2 Kings 19:23

¹⁷The king of Assyria sent Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King Hezekiah with a great army to Jerusalem. They went up and came to Jerusalem. When they had come up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is in the highway of the fuller’s field.

⁷Some trust in chariots, and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.

¹⁸He will consume the glory of his forest and of his fruitful field, both soul and body. It will be as when a standard bearer faints.

¹⁷He also wrote letters insulting the LORD, the God of Israel, and speaking against him, saying, “As the gods of the nations of the lands, which have not delivered their people out of my hand, so shall the God of Hezekiah not deliver his people out of my hand.”

²³Now therefore, please give pledges to my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you two thousand horses if you are able on your part to set riders on them.

²⁴By your servants, you have defied the Lord, and have said, “With the multitude of my chariots I have come up to the height of the mountains, to the innermost parts of Lebanon. I will cut down its tall cedars and its choice cypress trees. I will enter into its farthest height, the forest of its fruitful field. ²⁵I have dug and drunk water, and with the sole of my feet I will dry up all the rivers of Egypt.”

³Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with beautiful branches, and with a forest-like shade, of high stature; and its top was among the thick boughs. ⁴The waters nourished it. The deep made it to grow. Its rivers ran all around its plantation. It sent out its channels to all the trees of the field. ⁵Therefore its stature was exalted above all the trees of the field; and its boughs were multiplied. Its branches became long by reason of many waters, when it spread them out. ⁶All the birds of the sky made their nests in its boughs. Under its branches, all the animals of the field gave birth to their young. All great nations lived under its shadow. ⁷Thus it was beautiful in its greatness, in the length of its branches; for its root was by many waters. ⁸The cedars in the garden of God could not hide it. The cypress trees were not like its branches. The pine trees were not like its branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like it in its beauty. ⁹I made it beautiful by the multitude of its branches, so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied it.’

¹⁰“Therefore thus said the Lord GOD: ‘Because he is exalted in stature, and he has set his top among the thick branches, and his heart is lifted up in his height, ¹¹I will deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations. He will surely deal with him. I have driven him out for his wickedness. ¹²Foreigners, the tyrants of the nations, have cut him off and have left him. His branches have fallen on the mountains and in all the valleys, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land. All the peoples of the earth have gone down from his shadow and have left him. ¹³All the birds of the sky will dwell on his ruin, and all the animals of the field will be on his branches, ¹⁴to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, and don’t set their top among the thick boughs. Their mighty ones don’t stand up on their height, even all who drink water; for they are all delivered to death, to the lower parts of the earth, among the children of men, with those who go down to the pit.’

¹⁵“The Lord GOD says: ‘In the day when he went down to Sheol,^[+] I caused a mourning. I covered the deep for him, and I restrained its rivers. The great waters were stopped. I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him. ¹⁶I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to Sheol^[+] with those who descend into the pit. All the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the lower parts of the earth. ¹⁷They also went down into Sheol with him to those who are slain by the sword; yes, those who were his arm, who lived under his shadow in the middle of the nations.

¹⁸“‘To whom are you thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? Yet you will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the lower parts of the earth. You will lie in the middle of the uncircumcised, with those who are slain by the sword. “‘This is Pharaoh and all his multitude,’ says the Lord GOD.”

¹⁴My hand has found the riches of the peoples like a nest, and like one gathers eggs that are abandoned, I have gathered all the earth. There was no one who moved their wing, or that opened their mouth, or chirped.”

¹⁰He built towers in the wilderness, and dug out many cisterns, for he had much livestock, both in the lowlands and in the plains. He had farmers and vineyard keepers in the mountains and in the fruitful fields, for he loved farming.

³³Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? ³⁴Where are the gods of Hamath and of Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, of Hena, and Ivvah? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?