Isaiah prophesies Sennacherib’s fall

²⁰ Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent a message to Hezekiah: ‘This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I have heard your prayer concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria. ²¹ This is the word that the Lord has spoken against him:

‘“Virgin Daughter Zion
    despises you and mocks you.
Daughter Jerusalem
    tosses her head as you flee.
²² Who is it you have ridiculed and blasphemed?
    Against whom have you raised your voice
and lifted your eyes in pride?
    Against the Holy One of Israel!
²³ By your messengers
    you have ridiculed the Lord.
And you have said,
    ‘With my many chariots
I have ascended the heights of the mountains,
    the utmost heights of Lebanon.
I have cut down its tallest cedars,
    the choicest of its junipers.
I have reached its remotest parts,
    the finest of its forests.
²⁴ I have dug wells in foreign lands
    and drunk the water there.
With the soles of my feet
    I have dried up all the streams of Egypt.’

²⁵ ‘“Have you not heard?
    Long ago I ordained it.
In days of old I planned it;
    now I have brought it to pass,
that you have turned fortified cities
    into piles of stone.
²⁶ Their people, drained of power,
    are dismayed and put to shame.
They are like plants in the field,
    like tender green shoots,
like grass sprouting on the roof,
    scorched before it grows up.

²⁷ ‘“But I know where you are
    and when you come and go
    and how you rage against me.
²⁸ Because you rage against me
    and because your insolence has reached my ears,
I will put my hook in your nose
    and my bit in your mouth,
and I will make you return
    by the way you came.”

²⁹ ‘This will be the sign for you, Hezekiah:

‘This year you will eat what grows by itself,
    and the second year what springs from that.
But in the third year sow and reap,
    plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
³⁰ Once more a remnant of the kingdom of Judah
    will take root below and bear fruit above.
³¹ For out of Jerusalem will come a remnant,
    and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors.

‘The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

³² ‘Therefore this is what the Lord says concerning the king of Assyria:

‘“He will not enter this city
    or shoot an arrow here.
He will not come before it with shield
    or build a siege ramp against it.
³³ By the way that he came he will return;
    he will not enter this city
declares the Lord.
³⁴ I will defend this city and save it,
    for my sake and for the sake of David my servant.”’

³⁵ That night the angel of the Lord went out and put to death a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning – there were all the dead bodies! ³⁶ So Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and stayed there.

³⁷ One day, while he was worshipping in the temple of his god Nisrok, his sons Adrammelek and Sharezer killed him with the sword, and they escaped to the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son succeeded him as king.