2 Kings 18:13

THE CAMPAIGN OF SENNACHERIB AGAINST JUDAH IN 701 B.C.

"Now in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah did Sennacherib king of Assyria come up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and took them. And Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria to Lachish, saying, I have offended; return from me: that which thou puttest on me will I bear. And the king of Assyria appointed unto Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold. And Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was found in the house of Jehovah, and in the treasures of the king's house. At that time did Hezekiah cut off the gold from the doors of the temple of Jehovah, and from the pillars which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria."

Practically every word of the balance of this chapter and through 2 Kings 19 are given in the parallel account in Isaiah 36-37, where we have already written some sixteen pages of comments on these events. (See Vol. I of my major prophets series (Isaiah), pp. 329-345.) Montgomery referred to the two separate accounts of the same events as "parallel" and "duplicates."[6]

"In the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah did Sennacherib king of Assyria come up against all the cities of Judah" (2 Kings 18:13). The well-known chronological problem here has been discussed by many. "The year was 701 B.C., the twenty-fourth year of his reign."[7]

"Three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold" (2 Kings 18:14). There is no intelligent grounds whatever for supposing that Hezekiah would have paid a tribute this large (estimated anywhere from $2,000.000.00 to $10,000,000.00) without a firm promise from Sennacherib that he would not then besiege Jerusalem. Nor is there any valid reason for supposing that Sennacherib honored his promise by withdrawing from Jerusalem and returning years later in 688 B.C. and at that time meeting with the disaster that slew his army as here recorded in 2 Kings 19. The critical fad of conjuring up two such campaigns is founded on ridiculous sophistry. As Josephus expressed it quite bluntly, "The Assyrian king took it, and yet had no respect to what he had promised."[8] Critics who desire to uphold their false notion of two different campaigns point out that Sennacherib's monument (a base relief of which is in the British Museum[9]) shows him seated on a throne after the conquest of Lachish and viewing the parade of 200,000 captives that he took, but that he made no mention of a campaign against Jerusalem! Indeed! Indeed! Should we deny that the Battle of San Jacinto was fought because Santa Ana failed to erect a monument to it?

We are indeed gratified to find that Honeycutt in the Broadman Bible Commentary accepted the fact of one invasion only, "as a workable hypothesis for his commentary on 2Kings.[10] This writer contends that no other hypothesis is tenable. Honeycutt pointed out a number of very able scholars who, "diverge from the double invasion theory."[11]

In Sennacherib's monument, mentioned above, "He claims to have cast up entrenchments against Jerusalem; he gives a list of forty-six conquered cities, states that he received 800 talents of silver and thirty talents of gold as tribute, also many precious stones, ivory couches, and the women of his palace, and many male and female musicians."[12] A great deal of that inscription is probably a lie. The 300 talents of silver shows up in the list as 800, and no explanation involving different kinds of talents can harmonize the two figures. Furthermore, Isaiah had prophesied that Sennacherib would not cast up an embankment against Jerusalem, and we cannot believe his lying report that he did so. Also, all of that about the women, etc., is apparently false. This writer refuses to allow the foolish acceptance by the "scholars" of every word that they find on some inscription erected by some ancient son of the devil like Sennacherib. We thank God for the mild statement that, "Error ... may lie in the Assyrian figure."[13] We would suggest that the word `lie' should have headed his sentence.