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1 Kings 11

Amplified Bible, 2015 (AMP)

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1 Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent word to Hezekiah, saying, "Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: 'I have heard your prayer to Me regarding Sennacherib king of Assyria.'
2 This is the word that the LORD has spoken against him: 'The virgin daughter of Zion Has despised you and mocked you; The daughter of Jerusalem Has shaken her head behind you!
3 'Whom have you taunted and blasphemed? Against whom have you raised your voice, And haughtily lifted up your eyes? Against the Holy One of Israel!
4 'Through your messengers you have taunted and defied the Lord, And have said [boastfully], "With my many chariots I came up to the heights of the mountains, To the remotest parts of Lebanon; I cut down its tall cedar trees and its choicest cypress trees. I entered its most distant lodging, its densest forest.
5 "I dug wells and drank foreign waters, And with the sole of my feet I dried up All the rivers of [the Lower Nile of] Egypt."
6 'Have you not heard [asks the God of Israel]? Long ago I did it; From ancient times I planned it. Now I have brought it to pass, That you [king of Assyria] should [be My instrument to] turn fortified cities into ruinous heaps.
7 'Therefore their inhabitants were powerless, They were shattered [in spirit] and put to shame; They were like plants of the field, the green herb, As grass on the housetops is scorched before it is grown up.
8 'But I [the LORD] know your sitting down [O Sennacherib], Your going out, your coming in, And your raging against Me.
9 'Because of your raging against Me, And because your arrogance and complacency have come up to My ears, I will put My hook in your nose, And My bridle in your lips, And I will turn you back [to Assyria] by the way that you came.
10 'Then this shall be the sign [of these things] to you [Hezekiah]: this year you will eat what grows of itself, in the second year what springs up voluntarily, and in the third year sow and reap, plant vineyards, and eat their fruit.
11 The survivors who remain of the house of Judah will again take root downward and bear fruit upward.
12 For a remnant will go forth from Jerusalem, and [a band of] survivors from Mount Zion. The zeal of the LORD of hosts shall perform this.
13 'Therefore thus says the LORD concerning the king of Assyria: "He will not come to this city [Jerusalem] nor shoot an arrow there; nor will he come before it with a shield nor throw up a siege ramp against it.
14 By the way that he came, by the same way he will return, and he will not come into this city,"' declares the LORD.
15 For I will protect this city to save it, for My own sake and for My servant David's sake.'"
16 Then it came to pass that night, that the[3] angel of the LORD went forth and struck down 185,000 [men] in the camp of the Assyrians; when the survivors got up early in the morning, behold, all [185,000] of them were dead.
17 So Sennacherib king of Assyria[4] left and returned home, and lived at[5] Nineveh.
18 It came about as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, that his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer killed him with a sword; and they escaped to the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son became king in his place.
19 In those days [when Sennacherib first invaded Judah] Hezekiah became deathly ill. The prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz came and said to him, "Thus says the LORD, 'Set your house in order, for you shall die and not recover.'"
20 Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD, saying,
21 Please, O LORD, remember now [with compassion] how I have walked before You in faithfulness and truth and with a whole heart [entirely devoted to You], and have done what is good in Your sight. And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
22 Before Isaiah had gone out of the middle courtyard, the word of the LORD came to him, saying,
23 Go back and tell Hezekiah the leader of My people, 'Thus says the LORD, the God of David your father (ancestor): I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears. Behold, I am healing you; on the third day you shall go up to the house of the LORD.
24 I will add fifteen years to your life and save you and this city [Jerusalem] from the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will protect this city for My own sake and for My servant David's sake."'"
25 Then Isaiah said, "Bring a cake of figs. And they brought it and placed it on the [painful] inflammation, and he recovered."
26 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "What will be the sign that the LORD will [completely] heal me, and that I shall go up to the house of the LORD on the third day?"
27 Isaiah said, "This will be the sign to you from the LORD, that He will do the thing that He has spoken: shall the shadow [indicating the time of day] go forward ten steps, or go backward ten steps?"
28 Hezekiah answered, "It is easy for the shadow to go forward ten steps; no, but let the shadow turn backward ten steps."
29 So Isaiah the prophet called out to the LORD, and He brought the shadow on the steps ten steps backward by which it had gone down on the[1] sundial of Ahaz.
30 At that time[2] Berodach-baladan a son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick.
31 Hezekiah listened to and welcomed them and [[3] foolishly] showed them all his treasure house—the silver and gold and spices and precious oil and his armory and everything that was found in his treasuries. There was nothing in his house (palace) nor in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.
32 Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, "What did these men say [that would cause you to do this for them]? From where have they come to you?" Hezekiah said, "They have come from a far country, from Babylon."
33 Isaiah said, "What have they seen in your house?" Hezekiah answered, "They have seen everything that is in my house (palace). There is nothing in my treasuries that I have not shown them."
34 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the LORD.
35 Behold, the time is coming when everything that is in your house, and that your fathers have stored up until this day, will be carried to Babylon; nothing will be left,' says the LORD.
36 And some of your sons (descendants) who will be born to you will be[4] taken away [as captives]; and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.'"
37 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD which you have spoken is good." For he thought, "Is it not good, if [at least] there will be peace and security in my lifetime?"
38 The rest of the acts of Hezekiah and all his might, and how he made the [Siloam] pool and the aqueduct and brought water into the city, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
39 Hezekiah slept with his fathers [in death], and Manasseh his son became king in his place.
40 Manasseh was twelve years old when he[1] became king, and he reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Hephzibah.
41 He did [great] evil in the sight of the LORD, in accordance with the [idolatrous] repulsive acts of the [pagan] nations whom the LORD dispossessed before the sons (descendants) of Israel.
42 For he rebuilt the high places [for the worship of pagan gods] which his father Hezekiah had destroyed; and he set up altars for Baal and made an [image of] Asherah, just as Ahab king of Israel had done, and he worshiped all the [starry] host of heaven and served them.
43 And he built [pagan] altars in the house (temple) of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, "In Jerusalem I will put My[2] Name (Presence)."