Isaiah 37:8-13

2. THE POTENTATE

TEXT: Isaiah 37:8-13

8

So Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah; for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish.

9

And he heard say concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopa, He is come out to fight against thee. And when he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

10

Thus shall ye speak to Hezekiah king of Judah, saying, Let not thy God in whom thou trustest deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

11

Behold, thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, by destroying them utterly: and shalt thou be delivered?

12

Have the gods of the nations delivered them, which my fathers have destroyed, Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden that were in Talassar?

13

Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and Ivvah?

QUERIES

a.

Why is Tirhakah attacking the Assyrian forces?

b.

Who were the children of Eden?

PARAPHRASE

So the Assyrian army general left Jerusalem and returned to his king. But he found his king waging war on Libnah, having already departed from Lachish. Then the king of Assyria received an intelligence report that Tirhakah, king of Ethiopia, was marching toward southern Palestine to fight against him. Immediately, the king of Assyria sent messengers with a warning to Hezekiah, saying to him, Do not be fooled with any oracle from your God that Jerusalem will be delivered from my handif you trust in your God you will be deceived. Let me remind you that the reports of Assyrian destruction and victory over all the world are not exaggerated. Now, what makes you think you will be delivered? None of the gods of the different peoples of the world, such as those of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, or the gods of territories like Beth-eden or Telassar, have been able to deliver them from Assyrian conquestdo you think yours shall deliver you? Where are the kings of nations like Hamath, Arpad, Sepharvaim, Hena and Ivvah? They are gonedethroned by the mighty Assyrian king.

COMMENTS

Isaiah 37:8-9 WARY WARRIOR: The Assyrian army commander (the Rabshakeh) left Jerusalem and went directly to Libnah, 10 and 12 miles north of Lachish and 25 miles west (and a little south) of Jerusalem. Libnah and Lachish were cities along the Gaza strip and were strategic military positions on the Egyptian frontier. The king of Assyria probably felt he had secured Lachish and now he must secure Libnah since he apparently had received word that an Egyptian force was marching toward his deployed troops in Palestine.

Now Tirhakah was not yet king of Egypt. He was nephew of the man (Shabaka 715-701 B.C.) who was then king of Egypt. It appears from ancient records that Tirhakah was approximately 20 years of age at the time of Sennacherib's (701 B.C.) expedition into Judah. He would be old enough, since he was royalty, to be put in charge of a military force. Tirhakah's brother (Shabataka 701-689 B.C.) was the Pharaoh after Shabaka and then Tirhakah became Pharaoh (689-664 B.C.). Edward J. Young thinks Tirhakah is proleptically called king. That is, Isaiah, writing some years after these events occurred, when Tirhakah was in fact king, calls him king in an event that took place before he was king. This is not unusual. Daniel calls Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon proleptically in Daniel 1:1. Tirhakah was the third and last Pharaoh of the 25th Ethiopian dynasty. His Ethiopian kingdom was quite Egyptian in character. Sennacherib was successful against Tirhakah, but the mysterious loss of Assyrian troops forced Sennacherib back to Assyria. Tirhakah enjoyed a respite from the Assyrian threat for some years, but was defeated by Esarhaddon and later by Assurbanipal. He was driven south where he retained rule of that portion of Egypt.

Sennacherib apparently associated Tirhakah's show of force with Hezekiah's refusal to surrender to Rabshakeh. He evidently assumed the Egyptians were in collusion with the Hebrews and they were coming to rescue Jerusalem from Assyrian conquest. So the Assyrian king sent a written (Isaiah 37:14) message to Hezekiah.

Isaiah 37:10-13 WRITTEN WARNING: Isaiah 37:10 makes it appear as if the Assyrians have spies within the very chambers of King Hezekiah. It almost seems as if the Assyrians knew the very words Isaiah spoke in reply to Hezekiah's request (Isaiah 37:5-6). Here the Assyrian messengers are told to speak the message to Hezekiah. In Isaiah 37:14 Hezekiah takes a letter from the messengers and reads it. Perhaps the messengers read the letter to Hezekiah upon their arrival and then he took it from their hand and read it for himself. The message from Sennacherib was a warning. It intended to remind Hezekiah of current political history. It was common knowledge in the world at that time of the ruthless, overwhelming, destructive power of the Assyrians and the extensiveness of their conquests. They had conquered or at least dominated the whole Asia Minor-Mesopotamian-Palestinian area. Sufficient power to resist the Assyrians could not be found anywhere in the world! Cities and territories which had existed for centuries were swiftly conquered. Famous kings and potentates had been deposed and taken captive and either killed or deported into slavery. Whole cities and areas had been repopulated with Mesopotamian immigrants. The political, cultural, racial face of the inhabited world was being drastically changed. And does little, weak, religiously-oriented Judah think it can stand against a military machine like Assyria?

Some of the cities and territories listed have been located by the archaeologists and historians. Some are still lost in the sands and dust of antiquity. The reader may refer to Map #1 for locations of those known and those conjecturally placed. Beth-eden is the Eden referred to in Isaiah 37:12. Since many leading scholars and archaeologists believe the Garden of Eden was in Mesopotamia (Greek for between the rivers), Beth-eden may very well have retained its name from the Garden of Eden. William F. Albright, renowned archaeologist and scholar of antiquity says, Archaeological research has thus established beyond doubt that there is no focus of civilization in the earth that can begin to compete in antiquity and activity with the basin of the Eastern Mediteranean and the region immediately to the east of it.. (Tigris-Euphrates, Mesopotamian area). Very ancient clay tablets with creation accounts written on them have been discovered in that general area. Ur and Haran are cities directly associated with Abraham. Telassar was probably a territory near the region of ancient Elam (Media).

The imposing, overwhelming, seemingly omnipotent power of the Assyrian Empire (and other ancient world empires) was beyond anything, comparatively speaking, modern geopolitics has ever experienced. No empire has completely ruled the known world since Rome. None was ever as cruel and terrifying as the Assyrian. Hezekiah could not take Assyrian threats lightly! These threats were extremely critical tests of the faith of the Judeans. So Hezekiah did the only thing he could dohe took it to the Lord!

QUIZ

1.

Why would the king of Assyria want to conquer Libnah?

2.

Why may we conjecture that the king of Assyria suspected a collusion between Tirhakah and Hezekiah?

3.

Why would it seem the Assyrians had spies in the Hebrew palace?

4.

Why would the king of Assyria remind the Hebrews of current world events?

5.

Could the Eden of Isaiah 37:12 have any association with the Garden of Eden in Genesis? Why?

6.

Why could Hezekiah not take lightly these threats of Assyria?