Hezekiah’s illness
20 Around that same time, Hezekiah became deathly ill. The prophet Isaiah, Amoz’s son, came to him and said, “This is what the Lord says: Put your affairs in order because you are about to die. You won’t survive this.”
2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, 3 “Please, Lord, remember how I have walked before you in truth and sincerity. I have done what is right in your eyes.” Then Hezekiah cried and cried.
4 Isaiah hadn’t even left the middle courtyard of the palace when the Lord’s word came to him: 5 Turn around. Say to Hezekiah, my people’s leader: This is what the Lord, the God of your ancestor David, says: I have heard your prayer and have seen your tears. So now I’m going to heal you. Three days from now you will be able to go up to the Lord’s temple. 6 I will add fifteen years to your life. I will rescue you and this city from the power of the Assyian king. I will defend this city for my sake and for the sake of my servant David.
7 Then Isaiah said, “Prepare a bandage made of figs.” They did so and put it on the swelling, at which point Hezekiah started getting better.
8 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “What is the sign that the Lord will heal me and that I’ll be able to go up to the Lord’s temple in three days?”
9 Isaiah said, “This will be your sign from the Lord that he will make his promise come true: Should the shadow go forward ten steps or back ten steps?”
10 “It’s easy for the shadow to go forward ten steps,” Hezekiah said, “but not for the shadow to go back ten steps.” 11 So the prophet Isaiah called on the Lord, who made the shadow go back ten steps, down the flight of stairs built by Ahaz.[a]
12 At that time Merodach-baladan, son of Babylon’s King Baladan, sent messengers to Hezekiah with letters and a gift. This was because he had heard that Hezekiah was sick. 13 Hezekiah granted them an audience and showed them everything in his treasury—the silver, the gold, the spices, and the fine oil. He also showed them his stock of weaponry and everything in his storehouses. There wasn’t a single thing in his palace or his whole kingdom that Hezekiah didn’t show them. 14 Then the prophet Isaiah came to King Hezekiah and said to him, “What did these men say? Where have they come from?”
Hezekiah said, “They came from a distant country: Babylon.”
15 “What have they seen in your palace?” Isaiah asked.
“They have seen everything in my palace,” Hezekiah answered. “There’s not a single thing in my storehouses that I haven’t shown them.”
16 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Listen to the Lord’s word: 17 The days are nearly here when everything in your palace and all that your ancestors collected up to now will be carried off to Babylon. Not a single thing will be left, says the Lord. 18 Some of your children, your very own offspring, will be taken away. They will become eunuchs in the palace of Babylon’s king.”
19 Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The Lord’s word that you’ve spoken is good,” because he thought: There will be peace and security in my lifetime.
20 The rest of Hezekiah’s deeds and all his powerful acts—how he made the pool and the channel and brought water inside the city—aren’t they written in the official records of Judah’s kings? 21 Hezekiah lay down with his ancestors. His son Manasseh succeeded him as king.
Footnotes
- 2 Kings 20:11 Heb uncertain