Isaiah 36:1-12 ▼

1 In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah’s (YHWH is my strength) reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria (a step) attacked and captured all the fortified cities of Judah (praised).

2 And the king of Assyria (a step) sent the Rabshakeh {Rabshakeh}, with a great army, from Lachish (invincible) to King Hezekiah (YHWH is my strength) at Jerusalem (city of peace). And he stopped by the aqueduct of the upper pool, on the road to the Launderer’s Field.

3 Then Eliakim (GGod sets up) son of Hilkiah (my portion is YHWH) the palace administrator, Shebna (vigor) the scribe, and Joah (YHWH is brother) son of Asaph (gatherer) the recorder, went out to him.

4 The Rabshakeh said to them, “Tell Hezekiah (YHWH is my strength) that this is what the great king, the king of Assyria (a step), says: What is the basis of this confidence of yours?

5 You claim to have \You speak/ a strategy and strength for war, but these are empty words. In whom are you now trusting, that you have rebelled against me?

6 Look now, you are trusting in Egypt (land of bondage), that splintered reed of a staff that will pierce the hand of anyone who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh (great house) king of Egypt to all who trust in him.

7 But if you say to me, ‘We trust in the LORD our God {YHWH Elohenu},’ is He not the One whose high places and altars Hezekiah (YHWH is my strength) has removed, saying to Judah (praised) and Jerusalem (city of peace), ‘You⁺ must worship before this altar’?

8 Now, therefore, make a bargain with my master, the king of Assyria (a step). I will give you two thousand horses—if you can put riders on them!

9 For how can you repel a single officer among the least of my master’s servants when you depend on Egypt (land of bondage) for chariots and horsemen?

10 So now, was it apart from the LORD {YHWH} that I have come up against this land to destroy it? The LORD Himself said to me, ‘Go up against this land and destroy it.’”

11 Then Eliakim (GGod sets up), Shebna (vigor), and Joah (YHWH is brother) said to the Rabshakeh, “Please speak to your servants in Aramaic (language), since we understand it. Do not speak to us in Hebrew (in the dialect of Judah) in the hearing of the people on the wall.”

12 But the Rabshakeh replied, “Has my master sent me to speak these words only to you and your master, and not to the men sitting on the wall, who are destined with you⁺ to eat their own dung and drink their own urine?”