Isaiah 38:1-13 ▼

1 In those days has Hezekiah been sick to death, and Isaiah son of Amoz, the prophet, comes to him and says to him, “Thus said YHWH: Give a charge to your house, for you [are] dying, and do not live.”

2 And Hezekiah turns around his face to the wall, and prays to YHWH,

3 and says, “Ah, now, O YHWH, please remember how I have habitually walked before You in truth, and with a perfect heart, and I have done that which [is] good in your eyes”; and Hezekiah weeps [with] a great weeping.

4 And a word of YHWH is to Isaiah, saying,

5 “Go, and you have said to Hezekiah, Thus said YHWH, God of your father David: I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tear, behold, I am adding fifteen years to your days,

6 and out of the hand of the king of Asshur I deliver you and this city, and have covered over this city.

7 And this [is] to you the sign from YHWH, that YHWH does this thing that He has spoken.

8 Behold, I am bringing back the shadow of the degrees that it has gone down on the degrees of Ahaz, by the sun, backward ten degrees”; and the sun turns back ten degrees in the degrees that it had gone down.

9 A writing of Hezekiah king of Judah concerning his being sick when he revives from his sickness:

10 “I said in the cutting off of my days, || I go to the gates of Sheol, || I have numbered the remnant of my years.

11 I said, I do not see YAH—YAH! In the land of the living, || I do not behold man anymore, || With the inhabitants of the world.

12 My sojourning has departed, || And been removed from me as a shepherd’s tent, || I have drawn together, as a weaver, my life, || By weakness it cuts me off, || From day to night You end me.

13 I have set [Him] as a lion until morning, || So He breaks all my bones, || From day to night You end me.