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1Hezekiah son of Ahaz became king of Judah in the third year of Hoshea's rule in Israel.
2Hezekiah was 25 years old when he became king, and he ruled 29 years from Jerusalem. His mother Abi was the daughter of Zechariah.
3Hezekiah obeyed the Lord , just as his ancestor David had done.
4He destroyed the local shrines, then tore down the images of foreign gods and cut down the sacred pole for worshiping the goddess Asherah. He also smashed the bronze snake Moses had made. The people had named it Nehushtan and had been offering sacrifices to it.[#Nu 21.9.; #18.4 See Numbers 21.8,9. “Nehushtan” is a nickname that sounds like the Hebrew words for “snake” and “bronze.”]
5Hezekiah trusted the Lord God of Israel. No other king of Judah was like Hezekiah, either before or after him.
6He was completely faithful to the Lord and obeyed the laws the Lord had given to Moses for the people.
7The Lord helped Hezekiah, so he was successful in everything he did. He even rebelled against the king of Assyria, refusing to be his servant.
8Hezekiah defeated the Philistine towns as far away as Gaza—from the smallest towns to the large, walled cities.
9During the fourth year of Hezekiah's rule, which was the seventh year of Hoshea's rule in Israel, King Shalmaneser of Assyria led his troops to Samaria, the capital city of Israel. They attacked
10and captured it three years later, in the sixth year of Hezekiah's rule and the ninth year of Hoshea's rule.[#18.10 When the Israelites measured time, part of a year could be counted as a whole year.]
11The king of Assyria took the Israelites away as prisoners; he forced some of them to live in the town of Halah, others to live near the Habor River in the territory of Gozan, and still others to live in towns where the Median people lived.[#18.11 Probably Sargon, Shalmaneser's successor (see the note at 17.6).]
12All of that happened because the people of Israel had not obeyed the Lord their God. They rejected the solemn agreement he had made with them, and they ignored everything that the Lord 's servant Moses had told them.
13In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah's rule in Judah, King Sennacherib of Assyria invaded the country and captured every walled city, except Jerusalem.[#3 Macc 6.5.; #18.13 Sennacherib ruled Assyria 705–681 b.c. , and this event probably took place in 701 b.c.]
14Hezekiah sent this message to Sennacherib, who was in the town of Lachish: “I know I am guilty of rebellion. But I will pay you whatever you want, if you stop your attack.”
Sennacherib told Hezekiah to pay ten tons of silver and one ton of gold.
15So Hezekiah collected all the silver from the Lord 's temple and the royal treasury.
16He even stripped the gold that he had used to cover the doors and doorposts in the temple. He gave it all to Sennacherib.[#18.16 One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text.]
17The king of Assyria ordered his three highest military officers to leave Lachish and take a large army to Jerusalem. When they arrived, the officers stood on the road near the cloth makers' shops along the canal from the upper pool.
18They called out to Hezekiah, and three of his highest officials came out to meet them. One of them was Hilkiah's son Eliakim, who was the prime minister. The other two were Shebna, assistant to the prime minister, and Joah son of Asaph, keeper of the government records.
19One of the Assyrian commanders told them:
26Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah said, “Sir, we don't want the people listening from the city wall to understand what you are saying. So please speak to us in Aramaic instead of Hebrew.”
27The Assyrian army commander answered, “My king sent me to speak to everyone, not just to you leaders. These people will soon have to eat their own body waste and drink their own urine! And so will the three of you.”
28Then, in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, he shouted in Hebrew:
36-37Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah had been warned by King Hezekiah not to answer the Assyrian commander. So they tore their clothes in sorrow and reported to Hezekiah everything the commander had said.