2 Kings 20

About that time Hezekiah got sick, and he was going to die from it. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him and said, "This is what the LORD says: Get your affairs in order, because you are going to die. You will not get well."

1In those days was Hezekiah sick unto death. And the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz came to him, and said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live.

NoteHezekiah was king of Judah, the smaller southern kingdom whose capital was Jerusalem, ruling roughly 715–686 BC. Isaiah son of Amoz was a prophet active in Jerusalem through his reign. "In those days" is a loose connector: the events of this chapter are not necessarily later than the Assyrian siege described in the two previous chapters, and many readers place them earlier.

2Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall and prayed to the LORD. He said,

2Then he turned his face to the wall, and prayed unto the LORD, saying,

3"Please, LORD, remember how I have lived my life in front of you: faithfully, with my whole heart, doing what you consider good." And Hezekiah cried hard.

3I beseech thee, O LORD, remember now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Hezekiah wept sore.

NoteIn the King James wording, "a perfect heart" does not mean a flawless one. The Hebrew word means whole or undivided, loyalty that is not split between the LORD and other gods. "Walked before thee" is a standard idiom for the way a person conducts their entire life, not for a particular journey.

4Isaiah had not yet walked out through the middle courtyard when the LORD spoke to him. He said,

4And it came to pass, afore Isaiah was gone out into the middle court, that the word of the LORD came to him, saying,

5"Go back and tell Hezekiah, the leader of my people, that this is what the LORD, the God of your ancestor David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears. I am going to heal you. On the third day you will go up to the LORD's temple.

5Turn again, and tell Hezekiah the captain of my people, Thus saith the LORD, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee: on the third day thou shalt go up unto the house of the LORD.

Note"The third day" counts the present day as day one, so it means the day after tomorrow, hence "two days from now." Ancient Hebrew reckoning almost always counts inclusively like this. Going up to the temple was the public proof of recovery: a seriously ill man was in no state to make the climb to the temple mount, the highest ground in the city.

6I will add fifteen years to your life. And I will rescue you and this city from the power of the king of Assyria. I will protect this city for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David."

6And I will add unto thy days fifteen years; and I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for mine own sake, and for my servant David’s sake.

NoteAssyria was the dominant empire of the age, based in what is now northern Iraq. It had already destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel and, under Sennacherib, had overrun the fortified towns of Judah and threatened Jerusalem itself. A promise of rescue "from the hand of the king of Assyria" was a promise about the largest military power Hezekiah's world knew.

7Then Isaiah said, "Get a cake of pressed figs." They brought it and put it on the sore, and Hezekiah got better.

7And Isaiah said, Take a lump of figs. And they took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.

NoteA "lump of figs" is a cake of figs pressed into a solid mass, applied as a poultice, a soft dressing laid directly on the skin. Fig poultices for sores and swellings are attested in ancient Near Eastern medical texts, so this was a recognized remedy rather than an unusual act. The "boil" is an inflamed sore or ulcer; the Hebrew word covers a range of skin eruptions and does not identify the disease.

8Hezekiah had asked Isaiah, "What will be the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I will go up to the LORD's temple on the third day?"

8And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the LORD the third day?

9Isaiah had answered, "Here is the sign from the LORD that he will do what he has said. Do you want the shadow to move forward ten steps, or to go back ten steps?"

9And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?

NoteThe Hebrew word translated "degrees" literally means steps or stairs. A shadow moving "forward" means moving on in the normal direction as the day advances. Isaiah offers Hezekiah a choice between two directions of movement, and Hezekiah picks the one that could not happen naturally.

10Hezekiah answered, "It is an easy thing for the shadow to move ahead ten steps. No, let it go back ten steps instead."

10And Hezekiah answered, It is a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees.

11So Isaiah the prophet called out to the LORD, and the LORD brought the shadow back the ten steps it had already moved down on the stairway of Ahaz.

11And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the LORD: and he brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz.

NoteAhaz was Hezekiah's father and the previous king of Judah. What the King James calls his "dial" is literally "the steps of Ahaz," and scholars are divided on what it was: either a flight of stairs built so that a shadow descending the steps marked the passing hours, or a stepped sundial of the kind known from Egypt and Mesopotamia. The Hebrew does not settle it.

12At that time Berodach-baladan son of Baladan, the king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, because he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

12At that time Berodachbaladan, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present unto Hezekiah: for he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

NoteThe name appears elsewhere as Merodach-baladan; b and m were easily confused in copying, and both forms are found in the manuscripts. He was a Chaldean ruler who seized Babylon and twice led it in revolt against Assyria. In this period Babylon was a subject kingdom under Assyrian control, not yet an empire. Letters and a gift between kings were formal diplomacy, and an envoy sent to a distant king who was also resisting Assyria would normally be probing for an alliance.

13Hezekiah welcomed the messengers and showed them his whole treasure house: the silver, the gold, the spices, and the fine oil. He also showed them his weapons storehouse and everything in his storerooms. There was nothing in his palace or in all his kingdom that Hezekiah did not show them.

13And Hezekiah hearkened unto them, and shewed them all the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious ointment, and all the house of his armour, and all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah shewed them not.

NoteShowing envoys the treasury and the armory was not simple hospitality or vanity: it was how a king demonstrated to a prospective ally what he could contribute to a joint war. The spices and fine oil were not kitchen goods but high-value trade commodities, stored and counted alongside silver and gold.

14Then the prophet Isaiah came to King Hezekiah and asked him, "What did those men say, and where did they come from?" Hezekiah said, "They came from a country far away, from Babylon."

14Then came Isaiah the prophet unto king Hezekiah, and said unto him, What said these men? and from whence came they unto thee? And Hezekiah said, They are come from a far country, even from Babylon.

15Isaiah asked, "What did they see in your palace?" Hezekiah answered, "They saw everything in my palace. There is nothing in my storerooms that I did not show them."

15And he said, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All the things that are in mine house have they seen: there is nothing among my treasures that I have not shewed them.

16Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Listen to what the LORD says.

16And Isaiah said unto Hezekiah, Hear the word of the LORD.

17The time is coming when everything in your palace, and everything your ancestors have stored up until today, will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the LORD.

17Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store unto this day, shall be carried into Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD.

NoteThis came true about a century later, when Babylonian armies under Nebuchadnezzar took Jerusalem and stripped the palace and temple, finally destroying the city in 586 BC. At the moment Isaiah speaks, Babylon is a struggling vassal of Assyria, which is part of the force of the statement.

18And some of your own sons, your own children, will be taken away. They will serve as eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon."

18And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

NoteEunuchs were castrated men who served in royal households, often rising to positions of considerable trust as officials, stewards and administrators; castration was a common fate for high-ranking captives taken into a foreign court. The Hebrew word can sometimes mean simply a court official, but in the setting of a foreign king's palace the literal sense is the natural one. For a king's sons it meant service to a foreign master and the end of their own line.

19Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD you have spoken is good." For he thought, "At least there will be peace and safety during my lifetime."

19Then said Hezekiah unto Isaiah, Good is the word of the LORD which thou hast spoken. And he said, Is it not good, if peace and truth be in my days?

Note"Truth" here carries the sense of stability or security rather than accuracy. Hezekiah's closing words are ambiguous in Hebrew and can be read either as something he says aloud or as a private thought, and either as calm acceptance or as relief that the disaster will fall on someone else. The Hebrew leaves both open.

20The rest of what Hezekiah did, all his strength, and how he built the pool and the tunnel that brought water into the city, are written in the book of the record of the kings of Judah.

20And the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and all his might, and how he made a pool, and a conduit, and brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

NoteThe pool and conduit are almost certainly the works still visible in Jerusalem: a tunnel roughly 1,750 feet long, cut through solid rock, carrying water from the Gihon spring outside the city wall to a pool inside it, so that a besieging army could not cut off the supply. An inscription found in the tunnel in 1880 describes the two teams of diggers meeting in the middle. The "book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah" is a lost royal record repeatedly cited by the writer as a source; it is not the biblical books of Chronicles.

21Hezekiah died, and his son Manasseh became king in his place.

21And Hezekiah slept with his fathers: and Manasseh his son reigned in his stead.

Note"Slept with his fathers" is a set phrase for dying and being laid in the ancestral tomb; it says nothing about the manner of death, and is used of kings who died peacefully.