These chapters form the first portion of the historical episode which severs the earlier half of the prophecy from its latter half. They are of importance not only for the weighty facts they present (for this is sufficiently done and in a two-fold point of view in 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles), but for their connection with the two sections of the book of Isaiah. No doubt, the incidents had their value, and so also the record of them, as the most conspicuous seal which could then be affixed on the prophet's character; for the danger was extreme, the distress of the people intense, the antecedents of the King in opposition to the Assyrian by no means reassuring, the confidence of the enemy boundless. Yet was the word of Isaiah distinct and soon most punctually verified.
But there are deeper grounds for the introduction of this historical matter into the midst of the prophecy. It was of moment that the believer should have the inspired and therefore sure means of discriminating between the part which was thus accomplished and the part which yet awaits its fulfillment. We can now readily see that the Shalmanesers and the Sennacheribs of the past have not exhausted the terms and scope of the prophecy; we can understand that enough has been done to form an adequate type, an historical basis, for that which is to come and to make good every word that proceeds from the Lord. Any mind can judge that the overthrow of the Assyrian—as the precursor of Babylon's supremacy, the captivity of Judah and the long times of the Gentiles—widely differs from the final judgment of the Assyrian, when Babylon in its last phase is itself destroyed and the times of the Gentiles close in the glory of Jerusalem and Israel under David the beloved, their king, and the new covenant in the pleasant land.
No king had shown such trust in the Lord since the days of David as Hezekiah. But his faith was tried. With alacrity of heart he had made the Lord his object, from the day he ascended the throne. “He in the first year of his reign, in the first month, opened the doors of the house of the Lord and repaired them.” (2 Chron. 29:33He in the first year of his reign, in the first month, opened the doors of the house of the Lord, and repaired them. (2 Chronicles 29:3).) He inspired the Levites and priests with somewhat of his own desire to renounce long indifference for loyalty to Jehovah. “Now they began on the first day of the first month to sanctify, and on the eighth day of the month came they to the porch of the Lord: so they sanctified the house of the Lord in eight days and in the sixteenth day of the first month they made an end.” The vessels which were cast away in king Ahaz's reign were once more prepared. “The king rose early and gathered the rulers of the city, and went up to the house of the Lord. Atonement was made for all Israel, for the king commanded that the burnt-offering and the sin-offering should be made for all Israel.” What governed all was “the commandment of the Lord by His prophets.” He was the first king, since the rent of Ephraim under Rehoboam whose heart sought that all Israel should come to the house of the Lord at Jerusalem to keep the passover unto the Lord God of Israel. Godly predecessors felt it too little—thought not of it—certainly did nothing toward it; ungodly predecessors would have desired nothing less, however much they would have seen all Israel re-united under their own scepter. Hezekiah clave to the Lord and sought for all Israel the same thing. And though his overtures were laughed to scorn and mocked by most, “divers of Asher, and Manasseh, and of Zebulon humbled themselves and came to Jerusalem. Also in Judah the band of God was to give them one heart to do the commandment of the king and of the princes, by the word of the Lord.” The old altars to their false gods, at any rate unhallowed, unauthorized altars were taken away and cast into the brook Kidron, the images were broken, the groves were cut down, the high places disappeared: The due honor of the house and servants and service of Jehovah was provided for as written in His law. “And in every work that he began in the service of the house of God, and in the law, and in the commandments, to seek his God, he did it with all his heart, and prospered.”
“After these and the establishment thereof, Sennacherib king of Assyria had entered into Judah, and encamped against the fenced cities, and thought to win them for himself.” Was it not strange? A great work had been wrought in restoring the defaced lineaments of the worship of the true God throughout Judah; yet this was no sooner done, than the enemy came to swallow them up! These who judged not by Scripture but by providence would at once be stumbled. Was it not plain that Hezekiah had done wrong in rejecting the traditions of his fathers? Was not God now chastening him and them for his rash reformation? Had he not lifted up his sacrilegious hand to destroy the brazen serpent that Moses made, treating with contempt as a piece of brass the venerable sign of divine grace to their perishing fathers in the desert, to which the children of Israel had till his days burned incense? Was the Assyrian a judgment?
Moreover, the pious king did what he could to fortify himself, sent the lowliest message to the proud Assyrian, gave him all the silver in the Lord's house, and stripped off for him the gold from its doors and pillars; but in vain. There was little of the simplicity, strength, or wisdom of faith in all this: no wonder that the blessing of God was not with him there, and that the enemy was emboldened to ask all. Rabshakeh is sent from Lachish to insult king Hezekiah, to blaspheme the God of Israel, and seduce the people to surrender at discretion to his master. Along with this, truth is mingled; for there were those (not Hezekiah) who did look to Egypt for help. But the aim of all was to reduce the Jews to despair, and to accomplish the designs of Assyria. Hence the very piety of the king, his zeal for Jehovah in throwing down the altars of false gods, is cunningly perverted into a charge of robbing the Lord of His honor, from whom (he pretended) his master had received his charge to come up against Hezekiah. Thus the enemy knows how to give a religious gloss to his own wicked devices as easily as he can blacken the most faithful of God's servants. What a mercy to have the unerring standard of His word to test and be tested by!
The entreaties of Eliakim (ver. 11), that Aramean should be spoken rather than the Jewish tongue only drew out further and audacious insolence; for Rabshakeh stood and cried in that very tongue to the people on the walls, warning them against their king and commending to them the hard terms of deportation to the east, in the face of the overthrow of the nations already broken by the Assyrian. Little did the blasphemer think that there listened to his taunting demand whether Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem, not Eliakim, Shebna, and Joab only, nor the men on the wall only, but Jehovah Himself. It was now His affair; and now at length the faith of Hezekiah begins to shine once more, whose commandment it was to answer him not.
Chap. 36. His clothes rent, the king covered in sackcloth repairs to the house of the Lord, and inquires of the prophet who returns the Lord's answer that they were not to fear the words of blasphemy; for the Lord would undertake the matter and send back the Assyrian to perish in his own land. (Ver. 1-7.)
Still confident, Sennacherib from Libnah sends a letter of similar import to Hezekiah, who spreads it before the Lord with earnest prayer for His intervention. (Ver. 8-20).
Isaiah again returns the answer of the Lord God of Israel: “Whereas thou hast prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria: this is the word which the Lord hath spoken concerning him; the virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee. Whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thine eyes on high? even against the Holy One of Israel. By thy servants hast thou reproached the Lord, and hast said, By the multitude of my chariots am I come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon; and I will cut down the tall cedars thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the height of his border, and the forest of his Carmel. I have digged, and drunk water; and with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of the besieged places.” (Ver. 22-25.) Insult as he might, himself or his servants, the Assyrian must learn that God knew all about him making him but the instrument of His own dealing with the nations. This work done, he must go back humbled and smitten, for he had exceeded his commission; and would God sanction his rage against Himself? (Ver. 26-29) After a sign of coming good to Judah (ver. 30-32), the Lord pronounces His decree. (Ver. 33-35.) “Then the angel of the Lord went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses. 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 Esar-haddon his son reigned in his stead.” (Ver. 36-38.) The total fall of his kingdom followed a few years after. Those that walk in pride God is able to abase. How blessed to hear His voice and know His love! Real as it was however, it was no more than a shadow of the great chief of the nations of the east in the latter day; even as Judah's deliverance and blessedness under the son of David of that day, was but the witness of a brighter day and a more enduring glory, when Jehovah shall exalt Him that was low and abase the high one. “I will overturn, overturn, overturn: and it shall be no more, until he come whose right it [the diadem] is; and I will give it him.”