9. Soon afterward King Sennacherib received word that King Tirhakah of Ethiopia was leading an army to fight against him. Before leaving to meet the attack, he sent messengers back to Hezekiah in Jerusalem with this message:
10. “This message is for King Hezekiah of Judah. Don’t let your God, in whom you trust, deceive you with promises that Jerusalem will not be captured by the king of Assyria.
11. You know perfectly well what the kings of Assyria have done wherever they have gone. They have completely destroyed everyone who stood in their way! Why should you be any different?
12. Have the gods of other nations rescued them—such nations as Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Tel-assar? My predecessors destroyed them all!
13. What happened to the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad? What happened to the kings of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?”
14. After Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it, he went up to the lord’s Temple and spread it out before the lord.
15. And Hezekiah prayed this prayer before the lord: “O lord, God of Israel, you are enthroned between the mighty cherubim! You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You alone created the heavens and the earth.
16. Bend down, O lord, and listen! Open your eyes, O lord, and see! Listen to Sennacherib’s words of defiance against the living God.
17. “It is true, lord, that the kings of Assyria have destroyed all these nations.
18. And they have thrown the gods of these nations into the fire and burned them. But of course the Assyrians could destroy them! They were not gods at all—only idols of wood and stone shaped by human hands.
19. Now, O lord our God, rescue us from his power; then all the kingdoms of the earth will know that you alone, O lord, are God.”
20. Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent this message to Hezekiah: “This is what the lord, the God of Israel, says: I have heard your prayer about King Sennacherib of Assyria.
21. And the lord has spoken this word against him:“The virgin daughter of Ziondespises you and laughs at you.The daughter of Jerusalemshakes her head in derision as you flee.
22. “Whom have you been defying and ridiculing?Against whom did you raise your voice?At whom did you look with such haughty eyes?It was the Holy One of Israel!
23. By your messengers you have defied the Lord.You have said, ‘With my many chariotsI have conquered the highest mountains—yes, the remotest peaks of Lebanon.I have cut down its tallest cedarsand its finest cypress trees.I have reached its farthest cornersand explored its deepest forests.
24. I have dug wells in many foreign landsand refreshed myself with their water.With the sole of my footI stopped up all the rivers of Egypt!’