Isaiah 36:1

DIVISION V (Isaiah 36-39)

This division is the historical section of Isaiah, corresponding with 2 Kings 18:13-19:37. "Except for Hezekiah's psalm, found only in Isaiah 38:9-20, and for Isaiah's omission of 2 Kings 18:14-16, including part of Isaiah 36:17a, much of the material in this Division coincides almost word-for-word with 2 Kings 18-20."[1]

There are some unanswered questions about variations in these two accounts: (1) Samaria fell in 722 B.C., which was Hezekiah's sixth year (2 Kings 18:10); Sennacherib's invasion of Judah was in 701 B.C., which therefore would have been Hezekiah's 27th year. Isaiah 36:1, however, states that Sennacherib's invasion of Judaea came in the 14th year of Hezekiah. All kinds of "explanations" are proposed by critics, most of them involving emendations in the text, the supposition of errors on the part of editors, co-editors, and redactors, etc., but as Rawlinson pointed out the solution of such problems is "quite impossible to determine except arbitrarily."[2]

We like the bold manner in which Archer handled this problem. He stated that, "The 14th year (Isaiah 36:1) seems to refer to the Second Reign of Hezekiah, that is, the additional span of fifteen years added to the king's life after that deadly illness."[3] Archer did not relate just how he came up with that explanation; but a number of scholars agree that Sennacherib's invasion actually occurred almost exactly in that 14th year following God's fifteen year extension of Hezekiah's life. This makes as much sense as any other "explanation" we have encountered. To us such discrepancies in the Word of God are not a problem. There were various ways in which the kingly reigns of that era were calculated. Furthermore, the other minor discrepancies that trouble some analysts are of little or no importance.

"The difference in the two copies is little more than what has manifestly arisen from the mistakes of transcribers. They mutually correct each other, and most of the mistakes may be perfectly rectified by a collation of the two copies."[4]

As Rawlinson pointed out, "Isaiah wrote the history of the reign of Hezekiah for the general Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah (2 Chronicles 32:32), from which the account in 2Kings is almost certainly taken; and there is a close verbal resemblance"[5] between this section of Isaiah and the passage in 2Kings. Isaiah is evidently the author of both narratives.

Some have been impressed by the fact that there are certain particulars in which the Assyrian inscriptions which have thus far been deciphered differ here and there with the Biblical account of Sennacherib's invasion. As might have been foreseen, those inscriptions make no mention whatever of the loss of 185,000 soldiers on a single night. The Assyrians also might have inflated the number of cities taken and also most probably were in error on other points. We have no patience whatever with scholars who seem to think that the word of Isaiah needs to be confirmed by the boastful, arrogant, and inaccurate monuments erected by some wicked pagan king. Even our own monuments in the U.S.A. are not always correct. In the old Trinity Church Yard at the foot of Wall Street on lower Broadway, New York City, one may read on the monument over the grave of Robert Fulton that he was "the inventor of the steamboat," which he most certainly was NOT, a fact attested by a corrective monument erected by the United States Government in Berea, Kentucky, on which the REAL inventor, a certain John Fitch, is memorialized.

In this light, who should be concerned that Sennacherib's inscriptions in some instances claim that the ruthless invader did some things at Jerusalem which Isaiah's prophecy had foretold that he would not do. All one needs to remember in such an instance is that Sennacherib, am ong other things, was a very wicked man. Any allegation that monuments he erected would always have been truthfully inscribed is a postulation that we cannot possibly accept.

RABSHAKEH THREATENS JERUSALEM (Isaiah 36)

On the "14th year" see the chapter introduction. The invasion of Sennacherib referred to here took place in 701 B.C., at which time the Assyrian ruler did indeed ravage all of the outlying cities of Judaea, laying them waste, depopulating and carrying into captivity their peoples and despoiling them of vast quantities of booty.

It looked as if there would be little or no opposition to him; but suddenly Tirhakah, one of the Ethiopian rulers of Egypt appeared to confront Sennacherib; and that was the principal reason why he wished to bring about the surrender of Jerusalem in order to avoid fighting on two fronts at once. Sennacherib was engaged at the moment in destroying Lachish; and Isaiah 36:1 here states that it was from that city that Sennacherib sent an envoy to demand the surrender of Hezekiah.

Isaiah 36:1-3

"Now it came to pass in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, that Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and took them. And the king of Assyria sent Rabshakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem unto king Hezekiah with a great army. And he stood by the conduit of the upper pool in the highway of the fuller's field. Then came forth unto him Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder."

The narrative in 2Kings points out that Hezekiah had requested this envoy by a message sent to Sennacherib during the siege at Lachish, "I have offended; that which thou puttest on me I will bear" (2 Kings 18:14). Sennacherib demanded and received from Hezekiah 300 talents of silver, and 30 talents of gold, which Hezekiah at great cost had paid. Sennacherib had already carried away over 200,000 captives at the time when he sent this envoy to Hezekiah, which was composed of three men of high rank: Tartan, Rabsaris and Rabshakeh.[6] Rabshakeh, the commanding general of the invading army, seems to have been the most important; at least, he was the speaker and was alone mentioned in this chapter.

Hezekiah responded by sending three important officers of Judah: Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah. It is interesting that Eliakim's replacement of Shebna as the officer over the king's household, as prophesied in Isaiah 22:20-22 had, at this time already occurred, Shebna, at this time being demoted to scribe. "It is also of interest that the spot where this meeting occurred was the very place where Isaiah some forty years earlier had been commanded to meet Ahaz. It was probably on the north side of Jerusalem, not far from the Damascus gate (Isaiah 7:3)."[7] God's message to the king of Judah would be the same as it was then, "Do not fear the Assyrians."