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21. "All nations"

 

Empire builders have always been good at persuading or dragooning conquered peoples into enlisting in their armies to help on the good work of making further conquests. In the first century A.D. when Titus came against Jerusalem with five Roman legions (out of 26 spread across the empire), he approximately doubled the size of his army by pulling in additional contingents of fighting men from nearly all the nations round Judaea.

 

Sennacherib had also thought of this idea long centuries before, and accordingly it was only occasionally that the prophets referred to the invaders as "the Assyrians". More often they employed the comprehensive description: "all nations". Long before the invasion came, Isaiah knew that it would have this character:

 

"And he (the Lord) will lift up an ensign to
the nations
from far, and will hiss (whistle!) for them...and in that day they shall roar against them (the people of God) like the roaring of the sea; and if one look unto the Land, behold darkness and sorrow, and the light is darkened in the heavens thereof" (Is. 5:26,30).

 

When the invasion was in full spate, the prophet still used the same terminology:

 

"and the multitude of
all the nations
that fight against Ariel...shall be as a dream of a night vision (like a nightmare)" (29:7).

 

"The breath of the Lord, as an overflowing stream, shall reach to the midst of the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of vanity" (30:28).

 

So also Micah:

 

"Now also
many nations
are gathered against thee (Zion), that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion" (Mic. 4:11).

 

The Hezekiah psalms also:

 

"All nations
compassed me about: but in the name of the Lord will I destroy - them" (Ps. 118:10).

 

"He (the Lord) shall subdue the people under us, and
the nations
under our feet" (47:3).

 

"Pour out thy wrath upon the Gentiles...and upon
the kingdoms
that have not called upon thy name" (79:6).

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Elam and Media

 

Sargon and Sennacherib had lately re-asserted Assyrian dominance over Elam and Media, the latter especially, so of course contingents from these remote nations were drafted into the invading army:

 

"The treacherous dealer dealeth treacherously, and the spoiler spoileth (this is Isaiah's triple description of the vileness of Assyrian invasion; 24:16; 33:1).

 

Go up, O Elam: besiege, O Media; all the sighing thereof (i.e. of the besieged) have I made to cease" (Is. 21:2 cp. 22:6).

 

Edom and Moab

 

But outstanding among these Jew-hating allies of Sennacherib were the Edomites. These men of Esau never lost an opportunity of working off old scores against the people of God. Their rancorous hatred of Jerusalem has already been quoted:

 

"Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof" (Ps. 137:7).

 

The vigour of the prophetic language about Edom is hardly to be matched anywhere else:

 

"For three transgressions of Edom and for four I will not turn away the punish­ment thereof: because he did pursue his brother (Israel) with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually and he kept his wrath for ever" (Am. 1:11).

 

Obadiah's short prophecy — all of it about Edom — has marvellously similar language:

 

"For thy violence against thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever...Thou shouldest not have looked on their affliction in the day of their calamity..." (Obad. 10,13).

 

No wonder, then, that these prophets also have powerful passages of retribution one day to be brought home to these bitter, hate-filled neighbours (see v. 18). Regarding Moab, there seems at first to have been friendly sympathy on the part of the people of Judah as the inevitable Assyrian invasion of that country was con­templated (Isaiah 15,16), even to the extent of encouraging Moabite refugees to flee for safety to Jerusalem where the prophets at any rate were confident that there would be immunity from Assyrian hammer-blows:

 

"Let the outcasts of Moab dwell with thee (the daughter of Zion; v.1 )...and in mercy shall the throne be established: and he shall sit upon it in truth in the tabernacle of David" (Is. 16:4,5 LXX and other versions, following a re-pointed Hebrew text).

 

But this comradely attitude changed dramatically:

 

"For in this mountain shall the hand of the Lord rest, and Moab shall be trodden down under him, even as straw is trodden down for the dunghill...and he shall bring down their pride together with the spoils of their hands" (Is. 25:10,11; cp. Am. 2:1-3).

 

It may be surmised that when Moab was overrun the men of that nation were not un­willing to buy easier terms by enrolling in Sennacherib's army now invading Judah. Hence this prophetic repudiation.

 

There were others also who changed sides. In the course of one of Rabshakeh's "leaflet raids" aimed at undermining morale in Jerusalem, this magnificently con­fident challenge was issued:

 

"Now therefore give pledges, I pray thee, to my master, the king of Assyria, and I will give thee two thousand horses, if thou be able on thy part to set riders upon them" (Is. 36:8) —

 

meaning: "I'm willing to make a bet with you, Hezekiah, that you can't find two thousand men to defend your city; your situation is as hopeless as that! (By contrast, Solomon had had 12,000 horsemen and 40,000 stalls for horses; 1 Kgs. 4:26).

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Desertions

 

As will be seen in the next two chapters, Rabshakeh was well supplied with inside information. His spies operated very efficiently inside Jerusalem. So it was known that before the siege of Jerusalem began there had been wholesale desertions from Hezekiah's already pathetically feeble army:

 

"As for Hezekiah, the awful splendour of my lordship overwhelmed him (the king's sickness?), and the irregular and regular troops which he had brought in to strengthen Jerusalem, his royal city, took leave..." (Taylor Prism).

 

In effect, Isaiah's "burden upon Arabia" says the same thing:

 

"They fled from the drawn sword, and from the bent bow, and from the grievousness of war. For thus hath the Lord said unto me, Within a year, according to the years of an hireling (mercenary troops!), and all the glory of Kedar shall fail: and the residue of the number of archers, the mighty men of the children of Kedar, shall be diminished: for the Lord God of Israel hath spoken it" (Is. 21:13-17).

 

Kedar was in the northern part of the Arabian desert, perhaps even another name for the Ammonites — hence Amos 1:13-15. These too joined the enemy. And so also — it may be inferred — did Tyre, for until the days of Alexander the Great four hundred years later it was the settled policy of Tyre and Zidon not to fight invaders but to make friends with them, buying them off with lavish payments out of the wealth of their burgeoning overseas trade (Amos 1:9,10; Joel 3:4-8).

 

Philistia

 

The case with the Philistines was different. Their land was early overrun by the Assyrians, and their cities captured. Their pro-Jerusalem government (the result of 2 Kgs. 18:8) was dealt with in the brutal fashion typical of Assyrian methods, and forthwith Philistia came in on the side of the Nazis (Taylor Prism). All of these details are brought together in a shattering catalogue of nations now confederate against Jehovah and His holy city:

 

"They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel be no more in remembrance" —

 

and the list which follows nominates practically all the nations round the Holy Land.

 

Scarcely one is missing:

 

"Edom, the Ishmaelites, Moab, the Hagarenes (Gen. 16:3), Gebal, Ammon, Amalek, the Philistines, Tyre — and Assur (Assyria) is joined with them" (Ps. 83:4-8).

 

All nations against Jerusalem to battle — what a prospect!

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22. Rabshakeh

 

Jerusalem was "Straitly shut up". The siege had begun. On mount Scopus, called by Josephus "the camp of the Assyrians", the enemy had established his main headquarters. Sennacherib was not there in person to direct operations. He was set on the reduction of Lachish and Libnah, the only defenced cities besides Jerusalem which had not yet capitulated. These were specially important because, once taken, the Assyrian could march on Egypt knowing that his rear was secure; his com­munications with the homeland would not be under threat.

 

Also, the massive army of Pharaoh Sabataka, the Ethiopian, was slowly making its way northward. This was the only threatening enemy Sennacherib had left. He must be ready to intercept and destroy it.

 

Prominent in the control of this army now encamped against Jerusalem was Rabshakeh, a renegade Jew (see H.Gt. p.54). He was now entrusted with the task of talking Jerusalem into submission. It has to be admitted that he went to the work with an efficiency which commands admiration.

 

Rabshakeh in action

 

He chose to approach the city defences near the Gihon spring "by the conduit of the upper pool" the very place where the heart of Ahaz had trembled at the prospect of invasion from Syria and Israel (Is. 7:3), the very place also where the in­spired prophecy had been made of the birth of a godly Immanuel, son of Ahaz (7:13,14).

 

Here, at Gihon, Rabshakeh could make careful observation as to the availability of water supply for the men and horses of his army; he could also observe what was the result of the recent frantic engineering to bring the waters of the Kidron brook within the city walls.

 

A delegation from Hezekiah met Rabshakeh there, hoping, though with precious little optimism, to coax some reality into the terms of the treaty which had earlier been signed with Sennacherib.

 

These endeavours were roughly brushed aside. Rabshakeh had no intention at all of indulging in quiet diplomacy. Instead he

 

"cried with a loud voice in the Jew's speech unto the people of Jerusalem that were on the wall, to affright them, and to trouble them" (2 Chr. 32:18).

 

He was interested in propaganda, not peace-making. The great powers of the twentieth century were not the inventors of psychological warfare. Nearly three thousand years ago the Assyrians were expert at it!

 

In vain this deputation of three pleaded for quiet negotiations, to be conducted in the Syrian language. Why should Rabshakeh talk pleasantly when he knew that morale in Jerusalem was near to breaking point? So he hammered away in as uncouth and bullying a manner as he could muster — and it came easily.

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Fear and silence

 

Within the city Isaiah was doing what he could to allay the rising panic:

 

"Fear ye not the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their revilings...Who art thou that thou shouldest be afraid of a man that shall die (at the appointed time the Assyrians did die!), and of the son of man which shall be made as grass...thou hast feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor?" (51:7,12,13),

 

emulating Moses, he exhorted: "Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord" (Ex. 14:13). And, all that Hezekiah could do to counteract the blast of demoralising scorn which Rabshakeh's rough powerful voice hurled at the dense throng of citizens who lined the walls was to circulate an instruction:

 

"Answer him not." (36:21).

 

It says much for the power of the king's personality that he could so impose his will on the people in a time when his authority must have been tested to the limit. So Rabshakeh got no immediate response to his highly capable endeavours:

 

"They held their peace, and answered him not a word" —

 

which reaction must have puzzled Rabshakeh not a little.

 

With the complete lack of scruple essential to every worldly propagandist, he did not hesitate to indulge in self-contradiction. Any method was worth trying if only it weakened the hands of Jerusalem's men of war and undermined the spirit of resistance in the minds of the common people.

 

He switched to painting a rosy picture of the alluring advantages to be gained by quiet capitulation. They would soon find themselves re-settled in a land of surpass­ing fruitfulness and prosperity, so much better than the struggle of winning a livelihood from the rocky terrain of Judaea.

 

There was such sweet reasonableness about the ballyhoo he presented: 'After all, is not your present situation quite hopeless? Is it likely that the God Hezekiah teaches you to worship will be able to come to your aid? Consider the sorry fate of all the other peoples who prayed to their gods for rescue from the might of Sennacherib. What help did their superstition bring them? Are you who worship Jehovah likely to see your God get to work on this hopeless situation?' This Rabshakeh was a clever unscrupulous knave.

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Inside knowledge

 

There was a fine effective subtlety also about the way in which he wove into his logomachy a clever series of implications that his spies had him well-informed about the state of affairs inside the city.

 

He knew that Hezekiah was exhorting his people to put their confidence in Jehovah (Is. 36:4,5; 2 Chr. 32:8). He knew that there had been a treaty signed with Egypt, a political expedient that was sure to prove futile, more harm than good (36:6). He knew that Hezekiah had put through sweeping religious changes and had re­instated Solomon's altar of burnt-offering which Ahaz had taken out of the way (36:7). He knew that there had been wholesale desertions from the Judaean army (36:8; 21:15). He knew of Isaiah's reassuring message that Jerusalem would re­main inviolate (37:6). And he knew — the unkindest cut of all! — the prophecies which interpreted this Assyrian invasion as Jehovah's discipline of His wayward people (8:7; 10:5,6). How penetrating must that proud challenge have been in the ears of the people: "And am I now come up without Jehovah against this land to destroy it? Of course not! Jehovah said unto me, Go up against this land, and destroy it" (36:10). Sennacherib was the rod of His anger.

 

How could the Assyrian, outside the walls, know of these things? And the spirit of the people quailed before this casual demonstration of omniscience, even though it involved a crass contradiction of the hyper-confident assertions already made (36:4,5). But it was ever thus. In time of war the first and most horrid casualty is truth.

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23. Rabshakeh versus Jehovah

 

Rabshakeh, that Jewish renegade, knew right well that the strength of Jerusalem lay not in he impregnable character of its walls, lately botched up in the recent frantic defence measures, but in Hezekiah, whose shattered health was now marvellously restored, and in his amazing ability to command the loyalty and confidence of the people. Even more impregnable was Hezekiah's faith in Jehovah. Every yard of the city's walls was built solidly into that foundation.

 

To undermine that confidence of the people in their king and to intensify the hopeless bewilderment which but a little while ago had brought them near to surrender — these were the objectives which the uncouth Rabshakeh set himself.

 

"Let not Hezekiah deceive you (but of course be sure to listen to
me
and believe every deceitful word of the advice / give you!), for he shall not be able to deliver you...Hearken not to Hezekiah...Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, Jehovah will deliver us" (Is. 36:14,16,18).

 

The repetition went on ceaselessly, blackening the king's character and all the time probing how best to drive a wedge between king and people. It is noteworthy that not once in these harangues nor in the various Sennacherib inscriptions was Hezekiah given his proper title. All other kings who came under the Assyrian heel were correctly denominated, but the Taylor Prism has only a curt contemptuous "Hezekiah the Jew". His stubborn refusal to capitulate rankled in Assyrian bosoms.

 

"Now therefore let not Hezekiah deceive you nor persuade you on this manner, neither yet believe him" (2 Chr. 32:15)

 

— but they did, or were too awed by his sterling faith in God to fly in the face of it. Specially in the Hezekiah psalms does the bitterness of this experience show. Although "the people answered him never a word", the power of Rabshakeh's propaganda bit deep:

 

"Thou (Jehovah) makest us to be a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision to them that are round about us" (literally round about the walls) (Ps. 44:13).

 

Hezekiah himself felt all this very keenly:

 

"Mine enemies reproach me all the day, and they that are mad against me are sworn against me" (Ps. 102:8).

 

"As with a sword in my bones, mine enemies reproach me: while they say daily unto me, Where is thy God?" (Ps. 42:10; cp. also 89:50,51).

 

Sennacherib's religious hatred

 

But was it Hezekiah or was it the God he worshipped who was the vexing hin­drance in the way of Assyrian imperialism? Sennacherib hated the very name Jehovah. Was it not still talked about in Nineveh how a prophet from paltry Israel had fearlessly proclaimed throughout that impressive capital:

 

"Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown"?

 

And the amazing report, that this fellow with the yellow shrivelled skin had come to Nineveh from the bowels of the ocean with a tale to tell such as had never been heard, and that story had left its mark on king and people alike. Life in that vast city had been transformed at the behest of Israel's God — and thus the threat was removed, for Jehovah was not only powerful, He was kind. But Sennacherib, a devout worshipper of Ashur, the national god of his country, writhed every time he heard mention of this Jehovah who had brought his mighty people to their knees in prayer. Before ever he came to the throne the resolution had crystallised out in his mind that one day he would make Jehovah and His pro­phet pay for that Assyrian humiliation.

 

And now the time was come, yet forty days — nay, less than that — and Jerusalem shall be overthrown and its matchless temple and its Jehovah. Soon the account would be squared.

 

Meantime, let Sennacherib's minions rub in the truth that this Jehovah — He who is, and was, and is to come — was already shown to be powerless and, more than that, now no longer a God to take account of: "He who was" — only that! With this majestic theme to broadcast, the Voice of Assyria went on the air, blasting its message into every home in Jerusalem, and even into the temple itself!

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War against Jehovah

 

Hezekiah's faith was exposed as a futile superstition:

 

"Let not Hezekiah make you trust in Jehovah, saying, Jehovah will surely deliver us" (Is. 36:15).

 

"Let not thy God, in whom thou trustest, deceive thee, saying, Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria" (37:10).

 

"If thou say unto me, We trust in Jehovah our God; is it not he, whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah hath taken away, and said to Judah and to Jerusalem, Ye shall worship before this altar?" (36:7).

 

The twist in that last challenge was cleverly put over. True, Hezekiah's reformation had destroyed high places and had taken away the ornate Assyrian altar which Ahaz had installed in the temple area. But these were the tokens of an apostasy which had taken a rude buffeting since Ahaz slept with his fathers. The more intelligent and the more godly in Jerusalem would see through this, and would curl their lips at this heathen perversion of truth.

 

The barrage of logomachy went on day after day. The foghorn voice of Rabshakeh wore itself out. But others in his Ministry of Misinformation took up where he left off:

 

"And they spake against the God of Jerusalem, as against the gods of the people of the Land, which were the work of the hands of men" (2 Chr. 32:19).

 

The defenders' secret weapon

 

And their words were not wasted. For the people on the walls knew well enough their own military weakness. The faithful remnant among them lifted up their prayers in the temple:

 

"O God, how long shall the adversary reproach? shall the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?...Remember this, that the enemy hath reproached, O Lord, and that the foolish people have blasphemed thy name...Arise, O God, plead thine own cause: remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily. Forgive not the voice of thine enemies: the tumult of those that rise up against thee increaseth continually" (Ps. 74:10,18,22,23).

 

These Assyrian propagandists must have been much puzzled by the lack of response from the besieged. Could it be that they were so cowed that they hadn't even the courage to fight with words. What they did not know was that Hezekiah had commanded: "Answer never a word". And loyally, yet much discouraged, the people obeyed. Instead:

 

"Wherefore (they prayed) should the heathen say, Where is their God? (cp. Ps. 115:2) let him be known among the heathen in our sight by the revenging of the blood of thy servants which is shed...and render unto our neighbours (the Edomites and others who were now firm allies of Assyria) sevenfold into their bosom their reproach wherewith they have reproached thee, O Lord" (Ps. 79:10,12; cp. also Ps. 139:19-22; 140:8-11).

 

The heavenly counterblast to these rough Assyrian threats came, in the first instance, in an inspired message through the prophet of the Lord:

 

"The virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn...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. By thy servants hast thou reproached the Lord, and hast said, By the multitude of my chariots am I come up to the height of the mountains" (Is. 37:22-24).

 

"Because thy rage and thy tumult is come up into mine ears, therefore will I put my hook in thy nose, and my bridle in thy lips (figuratively, Sennacherib was soon to be treated as he, with savage satisfaction, treated his prisoners), and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou earnest" (37:29).

 

Although this stern rebuttal was primarily for the re-assurance of Hezekiah and his men, it would be surprising indeed if such a scornful riposte were not leaked to the Assyrians. And if it were, then what would they make of it?

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24. Israel's ancient Passover experience

 

About this time Hezekiah's men of God made much of the vivid memories, preserved in their ancient scriptures and in the national consciousness, of the unique and sensational deliverance which their forefathers had known when, under Moses, the people were delivered from a cruel oppression in Egypt. Indeed the king himself in some of the Hezekiah psalms, dwelt on this with a deep earnestness of spirit. There is no difficulty in seeing why this should be, for had not the king's reign begun with a uniquely enthusiastic observance of Passover in Jerusalem — this after one knows not how many years of shameful neglect? And, of course, even though this religious zeal tended to flag, Hezekiah's didn't, and he would see to it that this holy festival would be kept up in the holy city every year of his reign. Among the enthusiasts for this sustained revival none was so forward as Isaiah. When his long book of prophecy is read with an eye to such allusions they are found to be as common as daisies on a lawn.

 

Crossing the Red Sea

 

References to the slaying of the Passover lamb and to the sprinkling of blood are relatively few. But the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea crops up time and again:

 

"Art not thou he which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep; that hath made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over?...Art thou not he that hath cut Rahab (nickname for Egypt), and wounded the dragon (the Nile crocodile)?" (Is. 51:10,9).

 

"Where is he that brought them (Israel) up out of the sea with the shepherd of his flock?...that led them by the right hand of Moses with his glorious arm (Ex. 14:16), dividing the water before them, to make himself an everlasting name? (63:11,12).

 

Isaiah wrote out of a conviction that what God had done for Israel in former times He could assuredly do again! So let His people look for a like experience now:

 

"Ye shall not go out with haste, nor go by flight: for the Lord will go before you; and the God of Israel shall be your rearward" (52:12) —

 

precisely as happened at the Exodus:

 

"And the angel of God, which went before the camp of Israel, removed, and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud went from before their face, and stood behind them" (Ex. 14:19).

 

In similar fashion Is. 19 has a sequence of vivid pictures of a deliverance yet to be accomplished in Hezekiah's time (in part), and again (more fully) in Messiah's day, with one detail after another quarried out of the Exodus story — the pillar of cloud, the Glory of the Lord; the ruthless exposure of the futility of the gods of Egypt; the drying up of Egypt's waters; the pathetic inadequacy of the rulers of that highly organized land (19:1,3,5,11,16).

 

"When thou (Israel) passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers (e,g, Jordan), they shall not overflow thee...I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee...thou wast precious in my sight" (Is. 43:2-4).

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Wilderness journey

 

Always there was the implication that what God had done in ancient times for His people He could do again. Consider, too, how He cared for them in the wilderness:

 

"When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them...I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water" (41:17,18).

 

"I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert...to give drink to my people, my chosen. This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praise" (43:19-21).

 

"He caused the waters to flow out pf the rock for them: he clave the rock also (i.e. a second time), and the waters gushed out" (48:21).

 

In the time of Judah's desolation, and when vast multitudes of captives had been marched wearily away into distant bondage, the prophet's faith never flagged. As God had saved in the days of Moses, so He would save yet again, very soon, and even more powerfully:

 

"Say to the prisoners, Go forth; to them that are in darkness, Shew yourselves...they shall not hunger nor thirst (manna and the smitten rock); neither shall the heat nor sun smite them (the protecting shelter of the pillar of cloud; Ps. 105:39)...by the springs of water shall he guide them. And I will make all my mountains a way, and my highways shall be exalted...from the land of Sinim (the two wildernesses of Sinai and Zin; Dt. 32:51)" (49:9-12).

 

The same context echoes the covenant at Sinai and the inheritance of the Promised Land.

 

In earlier days, before ever Hezekiah came to the throne, Isaiah was using this Exodus language to foretell a yet more glorious deliverance (10:24-27; 11:15; 4:5). His mind seems to have been fascinated by those awe-inspiring experiences of long ago. But he wrote of them as he did because the mind of his God also still dwelt on them lovingly.

 

In the Psalms also

 

The Hezekiah psalms, some of which were probably written by Isaiah, constantly carry the same theme — God's vine in Egypt, the people's experience of hard bondage, how they were led by Moses and Aaron through the waters of the Red Sea, the destruction of the Egyptian crocodile, the fear-inspiring covenant at Sinai, the waters of Meribah, the tribes marching in correct order through the wilderness with the ark and its cherubim of glory in the midst, earthquake at the crossing of Jordan, the overthrow of the Canaanite peoples — all of these are mentioned in a context which speaks vividly of the despair and hardship and mighty exultation of Hezekiah's time (44:1-3; 74:13,14; 77:19,20; 80:1-8; 81:5-7; 114). The special point attaching to these Passover and Exodus allusions will be made more clear in the next chapter.

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25. Jerusalem delivered at Passover

 

The strong emphasis throughout Isaiah on the Passover deliverance of Israel under Moses prepared the way for a sequence of quite exciting intimations that that act of divine salvation was now to be matched by a deliverance at least as sensational as that which the Passover feast celebrated.

 

Although the overflow of zeal for the Lord which Hezekiah's first Passover had witnessed was now almost spent, it may be taken as certain that even at the time of Sennacherib's invasion the faithful remnant came up to Jerusalem to keep the feast — this in spite of, or perhaps even because of, the havoc which the Assyrian in­vasion had brought with it. If there was one city in Judah, besides Lachish, which could withstand the Assyrian assault, it was Jerusalem.

 

There the piety and steadfast devotion of these faithful ones found its reward, for — as Isaiah had foretold, (ch. 19) — Jerusalem and all its people came through un­harmed.

 

It was such a Passover night as had never been experienced before:

 

"As birds flying, so will the Lord of hosts defend Jerusalem; defending also he will deliver it; and
passing over
he will preserve it" (Is. 31:5).

 

This reassuring promise employs the very Hebrew verb (a word of rare occurrence) which is used in the great Passover chapter in Exodus (12:11,21,27,43,48 etc.).

 

The language describes the protecting angel of the Lord not suffering the destroyer to come into the holy city (Ex. 12:23).

 

In this place in Isaiah, the context could hardly be more explicit:

 

"Then shall the Assyrian fall with the sword
(hereb,
a play on
cherub),
not of a mighty man; and the sword, not of a mean man, shall devour him; but he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall be discomfited" (31:8).

 

Other Isaiah passages are just as specific:

 

"Ye shall have a song, as in the night when a holy solemnity is kept; and gladness of heart as when one goeth with a pipe to come into the mountain of the Lord" (30:29).

 

"A holy solemnity" means one of the feasts of the Lord. The words speak of a pilgrimage to Zion. This is a feast that is kept at night-time. Only Passover is so observed. The context of this passage is as explicit as the one quoted earlier:

 

"For through the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down which smote with a rod" (30:31).

 

Yet another example of the same sort:

 

"Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt! (Ariel is one of Isaiah's names for Jerusalem). Add ye year to year: let them kill sacrifices" (29:1).

 

The Passover chapter (Ex. 12:2) begins with:

 

"This month shall be unto you the beginning of months."

 

So it was in the month of Passover when year was added to year and when special sacrifices were offered. Isaiah continues:

 

"And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel...shall be as a dream of a night vision...so shall the multitude of all the nations be, that fight against mount Zion" (29:7,8).

 

Consider next this rather problematical passage:

 

"The night of my pleasure (Passover?) hath he turned into fear unto me. Prepare the table (the Passover meal?), watch in the watchtower ('It shall be a night of watching'; Ex. 12:42), eat, drink...anoint the shield (the door frame? Ex. 12:7)" (21:4,5).

 

Again, the context is the same:

 

"Babylon is fallen, is fallen; and all the graven images of her gods he hath broken into the ground" (21:9).

 

Here is the outcome of the controversy between Jehovah and the gods of Assyria (see ch.23). It is well-established that by "Babylon" Isaiah meant "Assyria" which had largely conquered Babylon. The reference to chariots and horsemen in pairs (21:9 RV) accords precisely with the character of Assyrian bas-reliefs.

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Protection and Destruction

 

Another passage about divine judgment and holocaust, is shot through with Passover language:

 

"Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee (None of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning; Ex. 12:22): hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation (Passover destruction) be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain" (26:20,21).

 

The exhortation to

 

"Look upon Zion, the city of our solemnities (Passover again)...Jerusalem a quiet habitation" (33:20).

 

is preceded by:

 

"Thou shalt not see a fierce people (the Assyrians), a people of a deeper speech than thou canst perceive: of a stammering tongue, that thou canst not understand" (v.19).

 

There is much more like this in the context.

 

Very briefly, but effectively, Isaiah's narrative underlines the drama of this Passover:

 

"Then the angel of the Lord (Ex. 12:23) went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians...and when they (the inhabitants of Jerusalem) arose early in the morning, behold they were all dead! Corpses!" (37:36) —

 

precisely as happened in Egypt. And as the Egyptians were urgent upon Israel to get themselves out of their land of bondage, so also were the Assyrians. Chapter 33 will bring together some striking evidence that the outcome of this Passover was freedom for the multitude of captives already marched away from Judah.

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26. The Destruction of Sennacherib's Army

 

If indeed Isaiah's prophecies have been assembled in approximately chronological order, it is certainly very remarkable that time after time during the reign of Ahaz or in the early days of Hezekiah, the prophet seems to have made explicit prognostications not only about the Assyrian invasion but also about the cataclysmic destruction in which that arrogant exercise in empire-building would culminate. Here are four examples couched in fairly explicit terms:

 

"Surely as I have thought, so shall it come to pass; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand: that I will break the Assyrian in my land, and upon my mountains tread him under foot: then shall his yoke depart from off them, and his burden depart from off their shoulders...In the year that king Ahaz died was this burden" (14:24-28).

 

"My Land...my mountains" — this was the reason why it must so transpire. In an exhortation to the people of Moab to seek refuge with the people of Jehovah, there is this assurance:

 

"The extortioner is at an end, the spoiler ceaseth, the oppressors are con­sumed out of the Land. And in mercy (i.e. according to God's promise) shall the throne (in Jerusalem) be established" (16:4,5).

 

"O my people that dwellest in Zion, be not afraid of the Assyrian: he shall smite thee with a rod, and shall lift up his staff against thee, after the manner of Egypt (see ch.25)...And the Lord of hosts shall stir up a scourge for
him
according to the slaughter of Midian at the rock of Oreb (Judges 7)...And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder...and the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing (of Hezekiah, the new king)" (10:24-27).

 

"Thou hast multiplied the nation (by the great number returning from captivity); thou hast increased their joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest (the great Jubilee harvest; see ch. 32), and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil (the plundering of the Assyrian camp; see ch.28)...For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood, but this (threatened horror against Jerusalem) shall even be for burning and for fuel of fire" — in other words, the biter bit (9:3,5 RV).

 

Vivid description

 

As the great crisis drew nearer the startling outcome which God purposed was depicted more and more clearly:

 

"Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas...The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters: but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind. And behold, at eveningtide trouble, and before the morning he is not. This is the portion of them that spoil us, and the lot of them that rob us" (17:12-14).

 

Whereas later prophecies were to specify Passover as the time of this deliverance, it is here foretold that the stroke of judgment would fall during the night (as in the day of Midian).

 

The figure of chaff being blown away from a threshing floor is repeated:

 

"The multitude of the terrible ones shall be as chaff that passeth away (here cp. Mic. 4:12,13): yea, it shall be at an instant suddenly. Thou (the invader) shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire. And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel...shall be as a dream of a night vision. It shall even be as when an hungry man dreameth, and, behold, he eateth; but he awaketh, and his soul is empty...so shall the multitude of all the nations be that fight against mount Zion" (29:5-8).

 

The figures of speech vary astonishingly, but the net result is always the same:

 

"In that day the Lord with his sore and great and strong sword will punish leviathan the piercing serpent...and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea. In that day sing ye unto her (Jerusalem), A vineyard of red wine (the environs of the city flowing with blood)" (27:1,2).

 

Here there is allusion to the two great powers of Assyria and Egypt, the former under the metaphors of the fast-flowing Tigris and the slow devious Euphrates, both of them belonging to the Assyrian heartland, and the latter (Egypt) appropriately described as the crocodile of the Nile (for 'sea' see 19:5).

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The Wrath of God

 

As the dies irae drew nearer, the expressions of God's wrathful purpose against the invaders intensified:

 

"At the noise of the tumult the people fled: at the lifting up of thyself the nations were scattered" (33:3).

 

"Then shall the Assyrian fall with the sword, not of a mighty man; and the sword, not of a mean man, shall devour him: but he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall be discomfited. And he shall pass over to his strong hold for fear (cp. 37:37). ("So Sennacherib king of Assyria
departed,
and
went,
and
returned,
and dwelt at Nineveh"), and his princes shall be afraid of the ensign, saith the Lord, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem" (31:8,9).

 

In "Second Isaiah" (which is certainly as contemporary with the Assyrian invasion as is "First Isaiah"), it is difficult to be sure whether the repeated descriptions of the holocaust are to be read as prophecies before the event or as reminiscences making use of that awe-inspiring devastation as a picture of a yet greater judgment to come in the days of Messiah's appearing. This is one of the great unsolved problems of this greatest of the Old Testament prophets. However, regarding the present investigation, the student loses nothing by the uncertainty.

 

"The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the Spirit (the wind?) of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass" (40:7). "Behold, all they that were incensed against thee (Zion) shall be ashamed and confounded: they shall be as nothing: and they that strive with thee shall perish. Thou shalt seek them, and shalt not find them, even them that contend with thee: they that war against thee shall be as nothing, and as a thing of nought" (41:11,12).

 

There is an impressive picture of God's patience giving out. How can He remain passive whilst swashbuckling conquerors bully and deride His faithful remnant?:

 

"The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, he shall stir up jealousy like a man of war: he shall cry, yea, roar; he shall prevail against his enemies. I have long time holden my peace: I have been still, and refrained myself: now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once" (42:13,14).

 

These violent ruthless invaders, more brutal than any beasts, are to have a taste of their own medicine:

 

"Thus saith thy Lord Jehovah and thy God that pleadeth the cause of his people, Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again: but I will put it into the hand of them that afflict thee; which have said to thy soul, Bow down, that we may go over" (51:22,23; for the same idea, see 49:26).

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A barrage of prophecy

 

Other prophets were as vigorous, if not as copious, as Isaiah:

 

"And this man (Hezekiah, in whom the hopes of the nation centred) shall be our peace, when the Assyrian shall come into our Land: and when he shall tread in our palaces (the fine country residences), then shall we raise against him seven shepherds and eight principal men...thus shall he deliver us from the Assyrian, when he cometh into our Land" (Mic. 5:5,6).

 

The seven shepherds were the prophets of the Lord who were better than military resources in stiffening the backbone of the faithful remnant — Isaiah, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk — and over them Hezekiah (himself a prophet, in the Book of Psalms), to lead and inspire them by his superlative Messianic ex­ample. Every one of these seven has a strong message against Assyria.

 

Psalms also

 

The Hezekiah psalms rival Isaiah in the way awe at the mighty judgment of Jehovah is intermingled with irrepressible gladness at His gracious goodness in rescuing His people from a nightmare of destruction and torment:

 

"Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the Land. He maketh wars to cease unto the ends of the Land; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire. Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the Gentiles, I will be exalted in the Land" (Ps. 46:8-10).

 

"For lo, the kings (Sennacherib's allies) were assembled, they passed by together. They saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away. Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail" (48:4-6).

 

"In Salem also is his tabernacle, and his dwelling place in Zion. There brake he the arrows of the bow, the shield, and the sword, and the battle...The stout­hearted are spoiled, they have slept their sleep...At thy rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the chariot and horse are cast into a dead sleep" (76:2-6).

 

The gloom and hopeless wretchedness of the siege suddenly gave way to an ex­plosion of delight and thankfulness:

 

"When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing: then said they among the Gentiles, the Lord hath done great things for them. The Lord
hath
done great things for us, whereof we are glad" (126:1-3).

 

Once the hunt is on in psalm and prophecy for echoes of this unique deliverance, there are many satisfying finds to be made by the diligent student.

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27. Theophany

 

There can be no manner of doubt that the destruction of Sennacherib's army out­side Jerusalem was an act of God. The only question that remains to be settled about it is whether it was an act of God in the sense in which the insurance policies use the phrase — something cataclysmic in the world of nature, such as lightning or earthquake — or whether it was a quite unique demonstration of destructive power expressing directly the wrath of God.

 

Besides a handful of very forceful passages in the Hezekiah psalms there are in Isaiah's prophecy more than fifteen extremely vivid descriptions of what happened in this majestic act of divine redemption. Consideration will be given first to the two longest. It will be seen that the first is rather general in its description, the other is much more specific:

 

"And he (the Lord) saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: therefore his arm brought salvation unto him; and his righteousness, it sustained him. For he put on righteousness as a breastplate, and an helmet of salvation upon his head; and he put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloke. According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his adversaries, recompense to his enemies: to the lands of the sea he will repay recompense. So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him. And the Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, saith the Lord" (Is. 59:16-20).

 

The character of this language is readily explained when it is realised that the prophet is using the great Assyrian debacle as a picture in history already past, in order to portray the yet greater deliverance which Messiah will yet bring to Zion. Now contrast the lurid detail in an earlier passage which, although written before the event, reads as though written by an eye-witness:

 

"Behold, the name of the Lord cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy (i.e. the prophetic message concerning it is terrible): his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire: and his breath as an overflowing stream shall reach even to the neck (cp. 8:7,8), to sift the nations with the sieve of vanity: and there shall be a bridle in the jaws of the people, causing them to err...And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard, and shall shew the lighting down of his arm, with the indignation of his anger, and with the flame of a devouring fire, with scattering (Jer. Bib: cloud­burst), and tempest, and hailstones. For through the voice of the Lord shall the Assyrian be beaten down which smote with a rod...For Tophet is ordained of old: yea, for the king it is prepared: he hath made it deep and large: the pile thereof is fire and much wood; the breath of the Lord like a stream of brimstone doth kindle it" (30:27-33).

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Hurricane natural or divine?

 

As Isaiah multiplies his testimonies of this judgment against the Assyrians the elements of storm and fire are frequently repeated. It is such details which impart an element of feasibilty to the idea that it was a hurricane of freak intensity which hit the camp of the besiegers outside Jerusalem. Hurricanes of this nature are very local in their destructive effects, so in this way the city itself may have escaped the worst ferocity of the storm. It could, of course, be argued that hurricanes of such violence, which must have their birth over a considerable stretch of water, do not happen in the Mediterranean. But it is conceivable that such a "whirlwind of the south" (21:1) may have built up in the sub-tropical waters of the Red Sea and then have spent itself turning north towards Jerusalem.

 

But even if such an extraordinary natural phenomenon be invoked as the most likely explanation, there are still the remarkable features of time and place to be explained — that this violent storm should come just when it did, and that it should head direct­ly for Jerusalem, bringing destruction all round the city and yet leaving the city itself virtually unharmed. What is the evidence supplied by Isaiah elsewhere?

 

"His (the Assyrian's) princes shall be afraid of the (Lord's) ensign, saith the Lord, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem" (31:9).

 

"Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire" (29:6).

 

"He shall also blow upon them, and they shall wither, and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble" (40:24) —

 

a literal whirlwind, or just a figure of speech?

 

The Shekinah Glory?

 

There are at least two places where it is strongly suggested that the destruction was associated with an overpowering manifestation of the Shekinah Glory of the Lord; and this phenomenon in turn is made into an anticipation of an essential feature of Messiah's coming in glory:

 

"O that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence (this is the language of the Sinai theophany), As when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence!" (64:1,2).

 

"For behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his (cherubim) chariots like a whirlwind to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. For by fire and by his sword (a paronomasia for cherub) will the Lord plead with all flesh: and the slain of the Lord shall be many" (66:15,16).

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Psalms and Prophets

 

It is interesting now to turn to the testimony of the psalms on this fascinating topic. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea...Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the Land. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the Land; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire" (Ps. 46:1,2,8,9).

 

"Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined (this must refer to the Shekinah Glory). Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence: a fire shall devour before him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about him" (50:2,3).

 

The destruction of an overpowering confederacy of enemies is invoked in Psalm 83 in very strong terms:

 

"As the fire burneth a wood, and as the flame setteth the mountains on fire: so persecute them with thy tempest, and make them afraid with thy storm" (83:14,15).

 

Psalm 97 is even more vivid:

 

"Clouds and darkness are round about him...a fire goeth before him, and burneth up his enemies round about (round about the city?). His lightnings enlightened the world: the earth saw, and trembled. The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord" (Ps. 97:2-5).

 

The final picture comes from Joel:

 

"The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem: and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the Lord will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel" (Jl. 3:16).

 

Like Isaiah, Joel was making use of his personal experience of God's rescue op­eration in Hezekiah's reign in order to prepare succeeding generations for the over­powering majesty of Messiah's salvation of Israel in the Last Days.

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28. The destroyer destroyed

 

Everyone in Jerusalem knew that it had been a night of terror. The voice of the Lord had made the sinners in Zion afraid. The faithful and unfaithful alike among God's people marvelled that that night of frightfulness had left them virtually un­scathed. But when dawn came over the mount of Olives the sight that was revealed to the eyes of the besieged was too astonishing to believe. All the various sections of the extensive camp of the Assyrians presented a scene of indescribable chaos. Tents, supply carts, cavalry..., elaborately prepared siege-works were all thrown about in a state of disorder, devastation and destruction such as no-one could have imagined the night before. Most amazing of all was the almost complete absence of life amidst all that wreck and ruin of the panoply of war. "They were all dead! Corpses!" Here was the might of Assyria, together with all the picked mercenaries, who had been brought in to make war against the God of Israel and against His holy city, now reduced to the stillness of death — everywhere jumbled corpses, piles of slain. There were clear signs of how these men of might had vainly sought to burrow into crannies in the rocks and into fox-holes frantically dug out in pockets of soil, for fear of the Lord and for the glory of His majesty.

 

The siege was over. The invasion itself was at an end. For, when word reached the great Sennacherib and the other mighty force with which he was determined to reduce the fortress of Libnah, the fear of Jehovah so stamped itself upon his brutal soul as to reduce him to the feebleness of a woman. He bethought him of the revil­ing and blaspheming which he had dictated to his scribe, to be sent imperiously to "Hezekiah the Jew." And now, how long before the stroke of Jehovah fell again and he lost the rest of his invincible force, aye, and maybe his own life also?

 

Salvaging the mighty gods of Assyria

 

So without any delay, orders went throughout the camp there for immediate aban­donment of the campaign. Instead, a return to Nineveh, as fast as possible, before worse befell. Especially let there be reverent care in transporting away from this cursed land the images of the gods which were set up in the camp. Somehow they must be saved from the wrath of this God of Israel whom nobody had ever seen.

 

Yet all this well-intentioned devotion came to nothing. Those loaded ox-carts made no progress. Those patient mindless beasts strained in vain at their yokes. Drivers wielded long whips and hurled frantic curses. The chaos and confusion of this sudden retreat was a misery to everybody: and it was made worse by the constant unexpected attacks of Israeli guerrillas.

 

"Bel bows down, Nebo stoops low; their idols are borne by beasts of burden.

The images that are carried about are burdensome,

a burden for the weary,

They stoop and bow down together;

unable to rescue the burden,

they themselves go off into captivity" (Is. 46:1,2 NIV).

 

Joel has a vivid picture of two Assyrian armies getting lost in the wilder parts of the country, in their desperate efforts to get as far away from Jerusalem as possible:

 

"I will remove far from you the northern army, and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea (the Dead Sea) and his hinder part toward the utmost sea (the Mediterranean)" (Jl. 2:20).

 

"At the noise of the tumult the people fled: at the lifting up of thyself the nations were scattered" (Is. 33:3).

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Too good to believe!

 

It was almost impossible to salvage anything — men or materials, or gods! — from the wreck and collapse of a proud invasion.

 

"Thine heart shall meditate terror" —

 

it is a picture of bewildered men of Jerusalem trying to grasp this impossible truth, that their irresistible Assyrian tyrants were now reduced to helpless terror and the feebleness of women.

 

"Where is the scribe (making careful lists of plunder taken)? Where is the receiver (of tribute abjectly paid)? Where is he that counted the towers (the organizer of the siege works for battering or scaling the walls of Jerusalem)? Thou shalt not see a fierce people (any longer), a people of a deeper speech than thou canst perceive..." (Is. 33:18,19).

 

All this is swept away into a havoc of overthrow and extinction.

 

"Thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth of thee" (49:17).

 

How briefly and eloquently does Isaiah's record describe Sennacherib cutting his losses and clearing out of Judah:

 

"So Sennacherib king of Assyria
departed,
and
went,
and
returned,
and dwelt at Nineveh" (37:37) —

 

that is, he stayed away from Judah, and made no further attempt to add that country to his dominions.

 

Massive plunder

 

Meantime, once the men of Jerusalem had recovered from the shock of beholding the Assyrian camp, now a shambles of ruin and death, it was realised with eagerness and glee that here was a unique opportunity for plundering the plunderer:

 

"When thou (Assyria) shalt cease to spoil, thou shalt be spoiled." "Your plunder, O nations, is harvested as by young locusts; like a swarm of locusts men pounce on it" (33:1,4 NIV).

 

How graphically this figure of locusts describes the swarm of "beachcombers" streaming forth from Jerusalem to salvage everything of use left by the receding Assyrian tide. Weapons, clothing, food, tents — and especially the plunder that had already been gathered from far and wide by these insatiable predators. The initial chaos was made yet more chaotic as the eager search for anything of value went on. Even the weak and disabled joined in the exhilaration of it all:

 

"Then is the prey of a great spoil divided, the lame take the prey" (33:23).

 

It is a lovely allusion to how, long centuries before "the lame and the blind" had been used to add mockery to the frustration of David's men besieging Jebus (2 Sam. 5:6). Now the lame of the city gloated over the discomfiture of their besiegers. And the finest items out of all that plunder were dedicated to the glory of the God who had wrought this fantastic deliverance:

 

"I will consecrate their gain unto the Lord, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth" (Mic. 4:13).

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A threat of pestilence

 

But this sweeping destruction also created a serious problem. The piles of carcases scattered in the valleys round Jerusalem made a gargantuan feast for all the scavenger birds in the country. Ghoulish vultures in their scores shared fellowship in a gorgeous fraternal gathering. Yet even though they gave thanks to their Creator for His beneficent satisfying of their appetites, and happily ate till they could eat no longer, the stench of decay intensified and hung heavy on the air all round and within the city. It almost seemed inevitable that God would now destroy His saved people by pestilence.:

 

"And they shall go forth and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me" (66:24).

 

"Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases" (34:3)

 

There was nothing else for it but to organize a rapid collection of these grisly human remains into one place — the valley of Hinnom — and burn them there until a final destruction of the destroyers had been achieved. Thus the Land was cleansed.

 

"How are the mighty fallen!"

 

And what of Sennacherib himself, this puny mortal who had set himself so proudly against the God of Israel, with a confident resolve to wipe out the stain of that submission which had once been imposed on Nineveh by a paltry prophet?

 

With this set purpose he had become

 

"a ravenous bird from the east"

 

yet he was in truth

 

"the man that executed the counsel of Jehovah from a far country" (Is. 46:11).

 

Isaiah foretold that

 

"he shall pass over to his stronghold
for fear,
and his princes shall be afraid of the ensign" — the Lord's pillar of cloud and fire (31:9).

 

In his own land retribution came home to him, the mightiest man in that civilisation:

 

"And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer (Arad-melek and Nergal-shar-usur) his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia: and Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead" (Is. 37:38).

 

According to Esarhaddon's Nineveh prism this took place about twenty years after the debacle at Jerusalem. It may be wondered why the judgment which fell in such summary fashion on troops and officers spared Sennacherib, the real villain of the piece, for so long. Could the explanation be that for all his beastliness he had the good sense to recognize and humble himself before the authority of Jehovah, and for this was given a longer lease of life? But if so, in time he went back on this, resuming his devotion to the god whose futility had been so signally exposed in Judaea. So he died ignominiously in the very shadow of a useless deity. (For more on this, see "Hezekiah the Great", H.A.W., ch.17).

 

Slain in a crisis of revolution, with his capital a turmoil of warring factions, there was no possibility of dignified sepulture with pomp and circumstance. Instead this mighty monarch

 

"that made the earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms: that made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof...was cast out...like an abominable branch (LXX: corpse)...as a carcase trodden under feet."

 

Thus in due time, what Isaiah had foretold (14:16-19) concerning him duly came to pass. His carcase suffered a fate similar to that of his soldiery who died under the walls of Jerusalem.

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29. The No-gods

 

There was no part of the Assyrian war of words against the defenders of Jerusalem which did not include a vigorous tirade against dependence on the help of Jehovah. These diatribes came time and again.

 

Vigorous propaganda

 

Here is a sample:

 

"Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, Jehovah will deliver us. Hath any of the gods of the nations delivered his 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? (Here was accurate information about the theological prostitution practised in the Northern Kingdom.) Who are they among all the gods of these lands, that have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?" (Is. 36:18-20).

 

Not only truth but also logic is a front-line casualty in war-time propaganda. This argument: Those gods were clearly no good. Therefore neither is Jehovah,' falls in the same class as the unbeliever's contention: They've looked for the Second Coming of Christ for generations, and he hasn't come yet. Therefore he never will.'

 

Here it comes again:

 

"Behold, thou (Hezekiah) hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly; and shalt thou be delivered? 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 Telassar? Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sephar­vaim, Hena, and Ivah?" (Is. 37:11-13) —

 

And where were they? — impaled on stakes, poor fellows!

 

Yet, having dismissed Jehovah as of no more worth than the pantheon of pagan gods, Sennacherib was not averse to pulling in the Lord of hosts on his side:

 

"Am I now come up without Jehovah against this land to destroy it? Jehovah said unto me (yes, indeed, He had done so; 8:7; 10:5,6), Go up against this land, and destroy it" (36:10).

 

So this vainglorious dictator congratulated himself in advance:

 

"As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idols, and whose graven images did excel them of Jerusalem and of Samaria, shall I not...so do to Jerusalem and her idols?"

 

 

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Blunt riposte

 

To this there could be only one answer:

 

"Wherefore it shall come to pass, that when the Lord hath performed his whole work upon mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks. For he said, By the strength of my hand I have done it" (10:10-13).

 

Long years before this the might of the angel of the Lord had struck against the pride of Egypt and "against all the gods of Egypt" (Ex. 12:12). Now at another Passover angelic retribution was stored up for a mightier oppressor:

 

"Hast thou (Sennacherib) not heard long ago, how I (the Lord) have done it? ... now have I brought it to pass, that thou shouldest be to lay waste defenc­ed cities into ruinous heaps.
Therefore
their inhabitants were of small power...Because thy rage against me, and thy tumult is come up into mine ears,
therefore
will I put my hook in thy nose, and my bridle in thy lips (precisely as this arrogant conqueror had treated many of his victims)" (37:26-29).

 

Not only was he to face humiliation, but so also the gods of Nineveh about whom his emissary crowed before the walls of the holy city. The mighty overthrow which left the Assyrian camp a squalid desolation also brought humiliation to all the idols honoured there — they were left smashed or prostrate. Everything that had been so proudly said against the gods of the conquered peoples now came back in unexampled violence against these deities whose almighty power had been pro­claimed with confidence and gloating.

 

The prophet's withering commonsense

 

Forthwith Isaiah went into action with a campaign of blistering exposure of the inane futility of all idol worship. His classic passage (44:9-20) now paraphrased here, is unequalled in any theological polemic for its scorn and satire and sweet logic:

 

'These graven images, so handsomely decorated, are not even worth the materials they are made of. Made by men, how can they possibly be greater than men? See the metal-worker as he dedicates his labours to the fashioning of one of them. His muscles ache with the effort. In the heat of his furnace his throat is parched with thirst. He feels ready to drop. And he — mark you! — is the creator of a god. What sort of a god is this?'

 

Another craftsman starts on his six days of creation by chopping a tree down — a tree which a man planted and whose growth the rain of heaven nurtured and en­couraged. Now that it is felled, it is too immense for his holy purpose. Much of it therefore becomes fuel to warm his house in the winter. Another portion becomes firing under his oven to bake his family's bread and to roast their joint of meat. And now — the great climax! — there is yet sufficient of it left for the fashioning of an idol with skill and pious patience. Thus at last he has before him the almighty controller of his destiny, and in deep devotion and humble service he prostrates himself before it' (Is. 44:9-20).

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Priest-ridden Sennacherib

 

Behold, then, this Sennacherib, the mighty monarch of the most powerful empire the world had yet known, behaving in this bird-witted fashion, cozening himself into pious reverence of a block of wood or stone. Back in his own land, having rushed awe-struck away from the chaos and carnage of a battle-field where no battle was fought, he still fails to learn the lesson which, with jeers and crudity, he has but lately hurled at those whose lands he has trampled. There, with what becoming obeisance does he prostrate himself in the incense-laden atmosphere of Ashur's holy sanctuary whilst crafty priests, unscrupulous and feigning, congratulate themselves on their own manipulation of the reins of power. Not Sennacherib, not Ashur, but themselves are the true lords of all! — except for what happens a thousand miles away in a paltry province called Judaea.

 

There it is possible to imagine Isaiah, back home from a moving service of thanks­giving to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, now contemplating the shattered remains of Assyrian idols, brought to his door by scavenging schoolboys. Would he not laugh his head off, the while thanking Jehovah that he had not been born into such idiocy as these pagans practised:

 

"They lavish gold out of the bag, and weigh silver in the balance, and hire a goldsmith; and
he
maketh it a god: they fall down, yea, they worship. They bear him upon the shoulder, they carry him, and set him in his place, and he standeth; from his place he shall not remove (this mighty deity!): yea, one shall cry unto him, yet can he not answer, nor save him out of his trouble" (46:6,7).

 

The God of Israel

 

What a contrast with the God who makes the clouds his chariot and who walks on the wings of the wind, whose voice is heard in the storm, whose lightning stroke slays in an instant, whose messenger operates in a vast pillar of cloud and fire.

 

"To whom will ye liken (such a) God? or what likeness will ye compare unto him?" (40:18).

 

Let all men know

 

"from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things" (45:6,7).

 

And Isaiah not only circulated such Scriptures as these, he also composed psalms on the same theme, and Hezekiah gladly saw to it that they were incorporated in the temple service (Ps. 96:3-5; 97:7-9; 115:4-8).

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30. Rejoicing and Thanksgiving

 

Naturally, when daylight came flooding in over the mount of Olives after that night of destruction in the Assyrian camp, it was the watchmen of the city who first became aware of the effects of that divine cataclysm:

 

"Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing: for they shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall return to Zion."

 

That familiar phrase "eye to eye" implies the curing of blindness, as when Jesus came the second time to the blind man in Jerusalem; now he was seen in person, and worshipped. In the primary reference of these words, there was all at once a ready acknowledgement of the might and saving power of their God:

 

"Break forth into joy, sing together, ye waste places of Jerusalem (i.e. the outlying suburbs made desolate by the invader): for the Lord hath comforted his people, he hath
redeemed
Jerusalem. The Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations (who aided the Assyrian onslaught; see ch.21); and all the ends of the Land shall see the salvation of our God" (52:8-10).

 

With unflagging enthusiasm Isaiah constantly returned to this happy theme:

 

"Behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy...The voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying" (65:18,19).

 

The prophet was, of course, using the recent glad redemption of the Holy City to foreshadow the loveliness of the salvation Messiah will one day bring to Jerusalem. It will come with the same suddenness, and with as terrifying a destruction. An end to misery and hopelessness; instead, irrepressible delight.

 

"Sing, O heavens (the angels, redeeming God's people with another great Passover judgment), and be joyful, O Land: and break forth into singing, O mountains (of Israel): for the Lord hath comforted his (hopeless) people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted" (49:13).

 

A very similar passage (44:23) ends with:

 

"For the Lord hath redeemed Jacob, and hath glorified himself in Israel" (cp. also 25:6,9; 55:12).

 

In Isaiah's day these words had a very real meaning in the startling experience of a stricken people.

 

Yet another passage of intense rejoicing ends with these words:

 

"...and the hand of the Lord shall be known toward his servants, and
his in­dignation toward his enemies"
(66:10,14).

 

Here is the prophet declaring: Our God has done this in our time, and one day when Messiah comes, He will repeat this scenario with even greater majesty.

 

Familiar words of an Isaiah psalm take on a new and heartening meaning when read against this background of sensational events:

 

"Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad,
because
of thy
judgments.
Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof (cp. 'where is he that counted the towers?' — spoken derisively against the Assyrian inspection of Jerusalem's defences). Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces (all of them under divine protection — as experience had just proved); that ye may tell it to the generation following. For this God (who has so delivered us) is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even un­to death (an allusion to the specified extension of Hezekiah's life: 15 years)" (Ps. 48:11-14).

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