Isaiah 36:3

(Chapter 36—Verse 1 and following) And it came to pass in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them. And the king of Assyria sent Rabshakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a great army. And he stood by the conduit of the upper pool, on the highway to the washer's field. And Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the secretary, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder, came out to him. And Rabshakeh said to them, "Say to Hezekiah, 'Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: On what do you rest this trust of yours?' By what plan and courage do you prepare to rebel? On whom do you have confidence, because you have turned away from me? Look, you trust in this broken reed staff, in Egypt: if a man leans on it, it will enter into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, to all who trust in him. But if you say to me, 'We trust in the LORD our God,' is it not he whose heights and altars Hezekiah has taken away, and said to Judah and Jerusalem, 'You shall worship before this altar'? And now make a deal with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses, and you will not be able to provide riders for them. And how will you withstand the face of one judge from my lord's servants? And if you rely on Egypt: and on chariots, and on horsemen: and now, did I ascend to this land without the Lord, to destroy it? The Lord said to me: Go up on this land and destroy it. The history is clear and does not require interpretation: and this same thing is reported more fully in the volumes of Kings and Chronicles. In the third year of Hosea the son of Elah, king of Israel, Hezekiah the son of Ahaz king of Judah began to reign. […]

But these things are said to Shebna, who was the governor of the Temple before him, of whom it is written in the same vision: Go and enter to him who dwells in the tabernacle, to Shebna the governor of the Temple, whom the Hebrews say handed over his hands to the Assyrians, terrified by Rabsaris' threats, and betrayed the lower part of Jerusalem to the enemy, and except for the fortress of Zion and the Temple, nothing else remained that the Assyrian did not hold. Where are those who think that Sobna, who is now going out with Eliacim and Joahe to meet Rabsacen, is the same person as before. There, Sobna, the head of the Temple, is said to be captured by the Assyrians; but here Sobna is a scribe, that is, a γραμματεὶς, who is called Sopher in Hebrew, and is the same as the previous one.

Second, the messengers of the Jews are described: and there went out to him Eliacim, who succeeded Sobna, who handed over the lower part of the city to the Assyrians, as above (Isa 22:15–25); Sobna, not the one mentioned above; the recorder, the secretary of …

The history related here, and in the three following chapters, is, almost in the same words contained 2 Kings 18, 19, 20. It is inserted here, to explain and confirm some of the foregoing predictions.

Then came forth unto him,.... Being sent by Hezekiah; for otherwise Rabshakeh had the impudence to call to him, in order to parley, and treat with him about the surrender of the city; but as this was not thought either safe or honourable for the king to go in person, his following ministers went; see 2Ki 18:18, Eliakim, Hilkiah's son, which was over the house; not over the house of the Lord, the temple, as some, but the king's house, being high steward of if, or "major domo".