Chapter 20

Epilogue

Hezekiah lived for two or three years after the great victory. One of the finest kings of Judah, he built several cities, constructed the tunnel and Pool of Siloam, and erected the second wall. In spite of the cancerous taxes of Assyria, he gathered much wealth for Judah. His greatest service was the restoration of the temple services and the religious reformation that followed.

His mistakes cost Judah dearly, however. If he had followed Isaiah's counsel and remained loyal to Assyria, Sennacherib probably wouldn't have invaded Palestine twice or deported over 200,000 people. But then we would never have known God's mighty power to stop the most efficient war machine of that era.

Hezekiah's blunder with the Babylonian ambassadors eventually cost Judah its freedom. In 605 BC, just eighty years after Hezekiah's death, Nebuchadnezzar conquered Judah and eventually destroyed Jerusalem.

Even so, when Hezekiah died, Judah mourned for many days, for his people greatly loved him.

Isaiah served more than sixty years under five of Judah's kings—Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, and probably Manasseh. Often he told of his call to the prophetic ministry. He had been in the temple praying when, in vision, he saw the Most High and received the summons to carry God's messages to His people.

His inspired testimony eventually cost him his life. Manasseh hated Isaiah because of his influence over Hezekiah. Tradition states that when the young man Manasseh became sole ruler of Judah at the age of twenty-two, he condemned Isaiah to death because he claimed to have seen God. The young king quoted Exodus 33:20, which stated that no man can see God and live. The passage gave him the excuse he wanted to have the old prophet executed. Isaiah was placed in a hollow log, and Manasseh ordered his men to saw the log in half.

Shebna, after his demotion, continued to build his extravagant tomb and ride in his chariot. But, true to prediction, Shebna was later captured and taken prisoner to a strange land—along with his chariot. He died on foreign soil. Archaeologists have discovered a tomb on the Mount of Olives that bears his name. As nearly as they can tell, the tomb has never been occupied.

Sennacherib was perhaps the most powerful of all the Assyrian kings. He and the other rulers of his nation greatly benefited the world of their time. They ended most local wars, provided an efficient central government, built good roads, and established a regular postal service. Usually they allowed each country to govern itself as long as the nation paid its taxes.

But their inhuman acts have filled many volumes, and the cruelty shown by both kings and soldiers alike has rarely been equaled even in twentieth-century concentration camps.

Sennacherib was the most cruel of the Assyrian kings. The king delighted in inventing new war machines and more efficient and painful methods of torture. He was hated by literally everyone outside Assyria, and many of his own countrymen grew to detest him.

His unnecessary destruction of Babylon utterly severed him from the affection of his world. Several of the lists of kings drawn up by historians in his time left his name out entirely.

Unable to trust the historians to tell the story his way, he hired his own scribes to write everything to favor him. At times his forces went down to terrible defeat in battle, but he would have his scribes write the account as though it were a victory. Often he would leave out a key event if it didn't suit his image. Perhaps that is why we have no record from him of anything he did during his last eight years. Never recovering from the blow he received in Judah at the hands of Yahweh, he didn't mention that campaign and remained silent after that.

In the month of Nisanu (late March or early April) of the year 681 B C, while he worshiped in the temple of Nisroch, his god, two of his sons, Adrammelech and Sharezar, crept up behind him and murdered him with a sword. They hoped to take over his throne. But their brother Esarhaddon prevented them from doing it.

The assassins fled for their lives to Armenia, and Esarhaddon assume the throne. Thus ended the life of one of history's greatest, and perhaps most evil, kings exactly in the way Isaiah predicted.