supremacy?
And as the king prayed the word of Jehovah came to Isaiah, and he sent to Hezekiah this glorious message about Sennacherib:
"The virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn. The daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee."
The blasphemies, the vaunts, the menacing self-confidence of Sennacherib, were his surest condemnation. Did he count God a cypher? It was to God alone that he owed the fearful power which had made the nations like grass upon the housetops, like blasted corn, before him. And because God knew his rage and tumult, God would treat him as Sargon his father had treated conquered kings:-
"I will put My hook in thy nose, and My bridle in thy lips. And I will turn thee back by the way by which thou earnest."
He had thought to conquer Egypt: instead of that he should be driven back in confusion to Assyria.
It was but a plainer enunciation of the truths which Isaiah had again and again intimated in enigma and parable. It was the fearless security of Judahs lion; the safety of the rock amid the deluge; the safety of the poor brood under the wings of the Divine protection from "the great Birds" nester of the world; the crashing downfall of the lopped Lebanonian cedar, while the green shoot and tender branch out of the withered stump of Jesse should take root downward and bear fruit upward.
And the sign was given to Hezekiah that this should be so. This year there should be no harvest, except such as was spontaneous; for in the stress of Assyrian invasion sowing and reaping had been impossible. The next year the harvest should only be from this accidental produce. But in the third year, secure at last, they should sow and reap, and plant vineyards and eat the fruit thereof. And though but a remnant of the people was left out of the recent captivity, they should grow and flourish, and Jerusalem should see the besieging host of Assyria no more forever; for Jehovah would defend the city for His own sake, and for His servant Davids sake.
Thereafter occurred the great deliverance. In some way-we know not and never shall know how-by a blast of the simoom, or sudden outburst of plague, or furious panic, or sudden assault, or by some other calamity, the host of Assyria was smitten in the camp, and one hundred and eighty-five thousand, including their chief leaders, perished. The historian, in a manner habitual to pious Semitic writers, attributes the devastation to the direct action of "the angel of the Lord"; {Comp 2Sa_24:15-16} but as Dr. Johnson said long ago, "We are certainly not to suppose that the angel went about with a sword in his hand, striking them one by one, but that some powerful natural agent was employed."
The Forty-Sixth Psalm is generally regarded as the Te Deum sung in the Temple over this deliverance, and its opening words, "God is our refuge and strength," are inscribed over the cathedral of St. Sophia at Constantinople.
It is usually supposed that this overwhelming disaster happened to the host of Assyria before Jerusalem. This, however, is not stated; and as the capture of Lachish was an argent necessity, it is probable that the Turtan led back the forces which had accompanied him, and took them afterwards to Libnah. Yet, since Libnah was but ten miles from Jerusalem, the Jews could not feel safe for a day until the mighty news came that the
"Angel of God spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed,
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed heavy and chill,
And their breasts but once heaved, and forever grew still."
When the catastrophe which had happened to the main army and the flight of Sennacherib became known, the scattered forces would melt away.
All the Assyrians who escaped were now hurrying back to Nineveh with their foiled king. Sennacherib seems to have occupied himself in the north, except so far as he was forced to fight fiercely against his own rebel subjects. He never recovered this complete humiliation, he never again came southwards. He survived the catastrophe for seventeen or twenty years, and fought five or six campaigns; but at the end of that period, while he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch or Assarac (Assur), his god, he was murdered by his two sons Adrammelech (Adar-malik-"Adar is king") and Sharezer (Nergal-sarussar-"Nergal protect the king"), who envied him his throne. They escaped into the land of Ararat, but were defeated and killed by their younger brother Esarhaddon (Assur-akh-iddin-Assur bestowed a "brother") at the battle of Hani-Rabbat, on the Upper Euphrates. He succeeded Sennacherib, and ultimately avenged on Egypt his fathers overwhelming disaster. He is perhaps the "cruel lord" Isa_19:4, and it is not unnatural that he should have prevailed against his parricidal brothers, for we are told that in a previous battle at Melitene he had shown such prowess that the troops then and there proclaimed him King of Assyria with shouts of "This is our king." He reigned from B.C. 681-668, and in his reign Assyria culminated before her last decline. He was the builder of the temple at Nimrod, and erected thirty other temples. Babylon and Nineveh were both his capitals, {2Ch_33:11} and he had previously been viceroy of the former.
The glorious deliverance in which the faith and courage of the King of Judah had had their share naturally increased the prosperity and prestige of Hezekiah, and lifted the authority of Isaiah to an unprecedented height. Hezekiah probably did not long survive the uplifting of this dark cloud, but during the remainder of his life "he was magnified in the sight of all nations." {2Ch_32:23} When he died, all Judah and Jerusalem did him honor, and gave him a splendid burial. Apparently the old tombs of the kings-the catacomb constructed by David and Solomon-had in the course of two and a half centuries become full, so that he had to be buried "in the ascent of the sepulchers," perhaps some niche higher than the other graves of the catacomb, which was henceforth disused for the burial of the kings of Judah. We have had occasion to observe the many particulars in which his reign was memorable, and to his other services must be added the literary activity to which we owe the collection and editing, by his scribes, of the Proverbs of Solomon. His reign had practically witnessed the institution of the faithful Jewish Church under the influence of his great prophetic guide.
The question whether the portent of the destruction of the Assyrian was identical with that related by Herodotus has never been finally answered. Herodotus places the scene of the disaster at Pelusium, and tells this story:-Sennacherib, King of the Arabs and Assyrians, invaded Egypt. Its king, Sethos, of the Tanite dynasty, in despair entered the temple of his god Pthah (or Vulcan), and wept. The god appeared to him with promises of deliverance, and Sethos marched to meet Sennacherib with an army of poor artisans, since he was a priest, and the caste of warriors was ill-affected to him. In the night the god Pthah sent hosts of field-mice, which gnawed the quivers, bow-strings, and shield-straps of the Assyrians, who consequently fled and were massacred. An image of the priest-king with a mouse in his hand stood in the temple of Pthah, and on its pedestal the inscription, which might also point the moral of the Biblical narrative, ("Let him who looks on me be pious"). Josephus seems so far to accept this version that he refers to Herodotus, and says that Sennacheribs failure was the result of a frustration in Egypt. The mouse in the hand of the statue probably originated the details of the legend; but according to Horapollion it was the hieroglyphic sign of destruction by plague. Bahr says that it was also the symbol of Mars. Readers of Homer will remember the title Apollo Smintheus ("the destroyer of mice"), and the story that mice were worshipped in the Troas because they gnawed the bow-strings of the enemy.
But whatever may have been the mode of the retribution, or the scene in which it took place, it is certainly historical. The outlines of the narrative in the sacred historian are identical with those in the Assyrian records. The annals of Sennacherib tell us the four initial stages of the great campaign in the conquest of Phoenicia, of Askelon, and of Ekron, the defeat of the Egyptians at Altaqu, and the earlier hostilities against Hezekiah. The Book of Kings concentrates our attention on the details of the close of the invasion. On this point, whether from accident, or because Sennacherib did not choose to register his own calamity, and the frustration of the gods of whose protection he boasted, the Assyrian records are silent. Baffled conquerors rarely dwell on their own disasters. It is not in the dispatches of Napoleon that we shall find the true story of his abandonment of Syria, of the defeats of his forces in Spain, or of his retreat from Moscow.
The great lesson of the whole story is the reward and the triumph of indomitable faith. Faith may still burn with a steady flame when the difficulties around it seem insuperable, when all refutation of the attacks of its enemies seems to be impossible, when Hope itself has sunk into white ashes in which scarcely a gleam of heat remains. Isaiah had nothing to rely upon; he had no argument wherewith to furnish Hezekiah beyond the bare and apparently unmeaning promise, "Jehovah is our Judge; Jehovah is our Lawgiver; Jehovah is our King. He will save us." It was a magnificent vindication of his inspired conviction, when all turned out-not indeed in minute details, but in every essential fact-exactly as he had prophesied from the first. Even in B.C. 740 he had declared that the sins of Judah deserved and would receive condign punishment, though a remnant should be saved. {Isa_6:11-13} That the retribution would come from some foreign enemy-Assyria or Egypt, or both-he felt sure. Jehovah would hiss for the fly in the uttermost canals of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria, and both should swarm in the crevices of the rocks, and over the pastures. {Isa_5:26-30} Later on in 732, in the reign of Ahaz, he pointed to Assyria, {Isa_7:18} as the destined scourge, and he realized this still more clearly in 725 and 721, when Shalmaneser and Sargon were tearing Samaria to pieces. {Isaiah 8, Isa_28:1-15, Isa_10:28-34} Contrary, indeed, to his expectation, the Assyrians did not then destroy Jerusalem, or even formally besiege it. The revolt from Assyria, the reliance on Egypt, did not for a moment blind his judgment or alter his conviction; and in 701 it came true when Sennacherib was on the march for Palestine. {Isa_14:29-32; Isa_14:29-30} Yet he never wavered in the apparently impossible conclusion, that, in spite of all, in spite even of his own darker prophecies, {Isa_32:14} Jerusalem shall in some Divine manner be saved. {Isa_1:19-20} The deliverance would be, as he declared from first to last, the work of Jehovah, not the work of man, {Isa_10:33; Isa_29:5-8; Isa_30:20-26; Isa_30:30-33} and because of it Sennacherib would return to his own land and perish there. The details might be dim and wavering; the result was certain. Isaiah was no thaumaturge, no peeping wizard, no muttering necromancer, no monthly prognosticator. {Isa_47:13} He was a prophet-that is, an inspired moral and spiritual teacher who was able to foresee and to foretell, not in their details, but in their broad outlines, the events yet future, because he was enabled to read them by the eye of faith ere they had yet occurred. His faith convinced him that predictions founded on eternal principles have all the certainty of a law, and that Gods dealings with men and nations in the future can be seen in the light of experience derived from the history of the past. Courage, zeal, unquenchable hope, indomitable resolution, spring from that perfect confidence in God which is the natural reward of innocence and faithfulness. Isaiah trusted in God, and he knew that they who put their trust in Him can never be confounded.
No event produced a deeper impression on the minds of the Jews, though that impression was soon afterwards, for a time, obliterated. Naturally, it elevated the authority of Isaiah into unquestioned pre-eminence during the reign of Hezekiah. It has left its echo, not only in his own triumphant paeans, but also in the Forty-Sixth Psalm, which the Septuagint calls "An ode to the Assyrian," and perhaps also in the Seventy-Fifth and Seventy-Sixth Psalms. In the minds of all faithful Israelites it established forever the conviction that God had chosen Judah for Himself, and Israel for His own possession; that God was in the midst of Zion, and she should not be confounded: "God shall help her, and that right early." And it contains a noble and inspiring lesson for all time. "It is not without reason," says Dean Stanley, "that in the Churches of Moscow the exultation over the fall of Sennacherib is still read on the anniversary of the retreat of the French from Russia, or that Arnold, in his lectures on Modern History, in the impressive passage in which he dwells on that great catastrophe, declared that for the memorable night of the frost in which twenty-thousand horses perished, and the strength of the French army was utterly broken, he knew of no language so well fitted to describe it as the words in which Isaiah described the advance and destruction of the hosts of Sennacherib."
They had been brought face to face, the two kings-Sennacherib and Hezekiah. One was the impious boaster who relied on his own strength, and on the mighty host which dried up rivers with their trampling march-the worldling who thought to lord it over the affrighted globe; the other was the poor kinglet of the Chosen People, with his one city and his enfeebled people, and his dominion not so large as one of the smallest English counties. But "one with God is irresistible," "one with God is always in a majority." The poor, weak prince triumphs over the terrific conqueror, because he trusts in Him to whom world-desolating tyrants are but as the small dust of the balance, and who "taketh up the isles as a very little thing." As {Isa_11:15} Assyria now vanishes almost entirely from the history of the Chosen People, we may here recall with delight one large and loving prophecy, to show that the Hebrews were sometimes uplifted by the power of inspiration above the narrowness of a bigoted and exclusive spirit. Desperately as Israel had suffered, both from Egypt and Assyria, Isaiah could still utter the glowing Messianic Prophecy which included the Gentiles in the privileges of the Golden Age to come. He foretold that-
"In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and Assyria, as a blessing in the midst of the land: whom the Lord of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt My people, and Assyria the work of My hands, and Israel Mine inheritance." {Isa_19:24-25}
"That strain I heard was of a higher mood!"
"King Hezekiah can have no finer panegyric than that of the son of Sirach: Even the kings of Judah failed, for they forsook the law of the Most High: all except David, and Ezekias, and Josias failed." (Ecclus. 49:4)
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain 2Ki_19:2. Sent to the prophet Isaiah—The prophet, in that…
JERUSALEM SUPERNATURALLY DELIVERED
CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES.—
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2Ki_19:2. Sent to the prophet Isaiah—The prophet, in that Jewish age, was regarded as the messenger and representative of Jehovah. While the king was entrusted to witness of the Royalty and Majesty of God, the prophet was recognized as the oracle of Divine Wisdom and Truth. Here was a crisis of eminent peril to the nation, in which the people and the Name of Jehovah were alike contemptuously menaced. It was a moment for the Word of God to come forth; so Isaiah was sought by the king.
2Ki_19:6. And Isaiah said unto them, Be not afraid—Terror met by cheerfulness; deliverance assured to Judah, destruction threatened to Assyria. “The servants of the king of Assyria” are called contemptuously נַעֲרֵי מֶלֶךְ, “the young men of the king,” i.e., his boastful and blasphemous generals. The literal fulfilment of these predictions proves so keen a difficulty to modern naturalism (as opposed to the supernatural) that critics are intent on discrediting these 2Ki_19:6-7 as an interpolation. But “the Word of the Lord endureth for ever.”
2Ki_19:9. He heard of Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia—This was the “rumour” (2Ki_19:7). The name of Tirhakah. king of Upper Egypt, a monarch of mighty conquests, lingers still in the inscriptions in the Egyptian temple of Medinet Abon. Apprehending the arrival of this Egyptian warrior, the Assyrian king sent Hezekiah a terrifying letter urging immediate surrender.
2Ki_19:12. The children of Eden in Thelasar—Not the Eden of Amos (2Ki_1:5), situate amid the beauties of Lebanon, but the Assyrian Eden mentioned by Ezekiel (Eze_27:33).
2Ki_19:14. Hezekiah spread the letter before the Lord—This act has been charmingly. described by Delitsch as “a prayer without words, a prayer in action, which then passes into a spoken prayer.”
2Ki_19:20. Then Isaiah sent to Hezekiah—While the king prayed, the prophet was receiving the answer. The simultaneousness of prayer and answer is emphasized. The message from God through Isaiah is a rhetorical outpouring of scorn upon the Assyrian king’s pretensions, followed by direct and withering denunciations, which are sealed by minute prophecies, whose fulfilment should indicate to Hezekiah that the Lord Himself would effect the boastful blasphemer’s overthrow. “The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this” (2Ki_19:31).
2Ki_19:29. This shall be a sign unto thee—An address to Hezekiah. The sign was that for two years the peaceful labours of husbandry would be impracticable in consequence of the enemy’s presence near at hand but that agriculture would proceed in quiet in the third year, labour being crowned with bounty.
2Ki_19:32. Nor come before it with shield—Perhaps an assault, advancing with shield held in front; or, more probably, Not occupy any position before the city defended by a fence or breastworks. None of the processes of seige or war should be permitted against Jerusalem. Rawlinson’s readings of the Assyrian slabs discovers extended and minute records of this expedition of Sennacherib, graphically reproducing the Scripture story of events. No account of the catastrophe is there given; the Assyrians only recounted their victories.
2Ki_19:35. That night the angel of the Lord went out, &c.—Two years interposed, during which the invasion of the land by Sennacherib went forward. “That night” therefore, refers to the ultimate concentration of the Assyrian army upon Jerusalem, with the intention of commencing the seige next day. “The angel of the Lord,” even as “the destroying angel” (Exo_12:23), went forth against the first born of Egypt; and 185,000 perished. How was this effected? By the scorching simoom, which still destroys entire caravans? or, as Josephus records (Antiq. x. i. 5), τοῦ θεοῦ λοιμικὴν ἐνσκὴψαντος αύτοῦ τῷ στρατῷ νόσον? “God had sent a pestilential distemper upon his army.”
2Ki_19:37. Sennacherib slain—His reverses in battle rendered him furious; his rage and tyranny grew intolerable. Judgment fell upon him from the hands of his own sons. And a third son, Esarhaddon, came to the Assyrian throne. Berosus informs as that this Asordanus was first viceroy of Babylon, and afterwards eight years king of Assyria.—W. H. J.
HOMILETICS OF 2Ki_19:1-37
THE RESOURCES OF THE GOOD MAN IN TIME OF TROUBLE
THIS was a day of sore trouble to Hezekiah. The veteran hosts of Sennacherib, flushed with victory, invested Jerusalem, and threatened it with destruction. The expected help from Egypt was not forthcoming. The defensive resources of Hezekiah were circumscribed, and it seemed hopeless to offer resistance. He had but one refuge—a refuge the proud Assyrian despised: but it proved all-sufficient in the day of his calamity. The whole chapter is a striking illustration of the resources of the good man in time of trouble.
I. He seeks counsel from those who are most competent to advise him. (2Ki_19:1-7). It is not every prince who has an Isaiah at his elbow to advise in difficulty and comfort in distress. God’s way of helping in trouble is often in directing us to the best human counsellors.
1. The good man, like Hezekiah, recognizes the need of Divine intervention (2Ki_19:1-5). While the supercilious Assyrian trusted in his arms, Hezekiah trusted in his God. There are times when we are reduced to such straits that none but God can help us. No one sees these times with a keener eye than the good man. His common sense teaches him to exhaust all natural, human means, and not to stand wringing his hands in despair, or folding his arms in indifference; but he is aware a point is reached where all he can do is to trust: God must do the rest. It is wise to recognize this. It honours God and saves us from presumption.
2. The good man, like Hezekiah, recognizes the utility and power of prayer by a true servant of Jehovah. “Wherefore lift up thy prayer, &c.” (2Ki_19:4). The heritage of God’s people is a heritage of prayers. It is a strength to us in trouble to know that our own prayers are reinforced and supplemented by the prayers of others. Every praying agency we can set in operation is a positive gain. Even the prayerless are benefited by the supplications of praying souls on their behalf. We may be receiving blessings to-day in answer to the anxious prayers of parents who are no longer with us.
3. The good man, like Hezekiah, is encouraged with the promise of Divine help (2Ki_19:6-7). The message of Isaiah must have convinced the king of the wisdom of the course he adopted in seeking the advice and help of the prophet. Jehovah will punish the insolence of the blasphemous Assyrian, and deliver the distressed monarch from his fangs. How tenaciously we cling to the most indefinite promise of help when we are in trouble; it is the silvery rift in the cloud, the distant gleam of the squadrons rapidly hurrying to our relief. But with what calm confidence should we rest on the slightest word of the living God!
II. He is reminded of the nearness and reality of his peril (2Ki_19:8-13). There are plenty of real dangers in life without unduly harassing ourselves with imaginary ones. If Hezekiah, with the powerful Assyrian forces encircling his only stronghold, had been tempted to regard the peril as but trifling, he would be undeceived when he received the fierce, war-breathing message of Sennacherib. The wildest threats of Rabshakeh were reiterated, and Jehovah again insulted and blasphemed. Well did Hezekiah know the terrible might of the Assyrian arms; and yet, while he trembled, he was undismayed. It is fanaticism to treat danger with indifference. It is to court defeat and ruin.
III. He resorts to God in earnest prayer (2Ki_19:14-19). The prayer is short, but it is sublime in its style and comprehensive in its range, and burns throughout with incandescent earnestness. Its salient features are worthy of study. It is a model prayer for a distressed soul.
(1) The petitioner acknowledges the supreme Rulership of Jehovah (2Ki_19:15).
(2) He traces the ruin of nations to their idolatry (2Ki_19:17-18).
(3) He calls upon Jehovah to vindicate His supreme Lordship by delivering him from the threatened peril (2Ki_19:19). Prayer is the grand refuge of the distressed; it is the passionate outcry of conscious need. The more vividly we realise our peril, the more sincere and earnest will be our prayer. In prayer, says Bunyan, it is better to have a heart without words, than words without a heart.
IV. He is assured of a signal answer to his prayer (2Ki_19:20-34). If there were no answer, it would still be our duty to pray, though without an answer we should be in danger of becoming simply mechanical in our prayers. As by a letter Hezekiah was plunged into deepest grief, so by a letter of a different import shall his heart be made glad. This letter was written in the gorgeous imagery familiar to the gifted Isaiah. It is true a draught of water is as sweet to the thirsty, whether drank from a common earthenware vessel, or from a richly chased goblet; still, the precious fluid may be found in the one vessel as in the other. In this Divinely inspired answer Sennacherib is rebuked for his proud boasting, and his humiliation and retreat predicted; a pledge is given that Judah shall still flourish in peace and prosperity; a solemn announcement is made that Senuacherib shall utterly fail in carrying out his boasted threats, and Jehovah promises himself to defend and deliver the beleagured city. How great is the condescension of our God, in not only hearing prayer, but in assuring the suppliant of an answer—an answer adequate to meet the case, turning fear into confidence, humiliation into triumph, sorrow into joy.
V. He is privileged to witness a great and miraculous deliverance (2Ki_19:35-37). One hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians smitten in one night, and Sennacherib murdered by his own sons! Surely Judah is sufficiently avenged, its insults and suffering atoned, and the word of the blasphemed Jehovah solemnly vindicated. It is probable that the supernatural agent of Divine vengeance made use of a deadly plague or pestilence in the destruction of the Assyrian soldiers. Dr. Kitto contends that a simoom, or hot pestilential wind, was the destroying agent. Whatever the means used, the awful fact that so many perished cannot be explained away. Herodotus refers to it in his history, though in a legendary form, when he relates:—“As the two armies (Egyptian and Assyrian) lay opposite one another, there came in the night a multitude of field mice, which devoured all the quivers and bowstrings of the Assyrians, and ate the thongs by which they managed their shields. Next morning they commenced their flight, and great multitudes fell, as they had no arms with which to defend themselves.” Jehovah is not restricted to any one method in punishing his enemies.
LESSONS:—
1. Prayer is the best refuge of the distressed.
2. National calamities give anxiety to the true-hearted monaroh.
3. Sincere prayer is never offered in vain.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
2Ki_19:1. O the noble piety of Hezekiah! Notwithstanding all the straits of the siege and the danger of so powerful an enemy, I find not the garments of this good king any otherwise than whole and unchanged; but now, so soon as blasphemy is uttered against the majesty of his God, though by a pagan dog, his clothes are torn and turned into sackcloth. There can be no better argument of an upright heart than to be more sensible of the indignities offered to God than of our own dangers. The more we see God’s name profaned, the more shall we, if we be truly religious, love and honour it.—Bp. Hall.
2Ki_19:2-7; 2Ki_19:20-34. Isaiah a sublime example of a great prophet.
1. Was himself unmoved and confident while king and court were perplexed and distressed.
2. His influence and power were fully recognized in the depth of the national crisis.
3. Was familiar with the intentions of Jehovah, and rejoiced in vindicating His character.
4. His predictions were couched in terms of inimitable grace and dignity.
2Ki_19:2-7. A sorrowful embassy.
1. Its external appearance was symbolic of the desperate straits of the nation and its leaders.
2. It was sent to the only man who seemed able to advise in the emergency.
3. It returned with a message that inspired confidence and hope.
2Ki_19:4. Pray to thine utmost, strive and strain, tug hard and bestir thee all that may be. Prayer is a laborious exercise; and as a man that would be good at lifting must set his sides and shoulders to work, he must also often use himself to lifting, so here. This gets a dexterity, a handiness to the work.—Trapp.
2Ki_19:8-13. The arrogance of power.
1. Is fed by military successes.
2. Is exasperated by resistance.
3. Is imperious and blustering in its demands.
4. Refuses to acknowledge any power superior to itself.
2Ki_19:8-19. The two contrasted kings: Sennacherib and Hezekiah—the godless and the just.
I. Sennacherib, who sees himself in peril and obliged to retreat by the approach of Tirhakah, does not on that account become more modest and humble, but only more obstinate and arrogant. This is the way with godless and depraved men. In distress and peril, instead of bending their will and yielding to the will of God, they only become more stubborn, insolent, and assuming. Hezekiah, on the contrary, who was in unprecedented trouble and peril, was thereby drawn into more earnest prayer. He humbled himself under the hand of God, and sought refuge in the Lord alone.
II. Sennacherib rejects faith in the God of Israel as folly, and boasts that all the gods of the heathen were powerless before him. He lives without God in the world, and knows no God but himself. He asks, “Where is the God of Hamath?” &c. But where is now Sennacherib, who talked so proudly? He is gone like chaff before the wind, for the way of the godless shall perish. But Hezekiah will not let himself be drawn away from his God. His faith becomes only so much warmer and deeper. He prays, and seeks not his own honour, but that of the Lord, in whom he puts his confidence. The greater the cross, the greater the faith. The palm grows under weight. Sweetness flows from the grape when it is well trodden.—Lange.
2Ki_19:14. A king in trouble. It is evident that Sennacherib did not desire to make peace with Hezekiah. The destruction of Jerusalem would have been of great advantage to the Assyrians; to have left that strong city unsubdued behind them as they advanced towards Egypt would have been impolitic and unsafe. So Sennacherib determined to destroy it, and sent a letter full of boastful arrogance, threats, blasphemy, false insinuations, and insults to its king.
I. Hezekiah’s trouble.
1. Kings cannot escape the scorching sparks of trouble that fly in all directions from the burning wheels of life. Palatial walls are often no barrier, and perfumed chambers are no relief. Trouble, like death, enters all dwellings. The higher the station, the greater the liability to woe. Storms howl on mountain tops when sunshine gilds the plain. “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.” “The lofty pine the great wind often rives.”
2. Neither does piety prevent trouble. Hezekiah had manifested the most ardent zeal for the worship of Jehovah. He walked before God in truth and righteousness. And yet this trouble fell upon him. Trouble is not an absolute evil. If it were, the pious would escape it. It is an angel in dishabille stooping to serve us. “Celestial benedictions often assume dark disguises.” Trouble is a divine factor in human life. “Divine diet,” as an old writer phrases it, is as necessary for moral growth and strength as daily food is for our physical natures. Trouble is often a proof of God’s interest in us. The best need discipline. The pious are often more benefited by trouble than by joy.
3. Trouble, too, may arise, not from our own wrong-doings, but from the wrong-doings of others. Sennacherib’s lawless ambitions then troubled the whole earth. God uses evil men to discipline his saints. Our troubles are shaped by God. He controls them, though they appear wild and formless. Men rage like a storm, but we may be
“Assured that He, who from the tempest’s neck
Hath loosed his grasp, still holds it at His beck;
And with a pulse too deep for mortal sense,
The secret pulse of His omnipotence,
That beats through every motion of the storm,
Can check destruction in its wildest form.”
The hand that holds these sharp threshing instruments, these pruning knives, these fashioning chisels, is a firm one, and guided by infinite wisdom. God knew what Hezekiah needed. God used Sennacherib to discipline him.
4. Great troubles may be conveyed to us by insignificant means. A letter only was received, and yet what a universe of woe there was in it. Only a letter! But it has crushed a noble spirit, broken a mother’s heart, cast a man upon the earth writhing in unutterable anguish, blotted out his life’s sun, and driven him forth an exile to wander over a dark and desolate waste for ever. Only a letter! But who can tell what troubles the reception of a letter may convey? Postmen often carry social torpedoes in their bags. But, further, what was the trouble which now distressed Hezekiah?
1. The threatened loss of his kingdom. Men cling to their possessions. They have an instinct to retain as well as gain. Loss is always painful. To lose his kingdom was to lose his all.
2. The threatened loss of his position. None like to be compelled to abdicate, even if his throne be only the chief seat in the synagogue, the vestry hall, the market-place, or the workshop. Men grip high places tenaciously. Dread of social humiliation will blacken life’s fairest pictures. Hezekiah saw before him the loss of all his greatness and honour.
3. Threatened captivity or death. To grace a conqueror’s triumph, to pine away in a dungeon, or to endure a cruel death, would most probably be his lot if he were not delivered from his powerful foe. Little mercy was shown to the conquered in those days. A dark doom stared him in the face. That which men hold most dear—liberty and life—were imperilled.
4. Possible demolition of the royal city. Imperial cities have ever been dear to monarchs. The most heartless have wept over their destruction. Jerusalem was dear to every Jew. It was especially so to its kings. Hezekiah had fortified and beautified it. Its threatened destruction would fill him with dismay.
5. The ruin and exile of his people. Hezekiah felt deeply for his people’s welfare. Under his reign they had enjoyed much peace and prosperity. That they should be exposed to the brutalities of an invading host, their houses and vineyards destroyed, and themselves ultimately carried away captive into a strange land, would overwhelm him with grief. Such a Calamity seemed nigh.
6. The dishonour of Jehovah. Sennacherib had insulted God, and Hezekiah’s pious heart burned with a holy indignation. If Jerusalem were taken, God’s holy and beautiful house would be profaned, His glory tarnished, and His worship’ which had been lately restored, obliterated from the earth. These were the bitter elements thrown into his chalice of grief. With a heavy heart he wended his way to the house of God, taking the letter with him.
II. Hezekiah’s refuge.—All men have not a Divine refuge in trouble. The irreligious cannot rush into the sheltering arms of God. If earthly refuge fails, they are like a ship caught in the tempest without anchor or haven; a warrior exposed to his enemies without shield or fortress; a traveller under the pelting storm without covert or home. Earthly refuges are insufficient in times of extreme peril. Life’s insecurities throw us on God. The pious have an advantage over the godless in hours of trial: they can use every means of protection and help which the irreligious have, and then shelter themselves in God. Hezekiah had availed himself of every earthly defence. He had done all that a wise monarch could do to defend his city, and after this, he committed his cause to God. Fanaticism despises means, but true faith uses them, and then soars above them to rest in omnipotence.
1. Hezekiah sought God in his refuge in the Temple. He went there because, in that holy place, God more particularly manifested Himself. Special promises were given to those who prayed within its sacred precincts. Hezekiah had often beheld the Divine glory there. It was his accustomed place of worship. His trouble had not driven him there, as trouble often drives one to the sauctuary. He went there because he believed that he would find God most easily in that place. Helpful memories often crowd upon us in places where we have often prayed, and bear us up, as upon eagles’ wings, into the Divine presence. Sacred places are often the gale of heaven to the troubled spirit. Men, then, strive to find the quickest way to the sympathetic heart of God.
2. Hezekiah would set a good example to the nation. He would lead his people to seek God in that day of trouble. Kings have great influence. Many follow them either to the temples of vice, or to the temples of religion. A king’s example is often more potent than a Divine command.
3. He would publicly manifest his confidence in God’s power to protect and save. His faith found expression in an act which honoured God and quickened his confidence in Him. It was not under the paralysis of despair, nor from an ostentatious display of formal piety, but from the promptings of a sincere trust in the living God, that Hezekiah “went up into the House of the Lord.” Hezekiah spread the letter before the Lord. This was a most significant act—“a prayer in action.” It probably was done in solemn silence, words afterwards rising to his lips. He would not reply to this letter, but he would leave it with God to answer it. Many letters might better be left with God than answered. He wished to show how completely he could place his trouble before God. It is not every trouble that can be spread before God. Troubles that come from our follies, or that are the sequences of our sins, and that are the result of our opposition to the will of God, cannot be fully spread “before the Lord.” Some reserve is necessary, and this is often fatal to our success in prayer. Hezekiah had nothing to hide: he placed himself and his trouble entirely in the hands of God. This was his refuge, and his deliverance was sure.
LEARN:—
1. To live so as to have those troubles only which come by Divine appointment.
2. In the greatest of these troubles never to despair of Divine help, but to expect it.
3. To be pious in prosperity, that when adversity comes we may have God for our refuge.—Hom. Quarterly.
—The devout spirit of this prayer, the recognition of the Divine Being in the plenitude of His Majesty—so strikingly contrasted with the fancy of the Assyrians as to His merely local power; his acknowledgment of the conquests obtained over other lauds, and of the destruction of their wooden idols, which, according to the Assyrian practice, were committed to the flames, because their tutelary deities were no gods; and the object for which he supplicated the Divine interposition, that all the kingdoms of the earth might know that the Lord was the only God—this was an attitude worthy to be assumed by a pious theocratic king of the chosen people.—Jamieson.
2Ki_19:14-19. A pathetic spectacle.
1. A monarch pleading for a nation in distress (2Ki_19:14).
2. Jehovah reminded of His close relationship to His covenant people (2Ki_19:15).
3. A picture of the havoc wrought in a nation by its idolatry (2Ki_19:17-18).
4. A touching appeal to Jehovah to vindicate His character (2Ki_19:19).
—Distress and misfortune are the school in which a man learns to pray aright. How many a one repeats prayers every day, and yet never prays aright. Every one knows from his own experience that he has never talked so directly with God as in the time of need. Who is a true man? He who can pray, and who trusts in God.—Lange.
2Ki_19:15-19. A king in prayer. Prayers have their histories. Their ancestry is trouble, struggle with circumstances, and helplessness. They mark epochs in our lives. They are born in those hours which leave an indelible impression upon us. The sublimest strains which men have uttered have been towards God in moments of agony. A great man’s prayers in the anguish of trial lay bare the inner heart of humanity, and should be treasured up as a revelation. “Misery sees miracles.” Prayer is a great relief to the troubled heart. To utter our distress is to relieve it. To truly cast it upon God in prayer, is to remove it. Hezekiah sought relief in his trouble in prayer.
I. Hezekiah prayed to Jehovah as the God of his nation. O Lord God of Israel.
1. The nation bore the name of one of its progenitors, that “as a prince had prevailed with God.” The name Israel had been more generally applied to the northern kingdom of Samaria, which had already been overthrown; but Hezekiah claims it for the remnant that was left. Did he wish to remind himself of Jacob’s power in prayer when he uttered that name? or of God’s special interest in his nation? Perhaps both. What God has been to our forefathers, our churches, our nation in times of trouble, He will be to us amid the perils of our day. History is a handmaid in the service of faith.
2. His nation was Jehovah’s peculiar dwelling-place—“which dwellest between the cherubims.” The Shekinah—the holy light—as a symbol of the Divine presence, ever shone forth from between those weird and colossal figures which Solomon had carved and placed on either side of the mercy-seat. There might be seen a constant manifestation of the presence of God. But Hezekiah’s reference to this peculiar Divine manifestation—using words which were probably common among the Jews—was to suggest that as God dwelt among them He would protect His own dwelling-place. God would surely save His chosen habitation. This is true, God will protect where He dwells. While He remains, there is perfect safety. When He departs there is ruin.
(1). God dwelling in a nation saves it. God now manifests Himself, not by a material brightness, but by righteousness, purity, and truth.
(2). God dwelling in a man saves him. Every Christian is a temple of God. The true cherubim and shekinah are in the soul.
(3). God dwelling in a church saves it. No enemies can overthrow a church that has the Divine glory shining in the midst of it.
(4). We can appeal to the manifestations of the Divine presence to increase our confidence in God in times of danger.
II. Hezekiah recognizes, in his prayer, the sole supremacy of Jehovah. “Thou art the God,” &c.
1. Hezekiah asserted that Jehovah was the only true God. Polytheism was a foolish delusion. It probably arose from men’s innate propensity to materialize spiritual things, from the worship of natural objects as the manifestation of the Divine power, from the sinful and insatiate imagination of men’s hearts, from the deification of departed heroes, or from the attempt to give visible shape to applauded virtues. But there can be but one infinite and eternal God. He may reveal Himself in many ways—in flaming fire, in human forms, in religious truth, in nature, in Christ, in the Spirit—He is one only—infinite, eternal, and incomprehensible—God alone. None can be associated with Him. None can be placed in comparison with Him. All other gods are “no gods.” False and dead images, they cannot save themselves from destruction. But Jehovah, the true and living God, could save.
2. That He exercised supreme control over all the kingdoms of the earth. He was not only the God of Israel, but of all nations. Where His power was not acknowledged it was supreme. Where He was not worshipped He reigned, King of all kings, and Lord of all Lords. Hezekiah rested upon God’s sovereignty, though it was then obscured. It is often obscured. Evil powers seem triumphant Anarchy reigns. “High uproar lords it wide.” But God’s order manifests itself. His purposes unfold themselves. He overrules all dynasties, overthrowing one kingdom and setting up another, curbing the restless might of men, not destroying human freedom, but controlling it. Hezekiah’s faith grasped the truth that no earthly power could exist without the permission or surveillance of God. Assyria, as well as Judah, belonged to God.
III. He appealed to Jehovah as the Maker of heaven and earth. Heaven and earth to the Jewish mind included all things. Here was an assertion of universal creatorship. In this sublime idea of God is involved:—
1. That He is eternal. He existed before all things; delighting in the glory of His own nature before the worlds were made, no material form or spiritual existence sharing that eternity with Him.
2. That He is separate from His works. The universe is not He, as the ancient pantheists taught, and as some teach now. He is immanent in all His creatures, but independent of them. The Maker is not His work. God transcends all beings and worlds.
3. That He is omnipotent. He who made the universe must be almighty. Its greatness is inconceivable, and the power that produced it must be infinite.
4. That He has an absolute right to control all things. The Maker has indefeasible rights in his productions. This is admitted of men.
5. That He has all things under His direct control. As He has created all forces, all laws, all agencies, all worlds, all angels, all men, He has them under His immediate direction, and can turn them whithersoever He will. This conception of God afforded solid ground for Hezekiah’s faith. Before the greatness of Jehovah the might of Hezekiah’s enemies sank into nothingness. Large conceptions of God will ever give large expectations in prayer. The more we widen our views of God, the more confidence we shall have in Him in trouble.
IV. Hezekiah prayed with great earnestness. “Lord, bow down Thine ear,” &c. “Now, therefore, O Lord our God, I beseech Thee.” He ardently craves the attention of God. God’s knowledge is always perfect, and His interest in His troubled saints always sure; but it sometimes seems as if He heeded not. Faith needs testing. Desire must be tried. Hearing and seeing in men are the chief means of observation. The heart in its agonies ever feels the humanity of God. Heart cries to heart, deep unto deep, soul to soul. Earnestness is the living spirit in prayer. Our prayers may have order, beauty, and eloquence, but without earnestness they are vain. To desire fervently will lead invariably to ardent expressions. Cold prayers are no prayers. “I beseech Thee” is the natural cry of a praying heart. Earnestness is needed, not to lead God to observe our condition, or to create a disposition in Him to help us, but—
1. That the strength of our desires may be revealed.
2. That we may be raised from the low condition of formal devotion.
3. That we may have all the spiritual culture which the outcries of real need may impart.
4. That we may be prepared to receive Divine deliverance thankfully. Hezekiah was stirred with the most powerful emotions as he prayed. His trouble heated his soul as fire.
V. Hezekiah recognized the greatness of the deliverance which he sought. “Of a truth, Lord,” &c. Other kingdoms had fallen, why not his? Only that his hope was in God. No human ingenuity or might could deliver him. No gods could protect; Jehovah alone must save. Men must be brought to see that deliverance is God’s work. The soul is a besieged city. The forces of Diabolus are around Mansoul. The deliverance which it needs is great. Its Sennacherib is mighty. “Of a truth.” The whole race has come under his power. We cannot estimate the greatness of our danger. “When Napoleon Buonaparte, watching the fortunes of the battle, saw the charge of our Scots Greys, at Waterloo, as, launched on his columns, they dashed like a thunderbolt into the thick of them, crushing and bearing down all before them, he exclaimed, “How terrible are these Greys!” But what mortal foe so terrible as him we have to fight—so relentless, so malignant, ever walking about seeking whom he may devour! No serpent so cunning, no lion so savage! From other enemies escape may be found; from him, none. Neither the world, nor the Church itself, offers any asylum, nor the universe, other than the hollow of God’s hand, the shadow of His wings” (Guthrie). To recognize the greatness of the deliverance we need, will—
1. Deepen our sense of helplessness in ourselves.
2. Stimulate the exercise of great faith.
3. Prepare us for the manifestation of God’s great delivering hand.
VI. Hezekiah associates the glory of Jehovah with the deliverance which he sought.
1. The reproaches which had been cast upon him had been cast upon God. This deliverance would be one of those great revelations of the true and only God which, in an age when power in the Deity would be more influential than righteousness or love to impress men, would exercise a most potent influence in shaping their spiritual destinies, and, perhaps, set forces at work that for centuries would operate upon men in giving them a deeper reverence for the unseen God, and thus checking their vices and preparing the way for more exalted unfoldings of His character.
2. Hezekiah’s prayer prevailed. God’s might was put forth; whether, as Kingsley suggests, “by a stream of poisonous vapour, such as often comes forth out of the ground during earthquakes and eruptions of burning mountains, and kills all men and animals that breathe it,” or by a pestilence, or by the simoom, or by a plague of mice—according to the Egyptian legend of Herodotus—we cannot tell. But it was God’s delivering arm put forth in answer to Hezekiah’s faith and prayer—
(1) That his people might learn to put their trust in Him; and
(2) that all the earth might know that none could defy His power and prosper.—Hom. Quarterly.
2Ki_19:20-34. Jehovah, the defence of His people.
1. He vindicates His character from the wicked aspersions of His enemies.
2. He preserves His people inviolate.
3. He delivers them from distress, and restores to them prosperity and power.
4. He is unchanging in His fidelity to His covenant.
2Ki_19:21. There is no more fitting punishment for a proud and arrogant man than to be laughed at and derided, without being able to take revenge. The derision of the daughter, Zion, at the blasphemous boaster, Sennacherib, is not due to sinful malice; it is rather a joyful recognition and a praise of the power and faithfulness of God who reigns in heaven and laughs at those who scoff at Him (Psa_2:4; Psa_37:12-13).—Lange.
2Ki_19:32. Impotent men! What are we in the hands of the Almighty? We purpose, He overrules; we talk of great matters, and think to do wonders, He blows upon our projects and they vanish with ourselves. He that hath set bounds to the sea hath appointed limits to the rage of the proudest enemies; yea, even the devils themselves are confined. Why boast ye yourselves, O ye tyrants, that ye can do mischief? Ye are stinted, and even within those lists is confusion.—Bp. Hall.
2Ki_19:32-34. Jerusalem, the earthly city of God, a type of the eternal city, the Church of Christ. If God protected the former, so that no arrow could come into it, how much more will He protect the latter, break in pieces the bows of His enemies, and burn their chariots in fire!—Lange.
2Ki_19:35-37. The proud boaster humbled. I. He is smitten with dismay by the terrible evidences of a Divine avenging power (2Ki_19:35).
Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset were seen;
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown,
That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!
And the widows of Asshur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!
II. He relinquishes in fear and disgrace his proudly-cherished enterprise (2Ki_19:36). III. He comes to an untimely and ignominious end (2Ki_19:37).
—God’s judgments are often delayed for a long time, but then they come all the more suddenly and mightily (Psa_73:19). A single night may change the whole face of the matter. Where is now the boaster? Where is the multitude of his chariots? Sennacherib’s calamity and his retreat proclaim to all the world that God resisteth the proud; and they are a testimony only to the truth of 1Sa_2:6-10. He who had smitten whole kingdoms and peoples, fell under the blows of his own sons. When God has sufficiently chastised His church, He throws the rod of His wrath into the fire (Isa_33:1).—Lange.
2Ki_19:37. Sennacherib was the last of the great Assyrian conquerors. No Assyrian host again ever crossed the Jordan. Within a few years from that time, the Assyrian power suddenly vanished from the earth. The effect of the event must have been immense, in proportion to the strain of expectation and apprehension that had preceded it. Isaiah staked upon his prophetic word the existence of his country, his own and his people’s faith in God. So literally had that word been fulfilled that he was himself, in after times, regarded as the instrument of the deliverance. There is no direct expression of his triumph at the moment, but it is possible we have his hymn of thanksgiving, when he afterwards heard of the world-renowned murder which struck down the mighty king in the temple at Nineveh. The earth again breathes freely. The sacred cedar-grove feels itself once more secure. The world of shades, the sepulchre of kings, prepares to receive its new inmate (Isaiah 14.) If there is any doubt as to the prophet’s utterance, there is none as to the burst of national thanksgiving, as incorporated in the Book of Psalms (Psalms 46, 76). The weapons of the great army, such as we see them in the Assyrian monuments—the mighty bow and its lightning arrows, the serried shields—were shattered to pieces. The long array of dead horses; the chariots, now useless, left to be burnt; the trophies carried off from the dead, all rise to view in the recollection of that night. The proud have slept their sleep, and the mighty soldiers fling out their hands in vain. The arms have fallen from their grasp. The neigh of the charger, the rattle of the chariot, are alike hushed in the sleep of death. The wild uproar is over, the whole world is silent, and in that awful stillness the Israelites descend from the heights of Jerusalem, like their ancestors to the shores of the Red Sea, to see the desolation that had been wrought on the earth. As then, they carried away the spoils as trophies. The towers of Jerusalem were brilliant with the shields of the dead. The fame of the fall of Sennacherib’s host struck the surrounding nations with terror far and wide. It was like the knell of the great potentates of the world; and in their fall the God of Israel seemed to rise to a higher and yet higher exaltation. The importance of the deliverance was not confined to the country or the times of Hezekiah. It is not without reason, that in the churches of Moscow the exultation over the fall of Sennacherib is still read on the anniversary of the retreat of the French from Russia; or that Arnold, in his lectures on Modern History, in the impressive passage in which he dwells on that great catastrophe, declared that for “the memorable night of frost, in which 20,000 horses perished, and the strength of the French army was utterly broken, he knew of no language so well fitted to describe it as the words in which Isaiah described the advance and destruction of the host of Sennacherib.” The grandeur of the deliverance has passed into the likeness of all sudden national escapes.—Stanley.
—Thou art avenged, O God, Thou art avenged plentifully of thine enemies! Whoever strives with thee, is sure to gain nothing but loss, but shame, but death, but hell. The Assyrians are slain; Sennacherib is rewarded for his blasphemy; Jerusalem is rescued; Hezekiah rejoices; the nations wonder and tremble.—Bp. Hall.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain 2Ki 19:14
2Ki 19:14
Hezekiah’s letter would be very different in form from our letters. The Assyrians did not use paper or even skins, but did their writing on clay. It is very likely that the letter was a tablet of terra cotta.
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I. "Went up into the house of the Lord." Where was he so likely to find God as in His house? Notice the prayer of the king, how he speaks of God as dwelling between the cherubim. Perhaps he had heard how Sennacherib sat on his throne between winged bulls and lions; but he had heard Isaiah tell of seeing the Lord surrounded by winged intelligences. God has only to speak to His winged messenger, and the angel has gone to crush the foes of Jehovah and His people. This was a model prayer, not going all round the world, but fastening on the thing wanted and asking for that. If our prayers were more like telegrams, we should have speedier answers.
II. Was the letter ever answered? Yes, for Jehovah answered it Himself. We know what the result was, and how suddenly the bolt of vengeance struck down the proud blasphemer.
III. There is a postscript to God’s answer. "It came to pass that night...they were all dead corpses." Suppose we read in the newspaper to-morrow, "Sudden death of 185,000 soldiers!" What a stir it would make! What a sight the camp must have been next morning! There has been considerable discussion as to the cause of the destruction of so large an army, and it is generally understood now to have been the simoom. Cambyses, king of the Medes, lost fifty thousand men by one of these dreadful winds. But whether the wind was the messenger or an angel, it matters not. God willed it, and nature hasted to do His bidding.
T. Champness, New Coins from Old Gold, p. 179.
Hezekiah received the letter himself at the hand of the messengers, which was courteous; and he read it, which was calm and accurate; and he went up into the house of God, which was reverential; and he spread it before the Lord, which was filial and confiding.
I. Belief in the efficacy of prayer has latterly become very small. And at the root of this want of faith is this thought, that since God governs the world by general fixed laws, and since answers to particular prayers must be specialities, therefore oftentimes exceptions to these general laws, it is not to be expected that God will interrupt His universal system to meet any particular case. To this we answer two things: (1) In all other general laws, such as the laws of nations or even natural laws, provision is expressly made for exceptional occasions, and it is an axiom that under certain conditions the law shall not take any, or at least the same, effect. Why should not the same rule apply to the laws by which God regulates His providential dealings? (2) Why should not the particular answer to the particular prayer be itself a part of the grand universal law? Why should not God have ordained in His sovereignty that all true prayer shall bring certain results, as that any other cause in the world shall produce its own natural and proper effect?
II. Assuming then, as we well may, the fact that God does have respect to prayer, we ask, "What is it to spread a matter before God?" (1) You cannot spread anything before God till you have first spread yourself—your whole heart and life—before Him. (2) The whole trouble must be spread before Him; God loves minuteness; there is no spreading without minuteness. To speak out loud a sorrow or a care even to a thing inanimate is a help to definiteness, to clearness of thought, to manfulness, to duty; how much more so when we confide in God.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 9th series, p. 139.
References: 2Ki 19:14.—Old Testament Outlines, p. 81; S. Baring-Gould, One Hundred Sermon Sketches, p. 182; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 389. 2Ki 19:14-16.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iv., p. 183. 2Ki 19:15.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ix., p. 89.
2Ki 19:15-19
I. We are too apt to think that peace and prosperity are the only signs of God’s favour; that if a nation be religious, it is certain to thrive and be happy. But it is not so. We find from history that the times in which nations have shown most nobleness, most courage, most righteousness, have been times of trouble, and danger, and terror. When nations have been invaded, persecuted, trampled under foot by tyrants, then, to the astonishment of the world, they have become greater than themselves, and done deeds which win them glory for ever.
II. What is true of nations is often true also of each single person. To almost every man, at least once in his life, comes a time of trial or crisis, a time when God purges the man, and tries him in the fire, and burns up the dross in him, that the pure, sterling gold only may be left. To some it comes in the shape of some terrible loss or affliction. To others it comes in the shape of some great temptation. Nay, if we will consider, it comes to us all, perhaps often, in that shape. A man is brought to a point where he must choose between right and wrong. God puts him where the two roads part. One way turns off to the broad road which leads to destruction; the other way turns off to the narrow road which leads to life. If he believes in the living God and in the living Christ, then when temptation comes he will be able to stand. If he believes that Christ is dwelling in him, that whatever wish to do right he has comes from Christ, whatever sense of honour and honesty he has comes from Christ, then it will seem to him a dreadful thing to lie, to play the hypocrite or the coward, to sin against his own better feelings. It will be sinning against Christ Himself.
C. Kingsley, Town and Country Sermons, p. 370.
References: 2Ki 19:15-19.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 521. 2Ki 19:34.—C. Kingsley, Sermons for the Times, p. 183.
2Ki 19:35
I. In the first thirty-seven chapters of Isaiah’s prophecies we have a full account of the ways of the Jews at that time, and the reasons why God allowed so fearful a danger to come upon them. The first thirty-five chapters are a spiritual history of the Jews and the Assyrians and all the nations round them for many years. The kings of Assyria thought themselves the greatest and strongest beings in the world; they thought that their might was right, and that they might conquer, and ravage, and plunder, and oppress every country round them without being punished. They thought that they could overcome the true God of Judaea, as they had conquered the empty idols of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Iva. But Isaiah saw that they were wrong; he prophesied that a great eruption or breaking out of burning mountains would destroy the king of Assyria’s army and would even shake Jerusalem itself.
II. How the Assyrians were killed we cannot exactly tell, most likely by a stream of poisonous vapour, such as often comes forth out of the ground during earthquakes and eruptions of burning mountains and kills all the men and animals who breathe it. God intended all along to teach the Jews that the earth and heaven belonged to Him and obeyed Him. He taught them and the proud king of Assyria once and for all that He was indeed the Lord, Lord of all nations and King of kings, and also Lord of the earth and all that therein is. Those who really trust in Him shall never be confounded. Those who trust in themselves are trying their paltry strength against the God who made heaven and earth, and will surely find out their own weakness, just when they fancy themselves most successful. If man dare not fight on the Lord’s side against sin and evil, the Lord’s earth will fight for Him. Earthquakes and burning mountains will do His work.
C. Kingsley, Sermons on National Subjects, p. 247.
References: 2Ki 19:37.—E. H. Plumptre, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. iv., p. 450. 2Ki 20:1.—H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii., p. 99; A. Raleigh, Thoughts for the Weary, p. 90; G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 126. 2Ki 20:2.—J. Van Oosterzee, Year of Salvation, vol. ii., p. 482. 2Ki 20:9-11.—Hunter, Sunday Magazine, 1872, p. 644. 2Ki 20:11.—J. H. Wilson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. v., p. 24. 2Ki 20—Parker, vol. viii., p. 285. 2Ki 21:17, 2Ki 21:18.—J. R. Macduff, Sunsets on the Hebrew Mountains, p. 184. 2Ki 21—Parker, vol. viii., p. 298. 2Ki 22:2.—E. Monro, Practical Sermons on the Old Testament, vol. ii., p. 219. 2Ki 22:3-12.—D. G. Watt, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 180.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain The Deliverance of Jerusalem
The Deliverance of Jerusalem
2. Isaiah the prophet] This is the first mention of Isaiah in this book, but his own writings show that he had been an active teacher and statesman not only during the earlier years of Hezekiah himself, but also during the reign of Hezekiah's predecessor Ahaz: see on 2Ki_16:7; 2Ki_18:7. The chapters in the prophet's writings which relate to the present occasion are 2Ki_10:5 to 2Ki_12:6; 2Ki_14:24-27; 2Ki_17:12-14, 2Ki_17:22, 2Ki_17:29-33, 2Ki_17:36-37 (the last two of which substantially repeat 1 Kings 18, 19).
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3. Blasphemy] RV 'contumely': such as the nation was experiencing at the hands of the invader. The children.. bring forth] a figure for powerlessness in the time of peril.
4. Remnant] cp. 2Ki_19:30, Isa_10:20. A large number of the Judaean cities had been captured (see on 2Ki_18:13), so that the population of the capital might well be thus described.
7. Send a blast upon him] RV 'put a spirit in him': i.e. an impulse of fear. A rumour] Ill tidings respecting his army, whieh was destined shortly to perish in its advance against Egypt.
8. Returned] to Sennacherib. Libnah.. Lachish] in southern Judah.
9. Tirhakah] an Ethiopian, who was at first the general and subsequently the successor of the Egyptian king Shabako (2Ki_18:21). He was contemporary not only with Sennacherib, but with his two successors, Esarhaddon and Asshurbanipal.
12. Gozan, etc.] These places were all in the neighbourhood of the Euphrates. Gozan is mentioned in 2Ki_17:6; Haran in Gen_11:31; Eden in Eze_27:23.
13. Hamath] see on 2Ki_17:24; It had revolted against Sargon in 720 b.c., but the insurrection was crushed and its king Jahubidi slain.
15. Thou.. even thou alone] Whereas Sennacherib had counted the God of Israel among a number of deities all equally unable to withstand him (2Ki_18:33-35), Hezekiah here asserts that the Lord (Jehovah) is the only God, and implies that whatever the Assyrian had accomplished had been done by His permission.
19. That all.. may know] If a small kingdom like Judah successfully resisted Assyria, it could only be through the supremacy of its God.
21. The daughter of Zion] For the personification of a city as a woman cp. Mic_4:10; Isa_23:10, Isa_23:12; Isa_47:1.
23. The lodgings, etc.] RV 'his farthest lodging place, the forest of his fruitful field.'
24. I have digged.. waters] Sennacherib implies that the progress of his armies on foreign soil could not be hindered by the enemy stopping up the water-springs: he at once digs fresh wells. Besieged places] RV 'Egypt.' The numerous channels of the Nile were ordinarily a means of defence to Egypt (cp. Nah_3:8), but Sennacherib implies that they were inadequate to stay his advance.
25. Hast thou.. done it] This begins the Lord's response to Sennacherib's boastings. The Assyrian king had in reality only been an agent deputed to carry out the divine purposes: cp. Isa_10:12; Isa_47:6; Zec_1:15.
28. My hook] cp. Eze_38:4. The expression may be an allusion either to the method adopted for controlling wild animals (cp. Eze_19:4), or to a practice employed by the Assyrians towards their captives: see 2Ch_33:11; RM.
29. A sign unto thee] i.e. unto Hezekiah. The occurrence of the earlier and harsher part of the prophet's prediction would be a warranty for the fulfilment of the later and more cheerful portion of his message, viz. that the land should be free from invasion and cultivated in peace. This year.. the third year] The reckoning is inclusive, 'this year' meaning the year of the invasion, and 'the third year' being the second year after it.
30. The remnant] cp. 2Ki_19:3. The population, so sadly thinned by the war, would again recover its strength and numbers.
31. Out of Jerusalem, etc.] The country folk that had been driven into the capital by the invasion would again return to their homes.
32. Cast a bank] a mound of earth with an inclined surface, raised against the wall of a besieged city to enable the besiegers to reach the top.
34. Mine own sake] God's intentions towards His people could not be foiled altogether through the sins of the latter; so that though the divine justice had demanded the chastisement of the nation, the divine faithfulness required that it should be preserved from complete destruction.
35. The angel of the Lord] cp. Exo_12:23. In 2Sa_24:15-16 the pestilence that punished David's numbering of the people is attributed to an angel; and it is probable that it was a similar calamity that destroyed Sennacherib's army. It seems more likely that the disaster occurred in the low-lying ground on the Egyptian frontiers than in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem; and the Greek historian, Herodotus, who gives a fanciful account of an overthrow sustained by the Assyrians in a campaign against Egypt, places it near Pelusium. But wherever and however it happened, it was a signal confirmation of Isaiah's faith in the Lord and a striking vindication of his prescience.
36. Nineveh] its ruins have been found opposite the modern Mosul.
37. His sons smote him] Sennacherib's death did not occur until some 20 years after the destruction of his army, as described in 2Ki_19:35 but though he took part in several expeditions subsequent to his invasion of Judah, he never again molested the Hebrew state. Esarhaddon] reigned from 681 b.c. to 668.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain 2. Hezekiah and Isaiah and the Deliverance
2. Hezekiah and Isaiah and the Deliverance
CHAPTER 19
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1. Hezekiah’s message to Isaiah (2Ki 19:1-5)
2. Isaiah’s answer. (2Ki 19:6-7)
3. Sennacherib’s message to Hezekiah (2Ki 19:8-13; 2Ch 32:17)
4. Hezekiah’s Prayer (2Ki 19:14-19; 2Ch 32:20)
5. Jehovah’s answer through Isaiah (2Ki 19:20-34)
6. The deliverance (2Ki 19:35; 2Ch 32:21-22)
7. Sennacherib’s death (2Ki 19:30-37)
And Hezekiah also rent his clothes. In deep humiliation and sorrow the pious man went to the house of the Lord and sent messengers to Isaiah. This is most blessed. He did not call a counsel of his advisers, a meeting of the captains to talk the matter over; nor did he send first to the prophet. Faith knows a better way than that. He went straight into the presence of the LORD and the sending to Isaiah was secondary. Many of our failures as His people are due to the fact that we do not go to the LORD first.
And equally beautiful is his message to God’s prophet. He mentions not himself in the danger of Jerusalem. It is the honor of Jehovah which is at stake; the honor of the living God is at stake. The Assyrian had defied the God of Israel. Yea, Hezekiah’s comfort was that Jehovah had heard it all and knew it all. What lessons and what comforts are here for us also! Then he requests prayer.
The divine answer through Isaiah was brief. Be not afraid. The blessed assurance for faith first--Fear not! The promise of deliverance is the second thing in Isaiah’s answer.
Another message in the form of a letter is sent by Sennacherib to the king. Again Hezekiah goes with it straight to the LORD. He read it and went up into the house of the LORD and spread it before the LORD. What blessing there would be in the lives of all God’s people; what wonderful evidences of His power and His love we might have if all things which happened unto us were at once taken into the presence of God and spread before Him!
And the beautiful answer to Hezekiah’s prayer sent through the prophet! The LORD had heard, He had seen. All what had taken place He knew and any word which had been spoken. The message ends with the assuring word, “I will defend this city, to save it, for Mine own sake, and for my servant David’s sake.”
That night the judgment stroke fell. The whole Assyrian army of 185,000 men was smitten by the angel of the LORD. Prophetically it stands for the end of the Assyrian who will enter Israel’s land during the great tribulation and who will perish like Sennacherib’s army.
Sennacherib dwelt after that in Nineveh. There he was murdered by his own sons. An Assyrian cylinder in the British Museum contains a record of this deed.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The Mourning of Hezekiah and the Arrogance of the…
The Mourning of Hezekiah and the Arrogance of the Assyrian King
v. 1. And it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard it, that he rent his clothes, filled with horror over the blasphemy uttered by the Assyrian messengers, and covered himself with sackcloth, the garment of penitence, for he saw in the entire Assyrian campaign a punishment of God, and went into the house of the Lord.
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v. 2. And he sent Eliakim, which was over the household, and Shebna, the scribe, two of his chief officers, and the elders of the priests, the most notable among them, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah, the prophet, the son of Amoz, who, although advanced in years, was still proclaiming the Word of the Lord.
v. 3. And they said unto him, Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble and of rebuke and blasphemy, of rejection of the people on the part of God; for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth, said of the crisis in the birth of a child when the strength of the mother fails in the midst of the labor pains and the life of both the mother and the baby are in the greatest danger. The situation in Judah was likewise one of extreme peril.
v. 4. It may be the Lord, thy God, will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria, his master, hath sent to reproach the living God, to heap contempt upon Him; and will reprove the words which the Lord, thy God, hath heard; wherefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that are left, induce the Lord to revenge the arrogant blasphemy which had been heaped both upon Him and upon His people.
v. 5. So the servants of King Hezekiah, bearing this message, came to Isaiah.
v. 6. And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed Me; the word rendered "servants" really signifies "immature boys, lackeys," such as are not yet able to use proper judgment.
v. 7. Behold, I will send a blast upon him, an extraordinary impetus driving him on, and he shall hear a rumor, this disquieting report causing the uneasiness of his mind,and shall return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.
v. 8. So Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah; for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish, having meanwhile probably taken the city.
v. 9. And when he, the Assyrian king, heard say of Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia, ruler over Egypt, successor of Shebek II, Behold, he is come out to fight against thee, to anticipate Sennacherib’s attack of Egypt, he sent messengers again unto Hezekiah, in a last attempt to obtain possession of Jerusalem and of Judah, saying,
v. 10. Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah, king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria. The entire message was once more intended to intimidate Hezekiah by a false pretense of power.
v. 11. Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, by destroying them utterly, this being a boastful exaggeration; and shalt thou be delivered?
v. 12. 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 Thelasar? These were provinces north of the Tigris, in Mesopotamia and in the district of Palmyra, in Eastern Syria.
v. 13. Where Is the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and Ivah? Cf 2Ki 18:34. Over against all the arrogant blasphemy of the unbelievers the children of God have the promise and comfort of the Word of God, in whose power they are able to withstand all enemies.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 house of Yahweh
house of Yahweh
This is another way of saying "temple of Yahweh."
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Eliakim ... Shebna ... Isaiah ... Amoz
These are all names of men. (See: How to Translate Names)
He sent Eliakim
"Hezekiah sent Eliakim"
all covered with sackcloth
"all wearing sackcloth"
translationWords
king
Hezekiah
report
sackcloth
house of God
Eliakim
household
scribe
elder
priest
Isaiah
Amoz
prophet
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 19:1 Hezekiah showed his grief in the same way…
19:1 Hezekiah showed his grief in the same way his representatives had (see Joel 1:13). He wisely went to the Temple, where he laid bare his soul before God in heartfelt worship and supplication (see Pss 5:7; 48:9-10; 63:1-3).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.