2 Kings 18:5

18:5 He trusted in the Lord God of Israel; in this regard there was none like him among the kings of Judah either before or after. ¹ 

2 Kings 18:19-37

18:19 The chief adviser said to them, “Tell Hezekiah: ‘This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: “What is your source of confidence? ²  18:20 Your claim to have a strategy and military strength is just empty talk. ³  In whom are you trusting that you would dare to rebel against me? 18:21 Now look, you must be trusting in Egypt, that splintered reed staff. If a man leans for support on it, it punctures his hand and wounds him. That is what Pharaoh king of Egypt does to all who trust in him. 18:22 Perhaps you will tell me, ‘We are trusting in the Lord our God.’ But Hezekiah is the one who eliminated his high places and altars and then told the people of Judah and Jerusalem, ‘You must worship at this altar in Jerusalem.’ 18:23 Now make a deal ⁴  with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, provided you can find enough riders for them. 18:24 Certainly you will not refuse one of my master’s minor officials and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen. ⁵  18:25 Furthermore it was by the command of the Lord that I marched up against this place to destroy it. The Lord told me, ‘March ⁶  up against this land and destroy it.’”’” ⁷ 

18:26 Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebna, and Joah said to the chief adviser, “Speak to your servants in Aramaic, ⁸  for we understand it. Don’t speak with us in the Judahite dialect ⁹  in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.” 18:27 But the chief adviser said to them, “My master did not send me to speak these words only to your master and to you. ¹⁰  His message is also for the men who sit on the wall, for they will eat their own excrement and drink their own urine along with you.” ¹¹ 

18:28 The chief adviser then stood there and called out loudly in the Judahite dialect, ¹²  “Listen to the message of the great king, the king of Assyria. 18:29 This is what the king says: ‘Don’t let Hezekiah mislead you, for he is not able to rescue you from my hand! ¹³  18:30 Don’t let Hezekiah talk you into trusting in the Lord when he says, “The Lord will certainly rescue us; this city will not be handed over to the king of Assyria.” 18:31 Don’t listen to Hezekiah!’ For this is what the king of Assyria says, ‘Send me a token of your submission and surrender to me. ¹⁴  Then each of you may eat from his own vine and fig tree and drink water from his own cistern, 18:32 until I come and take you to a land just like your own – a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive trees and honey. Then you will live and not die. Don’t listen to Hezekiah, for he is misleading you when he says, “The Lord will rescue us.” 18:33 Have any of the gods of the nations actually rescued his land from the power of the king of Assyria? ¹⁵  18:34 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? ¹⁶  Indeed, did any gods rescue Samaria ¹⁷  from my power? ¹⁸  18:35 Who among all the gods of the lands has rescued their lands from my power? So how can the Lord rescue Jerusalem from my power?’” ¹⁹  18:36 The people were silent and did not respond, for the king had ordered, “Don’t respond to him.”

18:37 Eliakim son of Hilkiah, the palace supervisor, accompanied by Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph, the secretary, went to Hezekiah with their clothes torn ²⁰  and reported to him what the chief adviser had said.

2 Kings 19:10

19:10 “Tell King Hezekiah of Judah this: ‘Don’t let your God in whom you trust mislead you when he says, “Jerusalem will not be handed over ²¹  to the king of Assyria.”

2 Kings 19:2

19:2 He sent Eliakim the palace supervisor, Shebna the scribe, and the leading priests, ²²  clothed in sackcloth, with this message to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz:

2 Kings 1:7-10

1:7 The king ²³  asked them, “Describe the appearance ²⁴  of this man who came up to meet you and told you these things.” 1:8 They replied, ²⁵  “He was a hairy man ²⁶  and had a leather belt ²⁷  tied around his waist.” The king ²⁸  said, “He is Elijah the Tishbite.”

1:9 The king ²⁹  sent a captain and his fifty soldiers ³⁰  to retrieve Elijah. ³¹  The captain ³²  went up to him, while he was sitting on the top of a hill. ³³  He told him, “Prophet, ³⁴  the king says, ‘Come down!’” 1:10 Elijah replied to the captain, ³⁵  “If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty soldiers!” Fire then came down ³⁶  from the sky and consumed him and his fifty soldiers.

2 Kings 1:14-16

1:14 Indeed, ³⁷  fire came down from the sky and consumed the two captains who came before me, along with their men. ³⁸  So now, please have respect for my life.” 1:15 The Lord’s angelic messenger said to Elijah, “Go down with him. Don’t be afraid of him.” So he got up and went down ³⁹  with him to the king.

1:16 Elijah ⁴⁰  said to the king, ⁴¹  “This is what the Lord says, ‘You sent messengers to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. You must think there is no God in Israel from whom you can seek an oracle! ⁴²  Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’” ⁴³ 

Psalms 42:3

42:3 I cannot eat, I weep day and night; ⁴⁴ 

all day long they say to me, ⁴⁵  “Where is your God?”

Psalms 42:10

42:10 My enemies’ taunts cut into me to the bone, ⁴⁶ 

as they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” ⁴⁷ 

Psalms 71:10-11

71:10 For my enemies talk about me;

those waiting for a chance to kill me plot my demise. ⁴⁸ 

71:11 They say, ⁴⁹  “God has abandoned him.

Run and seize him, for there is no one who will rescue him!”

[18:5]  ¹ tn Heb “and after him there was none like him among all the kings of Judah, and those who were before him.”

[18:19]  ² tn Heb “What is this object of trust in which you are trusting?”

[18:20]  ³ tn Heb “you say only a word of lips, counsel and might for battle.” Sennacherib’s message appears to be in broken Hebrew at this point. The phrase “word of lips” refers to mere or empty talk in Prov 14:23.

[18:23]  ⁴ tn Heb “exchange pledges.”

[18:24]  ⁵ tn Heb “How can you turn back the face of an official [from among] the least of my master’s servants and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?” In vv. 23-24 the chief adviser develops further the argument begun in v. 21. His reasoning seems to be as follows: “In your weakened condition you obviously need military strength. Agree to the king’s terms and I will personally give you more horses than you are capable of outfitting. If I, a mere minor official, am capable of giving you such military might, just think what power the king has. There is no way the Egyptians can match our strength. It makes much better sense to deal with us.”

[18:25]  ⁶ tn Heb “Go.”

[18:25]  ⁷ sn In v. 25 the chief adviser develops further the argument begun in v. 22. He claims that Hezekiah has offended the Lord and that the Lord has commissioned Assyria as his instrument of discipline and judgment.

[18:26]  ⁸ sn Aramaic was the diplomatic language of the empire.

[18:26]  ⁹ tn Or “Hebrew.”

[18:27]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “To your master and to you did my master send me to speak these words?” The rhetorical question expects a negative answer.

[18:27]  ¹¹ tn Heb “[Is it] not [also] to the men…?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Yes, it is.”

[18:28]  ¹² tn The Hebrew text also has, “and he spoke and said.”

[18:29]  ¹³ tc The MT has “his hand,” but this is due to graphic confusion of vav (ו) and yod (י). The translation reads “my hand,” along with many medieval Hebrew mss, the LXX, Syriac Peshitta, Targum, and Vulgate.

[18:31]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “make with me a blessing and come out to me.”

[18:33]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Have the gods of the nations really rescued, each his land, from the hand of the king of Assyria?” The infinitive absolute lends emphasis to the main verb. The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Of course not!”

[18:34]  ¹⁶ tn The parallel passage in Isa 36:19 omits “Hena and Ivvah.” The rhetorical questions in v. 34a suggest the answer, “Nowhere, they seem to have disappeared in the face of Assyria’s might.”

[18:34]  ¹⁷ map For location see Map2 B1; Map4 D3; Map5 E2; Map6 A4; Map7 C1.

[18:34]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “that they rescued Samaria from my hand?” But this gives the impression that the gods of Sepharvaim were responsible for protecting Samaria, which is obviously not the case. The implied subject of the plural verb “rescued” must be the generic “gods of the nations/lands” (vv. 33, 35).

[18:35]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “that the Lord might rescue Jerusalem from my hand?” The logic runs as follows: Since no god has ever been able to withstand the Assyrian onslaught, how can the people of Jerusalem possibly think the Lord will rescue them?

[18:37]  ²⁰ sn As a sign of grief and mourning.

[19:10]  ²¹ tn Heb “will not be given.”

[19:2]  ²² tn Heb “elders of the priests.”

[1:7]  ²³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:7]  ²⁴ tn Heb “What was the manner…?”

[1:8]  ²⁵ tn Heb “said to him.”

[1:8]  ²⁶ tn Heb “an owner of hair.” This idiomatic expression indicates that Elijah was very hairy. For other examples where the idiom “owner of” is used to describe a characteristic of someone, see HALOT 143 s.v. בַּעַל. For example, an “owner of dreams” is one who frequently has dreams (Gen 37:19) and an “owner of anger” is a hot-tempered individual (Prov 22:24).

[1:8]  ²⁷ tn Heb “belt of skin” (i.e., one made from animal hide).

[1:8]  ²⁸ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:9]  ²⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:9]  ³⁰ tn Heb “officer of fifty and his fifty.”

[1:9]  ³¹ tn Heb “to him.”

[1:9]  ³² tn Heb “he”; the referent (the captain) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:9]  ³³ sn The prophet Elijah’s position on the top of the hill symbolizes his superiority to the king and his messengers.

[1:9]  ³⁴ tn Heb “man of God” (also in vv. 10, 11, 12, 13).

[1:10]  ³⁵ tn Heb “answered and said to the officer of fifty.”

[1:10]  ³⁶ tn Wordplay contributes to the irony here. The king tells Elijah to “come down” (Hebrew יָרַד, yarad), but Elijah calls fire down (יָרַד) on the arrogant king’s officer.

[1:14]  ³⁷ tn Heb “look.”

[1:14]  ³⁸ tn Heb “their fifty.”

[1:15]  ³⁹ sn In this third panel the verb “come down” (יָרַד, yarad) occurs again, this time describing Elijah’s descent from the hill at the Lord’s command. The moral of the story seems clear: Those who act as if they have authority over God and his servants just may pay for their arrogance with their lives; those who, like the third commander, humble themselves and show the proper respect for God’s authority and for his servants will be spared and find God quite cooperative.

[1:16]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elijah) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:16]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “him”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[1:16]  ⁴² tn Heb “Because you sent messengers to inquire of Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron, is there no God in Israel to inquire of his word?”

[1:16]  ⁴³ sn For the third time in this chapter we read the Lord’s sarcastic question to king and the accompanying announcement of judgment. The repetition emphasizes one of the chapter’s main themes. Israel’s leaders should seek guidance from their own God, not a pagan deity, for Israel’s sovereign God is the one who controls life and death.

[42:3]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “My tears have become my food day and night.”

[42:3]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “when [they] say to me all the day.” The suffixed third masculine plural pronoun may have been accidentally omitted from the infinitive בֶּאֱמֹר (be’ÿmor, “when [they] say”). Note the term בְּאָמְרָם (bÿ’omram, “when they say”) in v. 10.

[42:10]  ⁴⁶ tc Heb “with a shattering in my bones my enemies taunt me.” A few medieval Hebrew mss and Symmachus’ Greek version read “like” instead of “with.”

[42:10]  ⁴⁷ sn “Where is your God?” The enemies ask this same question in v. 3.

[71:10]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “those who watch for my life consult together.”

[71:11]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “saying.”