2 Kings 20:6-16

6 I will add 15 years to your life. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for My sake and for the sake of My servant David.' "

7 Then Isaiah said, "Bring a lump of pressed figs." So they brought it and applied it to his infected skin, and he recovered.

8 Hezekiah had asked Isaiah, "What is the sign that the Lord will heal me and that I will go up to the Lord's temple on the third day?"^[a]

9 Isaiah said, "This is the sign to you from the Lord that He will do what He has promised: Should the shadow go ahead 10 steps or go back 10 steps?"

10 Then Hezekiah answered, "It's easy for the shadow to lengthen 10 steps. No, let the shadow go back 10 steps."

11 So Isaiah the prophet called out to the Lord, and He brought the shadow^[b] back the 10 steps it had descended on Ahaz's stairway.^[c][d]

Hezekiah's Folly

12 At that time Merodach-baladan^[e] son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah since he heard that Hezekiah had been sick.

13 Hezekiah gave them a hearing and showed them his whole treasure house-the silver, the gold, the spices, and the precious oil-and his armory, and everything that was found in his treasuries. There was nothing in his palace and in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.

14 Then the prophet Isaiah came to King Hezekiah and asked him, "What did these men say, and where did they come to you from?" Hezekiah replied, "They came from a distant country, from Babylon."

15 Isaiah asked, "What have they seen in your palace?" Hezekiah answered, "They have seen everything in my palace. There isn't anything in my treasuries that I didn't show them."

16 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, "Hear the word of the Lord:

2 Kings 20:6-16 Meaning and Commentary

In this chapter is an account of Hezekiah's sickness, and of the means of his recovery, and of the sign given of it, 2 Kings 20:1 of the king of Babylon's congratulatory letter to him upon it, when he showed to the messengers that brought it his treasures, in the pride and vanity of his heart, 2 Kings 20:12 for which he was reproved by the prophet Isaiah, and was humbled, and submitted to the sentence pronounced on his house, 2 Kings 20:14, and the chapter is concluded with his reign and death, 2 Kings 20:20.

Footnotes

• [a] Isa 38:21-22
• [b] Lit shadow on the steps
• [c] Tg, Vg, Isa 38:8 DSS read on the steps of Ahaz's roof chamber
• [d] Isa 38:1-8
• [e] A few Hb mss, LXX, Syr, Tg, some Vg mss, Isa 39:1; MT reads Berodach-baladan