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2 Kings 18:13

in 2 Kings 18

In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah’s reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked and captured all the fortified cities of Judah.

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

Now in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah did Sennacherib king of Assyria come up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and took them.

KJV

Now in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah did Sennacherib king of Assyria come up against all the fenced cities of Judah, and took them.

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This verse in 2 Kings 18

Commentary

6 notes on this verse
In the fourteenth year - This note of time, which places the invasion of Sennacherib eight years only after the capture of Samaria, is hopelessly at variance with the Assyrian dates for the two events, the first of which falls into the first of Sargon, and the second into the fourth of Sennacherib, twenty-one years later. We have therefore to choose between an entire rejection of the Assyrian chronological data, and an emendation of the present passage. Of the emendations proposed the simplest is to remove the note of time altogether, regarding it as having crept in from the margin.

This site's exposition

Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked and captured

on 2 Kings 18:13-14

Lachish, where Hezekiah sends his message, is the city Sennacherib's own palace reliefs at Nineveh show under siege. "I have done wrong" is a plain surrender. The submission sits in the chapter that has said he trusted in the LORD, and the text lets both stand without resolving the tension.

The record, by era

The Church Fathers1 voice

A commentator

Jerome

Against the Pelagians 2.21 · Written before 420.

proposed

Of Hezekiah it is written, "And he did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. He destroyed the high places, and broke the statues in pieces, and burned the groves and broke the brazen serpent that Moses had made." And again, "He trusted in the Lord the God of Israel, and after him there was none like him among all the kings of Judah who were before him.

The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

The king of Assyria took all or most of the fenced cities of Judah, the frontier-towns and the garrisons, and then all the rest fell into his hands of course. The confusion which the country was put into by this invasion is described by the prophet, Isa. x.
Now in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah,.... Eight years after the captivity of Israel: did Sennacherib king of Assyria come up against all the fenced cities of Judah, and took them; many of them, the frontier towns, and proceeded as far as Lachish; ambitious of enlarging his dominions, his father having subdued the kingdom of Israel, and being also provoked by Hezekiah's refusing to pay him tribute.

The Nineteenth Century1 voice

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

Among the interesting illustrations of sacred history furnished by the recent Assyrian excavations, is a series of bas-reliefs, representing the siege of a town, which the inscription on the sculpture shows to be Lachish, and the figure of a king, whose name is given, on the same inscription, as Sennacherib.

The words behind it

15 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • וּבְאַרְבַּע֩and in four-

    uvearba'H702 →318 times

  • עֶשְׂרֵ֨הteen

    ʾesrehH6240 →338 times

  • שָׁנָ֜הyear

    shanahH8141 →877 times

  • לַמֶּ֣לֶךְof the king

    lamelekhH4428 →2525 times

  • חִזְקִיָּ֗הHezekiah

    chizkiyahH2396 →127 times

  • עָלָ֞הhe came up

    ʾalahH5927 →890 times

  • סַנְחֵרִ֤יבSennacherib

    sancherivH5576 →13 times

  • מֶֽלֶךְ־[the] king of

    melekh-H4428 →2525 times

  • אַשּׁוּר֙Assyria

    ʾashurH804 →151 times

  • עַ֣לon

    ʾalH5921 →5755 times

  • כָּל־all

    kol-H3605 →5413 times

  • עָרֵ֧י[the] cities of

    ʾareiH5892 →1090 times

  • יְהוּדָ֛הJudah

    yehudahH3063 →819 times

  • הַבְּצֻר֖וֹת<the> fortified

    habetzurotH1219 →

  • וַֽיִּתְפְּשֵֽׂם׃and he seized them

    vaiyitpesemH8610 →65 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Related verses

12 in all, six open

The number beside each verse is how many compiled reference works tie it to this one. The strongest six stand open.

Isaiah 36:1In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah’s reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked and captured all the fortified cities of Judah.5 worksHosea 12:1–2Ephraim chases the wind and pursues the east wind all day long; he multiplies lies and violence; he makes a covenant with Assyria and sends olive oil to Egypt.2 worksIsaiah 7:17–25The LORD will bring on you and on your people and on the house of your father a time unlike any since the day Ephraim separated from Judah—He will bring the king of Assyria.”2 works2 Chronicles 32:1–23After all these acts of faithfulness, Sennacherib king of Assyria came and invaded Judah. He laid siege to the fortified cities, intending to conquer them for himself.2 worksIsaiah 10:5Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger; the staff in their hands is My wrath.2 worksIsaiah 8:7–8the Lord will surely bring against them the mighty floodwaters of the Euphrates—the king of Assyria and all his pomp. It will overflow its channels and overrun its banks.2 works
The other 6 cross-references, with their words ▾
Isaiah 38:5“Go and tell Hezekiah that this is what the LORD, the God of your father David, says: ‘I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. Behold, I will add fifteen years to your life.2 works2 Kings 19:4Perhaps the LORD your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to defy the living God, and He will rebuke him for the words that the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant that still survives.”2 worksDeuteronomy 28:52They will besiege all the cities throughout your land, until the high and fortified walls in which you trust have fallen. They will besiege all your cities throughout the land that the LORD your God has given you.2 works2 Chronicles 32:4Many people assembled and stopped up all the springs and the stream that flowed through the land. “Why should the kings of Assyria come and find plenty of water?” they said.2 worksIsaiah 28:19As often as it passes through, it will carry you away; it will sweep through morning after morning, by day and by night.” The understanding of this message will bring sheer terror.2 worksHosea 8:14Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; Judah has multiplied its fortified cities. But I will send fire upon their cities, and it will consume their citadels.1 works

Where this verse connects

1 approved connection.

  • What the spade turned up

    Isaiah 36:1

    Hezekiah's reign externally anchored: Sennacherib's Prisms + Lachish reliefs (701 BC campaign) and the scientifically-excavated Ophel Hezekiah bulla; grounds the reformer-king of the Nehushtan panel as a real, datable figure.

    Source: Luckenbill, Annals of Sennacherib

The walk

5 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Isaiah 10:5

    Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger; the staff in their hands is My wrath.

    it leads to

    • Jeremiah 51:20–24

      “You are My war club, My weapon for battle. With you I shatter nations; with you I bring kingdoms to ruin.

    • Isaiah 14:25

      I will break Assyria in My land; I will trample him on My mountain. His yoke will be taken off My people, and his burden removed from their shoulders.”

    • Isaiah 10:15

      Does an axe raise itself above the one who swings it? Does a saw boast over him who saws with it? It would be like a rod waving the one who lifts it, or…

    • Isaiah 30:30

      And the LORD will cause His majestic voice to be heard and His mighty arm to be revealed, striking in angry wrath with a flame of consuming fire, and with cloudburst, storm, and hailstones.

    • Zephaniah 2:13

      And He will stretch out His hand against the north and destroy Assyria; He will make Nineveh a desolation, as dry as a desert.

Where this verse is studied

What the record shows

3 entries
  • Sennacherib's Prisms (Taylor / Oriental Institute / Jerusalem)undisputed

    Nineveh (Kuyunjik) · British Museum (Taylor Prism); Oriental Institute, Chicago (OIP Prism); Israel Museum (Jerusalem Prism)

    Counterpoint: These are royal propaganda written to glorify the king, and they are silent exactly where it would hurt: Sennacherib never claims to have taken Jerusalem and never explains why he left. Historians such as Mordechai Cogan and Nadav Na'aman also treat his figure of 200,150 deportees as inflated well beyond what the region could have held.

  • Sennacherib — attested in contemporary inscriptionundisputed

    Rassam Cylinder, Taylor/Oriental Institute/Jerusalem Prisms; Lachish reliefs

    Biblical figure (King of Assyria, 704-681 BC) identified in extra-biblical epigraphy.

  • Sennacherib's campaign (701 BC)undisputed

    Sennacherib Prism / Lachish reliefs

    verse:2ki.18.13

    Counterpoint: The 701 date is secure; what scholars still argue over is whether there was one campaign or two. William F. Albright and John Bright proposed a second invasion in the 680s to account for the mention of Tirhakah in 2 Kings 19:9, since he was young in 701. Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor and most current historians hold to a single campaign.

About 2 Kings

Jews Mourning in Exile, Eduard Bendemann, 1832, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum. Public domain.
Jews Mourning in Exile, Eduard Bendemann, 1832, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum. Public domain.
2 Kings: the study guide →Read 2 Kings 18 →

This page draws on Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); F. W. Farrar, The Second Book of Kings (Expositor's Bible); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Against the Pelagians 2.21; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Keil, The Books of the Kings and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.

Read on in 2 Kings 18 →