In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib the king of Assyria went up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them.

And the king of Assyria sent Rab- shakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a great force. And he stood at the conduit of the upper pool, on the road to the Fuller's Field.

Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came out to him.

And Rab-shakeh said to them, Say now to Hezekiah, Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria, What is this confidence in which you trust?

I say, It is but a vain word that you say, There is counsel and strength for war. Now in whom do you trust, that you rebel against me?

You now have put your trust in the staff of this broken reed, in Egypt, which, if a man should lean on it, will go into his hand and pierce it, for so is Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, to all who trust in him.

And if you say to me, We trust in Jehovah our God; is it not He whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and Jerusalem, You shall worship only before this altar?

Now therefore give pledges to my master, the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, if indeed you are able to set riders on them.

How then can you refuse one official of the least of my master's servants and put your trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

And have I now come up apart from Jehovah against this land to destroy it? Jehovah said to me, Go up against this land and destroy it.

And Eliakim and Shebna and Joah said to Rab-shakeh, Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, because we understand it; and do not speak to us in the Jews' language, in the ears of the people upon the wall.

But Rab-shakeh said, Has my master sent me only to your master and to you to speak these words, and not to the men who sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung and drink their own urine with you?

Then Rab-shakeh stood and cried out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said, Listen to the words of the great king, the king of Assyria:

Thus says the king, Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, because he is not able to deliver you;

Neither let Hezekiah cause you to trust in Jehovah, saying, Jehovah will surely deliver us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.

Do not listen to Hezekiah; for thus says the king of Assyria, Make your peace with me, and come out to me, and let each eat from his own vine and each from his own fig tree, and let each drink the waters of his own cistern;

Until I come and take you away to a land like your land, a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.

Be careful lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, Jehovah will deliver us. Have any of the gods of the nations delivered their land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?

Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? And have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?

Who among all the gods of these lands have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?

But they were silent and did not answer him a word, because of the commandment of the king that said, You shall not answer him.

Then Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him the words of Rab-shakeh.