HEZEKIAH, IN SACKCLOTH, SPREADING THE LETTER OF SENNACHERIB BEFORE THE LORD.ADAPTED FROM SPAGNOLETTO.

7 Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land; and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.

8¶ So Rab-shakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria warring against Libnah: for he had heard that he was departed from Lachish.

9 And when he heard say of Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, Behold, he is come out to fight against thee: he sent messengers again unto 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 delivered 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; as Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden which were in Thelasar?

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

14 And Hezekiah received the letter of the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up into the house of the LORD, and spread it before the LORD.

15 And Hezekiah prayed before the LORD, and said, O LORD God of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; thou hast made heaven and earth.

16 LORD, bow down thine ear, and hear: open, LORD, thine eyes, and see and hear the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent him to reproach the living God.

17 Of a truth, LORD, the kings of Assyria have destroyed the nations and their lands, 18 And have 'cast their gods into the fire: for they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone: therefore they have destroyed them.

19 Now therefore, O LORD our God, I beseech thee, save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the LORD God, even thou only.

20 Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus saith the LORD

| God of Israel, That which thou hast prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria I have heard.

21 This is the word that the LORD hath spoken concerning him; The virgin the daughter of Zion hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee.

22 Whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thine eyes on high? even against the Holy One of Israel.

23 By thy messengers thou hast reproached the LORD, and hast said, With the multitude of my chariots I am come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon, and will cut down 'the tall cedar trees thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the lodgings of his borders, and into the forest of his Carmel.

24 I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of 'besieged places.

25 10Hast thou not heard long ago how I have done it, and of ancient times that I have formed it? now have I brought it to pass, that thou shouldest be to lay waste fenced cities into ruinous heaps.

26 Therefore their inhabitants were "of small power, they were dismayed and confounded; they were as the grass of the field, and as the green herb, as the grass on the house tops, and as corn blasted before it be grown up.

27 But I know thy "abode, and thy going out, and thy coming in, and thy rage against me.

28 Because thy rage against me and thy tumult is come up into mine ears, therefore I will put my hook in thy nose, and my bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou camest.

29 And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such things as grow of themselves, and in the second year that which springeth of the same; and in the third year sow ye, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruits thereof.

30 And the remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall yet again take root downward, and bear fruit upward,

31 For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and they that escape out of mount Zion: the zeal of the LORD of hosts shall do this.

5 Heb given, Heb. By the hand of. 7 Heb the tallness, &c. 8 Or, the forest and his fruitful field.

10 Or Hast thou not heard, how I have made it long ago, and formed it of ancient times? should I now bring it to be laid waste,
be ruinous heaps? 11 Heb. short of hand. 12 Or, sitting.
13 Heb. the escaping aʻ the house of Judah lhat remaineth.

9 Or, fenced.

14

and fenced cities to Heb. the escaping

32 Therefore thus saith the LORD concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not ome into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, For come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it.

33 By the way that he came, by the same hall he return, and shall not come into this ty, saith the LORD.

34 For I will defend this city, to save it, r mine own sake, and for my servant Daid's sake.

35 And it came to pass that night, at the angel of the LORD went out, and

smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose carly in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.

36 So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.

37 And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer "his sons smote him with the sword: and they escaped into the land of "Armenia. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.

15 Isa. 37. 36. Ecclus. 48. 21. 1 Mac. 7.41. 2 Mac 8. 19.

16 Tob. 1. 21.

17 Heb. Ararat.

Chap. xix. This chapter is repeated with great exactness in Isaiah xxxvii.; and some of its facts (corresponding verse 10-14, and 35-37, of this chapter) are given, with some variation, in 2 Chron. xxxii. 17-23.

iah.

Verse 35. "Behold, they were all dead corpses."-Upon the agency which the Lord employed on this occasion, in deliing Judah, and in avenging the insulted honour of his own Great Name, we shall have occasion to remark under At present, we wish to adduce the very remarkable and valuable coincident testimony afforded by Herodotus, o mentions Sennacherib by name, and recites his miraculous defeat in such a manner, that, although greatly disted, we cannot fail to recognise the same event which the sacred writings record in three different places. He says, t at this time there reigned in Egypt a priest of Vulcan, named Sethon, who neglected and contemned the military ablishment which had been formed in Egypt; and among other dishonours which he put upon the soldier caste, he hdrew the allotment of twelve acres of land which, under former kings, had been allowed as the portion of every lier. After this, when Sennacherib invaded Egypt with a great army, not one of the military class came forward to assistance. The royal priest, seeing no help before him, withdrew to a temple, where standing before the image, deplored bitterly the evils with which his kingdom was threatened. As he wept, sleep overpowered him, and he , in a vision, the god standing by and bidding him be of good cheer, assuring him that no harm should befall him if marched out against the Assyrians, for he would himself send him assistance. Sethon took courage from this vision, : collecting a body of men, entirely consisting of shopkeepers, artisans. and the dregs of the people-there not being soldier among them-he marched out, and formed his camp at Pelusium. The night after his arrival, myriads ield-mice infested the camp of the enemy, gnawing in pieces their quivers, their bow-strings, and the straps of their lds; so that, in the morning, finding themselves deprived of the use of their arms, they fled in great disorder, and y of them were slain. Herodotus adds, that in his time this event was commemorated by a statue of the king iding in the temple of Vulcan, and holding in his hand a mouse, with the inscription, "Whoever looks on me, let be pious."

his is most evidently nothing more than an adaptation to Egypt, its king, and its gods, what belonged to Judah, Hezekiah, and to the power of Jehovah. It is the same narrative Egyptianized. We do not see any evidence that nacherib really invaded Egypt, and certainly was not doing so at this time. But there can be little doubt that his seedings in Palestine were but preparatory to the invasion of that country; and this rendered the destruction of his y a deliverance not only to the Hebrews but to the Egyptians also. Deeply interested as the latter were in the it, we may easily see the inducement of their priests to relate this amazing manifestation of divine power, with such umstances as might make it appear to have been intended for the deliverance of their own country, and effected by power of their own gods. Altogether, this Egyptian narrative, while it confirms that which we receive on an ority which needs no confirmation, furnishes one of the most curious instances of historical adaptation which we the means of distinctly authenticating.

7. “Nisroch.”—Nothing is known of this god.

His sons smote him with the sword."-It appears, from the book of Tobit, that on his return home, the Assyrian ;, his temper being soured by the signal defeat he had sustained, behaved with great severity, and even cruelty, in government; and particularly to the captive Israelites, numbers of whom he caused to be slain every day, and wn into the streets. By which savage humour having made himself so intolerable that he could not be borne 1 by his own family, his two eldest sons conspired against him" (Prideaux, i. 37). Some think that he had made w to sacrifice these two sons, to appease his gods, and to incline them to bestir themselves for the restoration of his But this conjecture rests on no authority.

rs.

Land of Armenia."-This country adjoined Assyria in the north, and was at this time tributary to Assyria, but emed by its own kings. Its scriptural celebrity is derived from its being the supposed and most probable first settlet of the men saved from the deluge; and, in a less degree, from certain allusions to the country and its products, ch may be found in the Prophets. As a general account, however, of Armenia would not contribute to the illuson of Scripture, we shall not write more largely of the country; but may refer those who desire further informato the article "Armenia" in the Penny Cyclopædia.' Any really illustrative points which the history or condition is country offers, have been and will be noticed in the proper places.

Esarhaddon."-This king, the third son of Sennacherib, is the "great and noble Asnapper" of Ezra (iv. 10), the on of Isaiah (xx. 1), the Sarchedon of Tobit (i. 21), and the Asaradin of Ptolemy. The following particulars coning him are chiefly from Dr. Hales (iv. 57, &c.). The reader will have observed that we are now attending to these gu kings and their affairs for the sake of illustrating the sacred history, which will be the better understood for e explanations. The details of the sacred history itself will then be more conveniently illustrated, independently of extraneous particulars here brought together.

seems that the Babylonians, Medes, Armenians, and other tributary nations, took the opportunity offered by the tration of the Assyrian power by the Lord's hand, to throw off the yoke they had so long borne. Esarhaddon was

therefore actively engaged, during the first years of his reign, in attempting to re-establish the broken affairs of the empire to which he had succeeded. It was not until the thirtieth year of his reign, however, that he recovered Babylon; and the Medes were never again brought under the yoke. It appears from Ezra iv., that it was this prince who transported the Cuthites, Babylonians, &c. into the waste cities of Samaria: and Hales conjectures, with probability, that this was to punish them for their revolt. When this king had settled his affairs at home, he undertook an expedition against the states of Palestine, Phoenicia, Egypt, and Ethiopia, to avenge his father's defeat, and to recover the revolted provinces west of the Euphrates. For three years he ravaged these provinces, and brought away many captives; as foretold by Isaiah (xx. 3, 4). About two years after, he invaded and ravaged Judea; and the captains of his host took Manasseh, the king, alive, and carried him away captive, with many of the nobility and people, to Babylon. Hales says, "Esarhaddon was a great and prosperous prince. He seems not only to have recovered all the former provinces of the Assyrian empire, except Media, but to have added considerably thereto, if we may judge of the several states which his grandson, Nabuchodonosor, summoned as his auxiliaries in the war with the Medes; namely, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, Cilicia, Syria, Phoenicia, Judea, Persia, Arabia, and Egypt (Judith i. 6-10; see Jackson, vol. i. p. 332). He is ranked by Ptolemy, in his Canon, among the Babylonian kings, probably because he made it his chief residence during the last thirteen years of his reign, to prevent another defection." The same learned writer proves that this prince is the Sardanapalus of Diodorus and Justin, in whose reign happened the revolt of the Medes, 710 B.c.; and whom both of these historians unskilfully confounded with the last king Sarac, who perished in the overthrow of Nineveh, about a century afterwards, in 606 B.C.

CHAPTER XX.

! Hezekiah, having received a message of death, by prayer hath his life lengthened. 8 The sun goeth ten degrees backward for a sign of that promise. 12 Berodach-baladan sending to visit Hezekiah, because of the wonder, hath notice of his treasures. 14 Isaiah understanding thereof foretelleth the Babylonian captivity. 20 Manasseh succeedeth Hezekiah.

IN 'those days was Hezekiah sick unto death. And the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz came to him, and said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live.

2 Then he turned his face to the wall, and prayed unto the LORD, saying,

3 I beseech thee, O LORD, remember now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Hezekiah wept 'sore.

4 And it came to pass, afore Isaiah was gone out into the middle court, that the word of the LORD came to him, saying,

5 Turn again, and tell Hezekiah the сарtain of my people, Thus saith the LORD, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, Í will heal thee: on the third day thou shalt go up unto the house of the LORD.

6 And I will add unto thy days fifteen years; and I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake.

7 And Isaiah said, Take a lump of figs. And they took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.

8 And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that the LORD will

heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the LORD the third day?

9 And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees

10 And Hezekiah answered, It is a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees.

11 And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the LORD: and he brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the 'dial of Ahaz.

12 At that time Berodach-baladan, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present unto Hezekiah: for he had heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

13 And Hezekiah hearkened unto them, and shewed them all the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious ointment, and all the house of his armour, and all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah shewed them not.

9 10

14 Then came Isaiah the prophet unto king Hezekiah, and said unto him, What said these men? and from whence came they unto thee? And Hezekiah said, They are come from a far country, even from Babylon.

15 And he said, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All the things that are in mine house have they seen there is nothing among my treasures that I have not shewed them.

16 And Isaiah said unto Hezekiah, Hear the word of the LORD.

17 Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store unto this day, "shall be carried into Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD.

18 And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

19 Then said Hezekiah unto Isaiah, Good

11 Chap. 24. 13, and 25. 13. Jer. 27. 22.

is the word of the LORD which thou hast spoken. And he said, Is it not good, if peace and truth be in my days?

20 And the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and all his might, and how he made a pool, and a conduit, and brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

21 And Hezekiah slept with his fathers: and Manasseh his son reigned in his stead.

12 Or, Shall there not be peace and truth, &c.

Chap. xx.-Some verses containing parallel facts may be found in 2 Chron. xxxii. ; but the parallel in Isaiah xxxviii. anl xxxix. is very exact and complete. The 38th of Isaiah also contains Hezekiah's song of thanksgiving for his recovery, which is not given in the present chapter.

Verse 11. "The dial of Ahaz."-This very remarkable verse offers two subjects for consideration ;-the manner in which it pleased God to produce the miraculous effect here recorded ;-and the character of the instrument by which that effect was shown. We shall reserve some remarks on the former point forthe parallel text in Isaiah, and confine our present attention to the latter. Yet it is not our intention to enter into any minute investigation in order to establish the identity of the dial of Ahaz; but to furnish such a brief statement, concerning ancient dials in general, as will furnish rather an illustrative than an explanatory view of the subject.

The present mention of a dial is the first on record, and enables us to find a very early point in the history of the invention, without affording any clue to its origin. This dial seems, however, from the manner in which it is mentioned, to have been considered a curious and rare thing, since it was distinguished by the name of the king by whom it had been erected. It would seem from the fact, that this king Ahaz sent from Damascus the pattern of an altar which he saw there, with directions that one like it should be made at Jerusalem, that he was what is called a man of taste, a collector of curiosities, and so on. Probably the dial was one of his curiosities, and perhaps originated like the altarbeing either imported from abroad, or made after the pattern of one that he had seen at Damascus or elsewhere. The Jews were not remarkable for their inventions; and it is by no means necessary to suppose that the use of sun-dials originated among them. Doubtless, however, they had those common and popular methods of measuring time by the length, inclination, and return of the shadows of objects, which in all times and countries have served for that purpose, and which continue in use among the peasantry of the most cultivated nations.

We very much incline to the opinion, which we find advocated by several continental writers, that the first contrivances for a more precise measurement of time, were pillars, set up in the midst of an open area, on the pavement of which were marked different lines, which furnished the necessary indications as the shadow of the column fell successively upon them. They were thus artificial gnomons; and there is some tolerable, though not very positive, evidence for the conclusion, that the famous obelisks of the Egyptians were intended for the same purpose. That pillars were used as gnomons in Greece and Italy we know; and nothing seems more likely that, when Augustus applied to this purpose the two grand obelisks which he caused to be removed from Egypt to Rome, he merely continued the use to which they had previously been devoted. Josephus quotes a curious passage from Apion, which, if we could clearly understand it, might throw some light on the subject. We give the explanation (for such it is, rather than a translation) after Whiston, which we think assigns the only intelligible sense which the passage will bear. Apion charges Moses, that he set up pillars in the room of gnomons (obelisks), under which he made a cavity like that of a boat, and the shadow from the top of the pillar fell into the cavity, and went round therein with the course of the sun. Apion mentions this to show that Moses imitated (or, as in this instance, improved upon) the custom of the Egyptians; which Josephus strongly denies, as well as his claim to this invention or imitation. What is said about Moses is of course an utter fiction; but the passage is of value, as implying that the Egyptians really did use their obelisks for the purpose indicated. We have the rather dwelt on this, not only on account of its superior antiquity, but because this is one of the alternatives which has been assigned to the dial of Ahaz. It is right to add that the Hebrew has no word to express a dial; and the word in the text has not that force, its meaning being "steps or degrees" (y)—the degrees or steps of Ahas, which has led a very large class of commentators, ancient and modern, to conclude that this famous "dial" was nothing else than a stair framed with so much art and proportion, that the shadows of the steps expressed the hours and the course of the sun.

The application of the principle of the gnomon to an artificial dial, would naturally be suggested by many circumstances. One of the explanations which the Rabbins give of the dial of Ahaz is, that it was a concave hemisphere, in the middle of which was a globe, the shadow of which fell upon diverse lines engraved on the concavity. They add, that these lines were twenty-eight. This will strike the reader as an adaptation of the sort of invention which Apion ascribed to Moses-falsely, indeed, but in such a manner as demonstrated that such a contrivance did actually exist. This will appear the more plainly, and the use of such a dial will be illustrated by the fact, that the pillar or obelisk used as a gnomon, was ultimately, as an improvement, surmounted by a ball supported on a very delicate stem, and so elevated that its shadow was thrown upon the neighbouring soil with great precision, and quite disengaged from that of the pillar by which it was supported. The ball however was by no means an essential part of the concave-hemispherical dials founded on this idea, a simple stylus being more usually employed to cast the required shadow. The first dials, properly so called (which appear to have been of this description), were, by the general confession of antiquity, the invention of the Babylonians, from whom the western nations derived them, as the Greeks allowed that they did. Anaximander, who introduced the first dial into Greece, had travelled in Chaldea in the time of the Captivity. His dial marked the equinoxes, the solstices, and by their means the seasons. It belonged to the class of which we are speaking, called by the Greeks exán, a boat, and huopagov, a hemisphere. The Egyptians also had such dials. Their solar equinoctial dial was of this class, as was also that with which Eratosthenes metred or verified the measure of the earth. Although these dials were obviously, in their origin, equinoctial dials, the application of their principle to horary indications is obvious, and was actually effected. We incline to suspect that the principle of the dial was known previously to the Egyptians, but that its detailed application was invented by the Babylonians. To this class of hollow hemispherical dials that rep.esented in fig. 1 seems to belong. It was found, upwards of a century since, at Ravenna; 265

VOL. II.

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