26 This is why their townsmen had no power, they were broken and put to shame; they were like the grass of the field and the green plant, like grass on the house-tops.
For see! the kings came together by agreement, they were joined together. They saw it, and so were full of wonder; they were troubled, and went quickly away in fear. Shaking came on them and pain, as on a woman in childbirth. By you the ships of Tarshish are broken as by an east wind.
Let them be like the grass on the house-tops, which is dry before it comes to full growth. He who gets in the grain has no use for it; and they do not make bands of it for the grain-stems. And those who go by do not say, The blessing of the Lord be on you; we give you blessing in the name of the Lord.
A voice of one saying, Give a cry! And I said, What is my cry to be? All flesh is grass, and all its strength like the flower of the field. The grass becomes dry, the flower is dead; because the breath of the Lord goes over it: truly the people is grass. The grass is dry, the flower is dead; but the word of our God is eternal.
A sword is on the men of pride, and they will become foolish: a sword is on her men of war, and they will be broken. A sword is on all the mixed people in her, and they will become like women: a sword is on her store-houses, and they will be taken by her attackers.
But the man of wealth, that he is made low; because like the flower of the grass he will come to his end. For when the sun comes up with its burning heat, the grass gets dry and the grace of its form is gone with the falling flower; so the man of wealth comes to nothing in his ways.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » John Gill's Exposition of the Bible » Commentary on 2 Kings 19
Commentary on 2 Kings 19 John Gill's Exposition of the Bible
INTRODUCTION TO 2 KINGS 19
This chapter relates that King Hezekiah, on a report made to him of Rabshakeh's speech, sent a message to the prophet Isaiah to pray for him, who returned him a comfortable and encouraging answer, 2 Kings 19:1 and that upon Rabshakeh's return to the king of Assyria, he sent to Hezekiah a terrifying letter, 2 Kings 19:8, which Hezekiah spread before the Lord, and prayed unto him to save him and his people out of the hands of the king of Assyria, 2 Kings 19:14, to which he had a gracious answer sent him by the prophet Isaiah, promising him deliverance from the Assyrian army, 2 Kings 19:20, which accordingly was destroyed by an angel in one night, and Sennacherib fleeing to Nineveh, was slain by his two sons, 2 Kings 19:35.
And it came to pass, when King Hezekiah heard it,.... The report of Rabshakeh's speech, recorded in the preceding chapter:
that he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth; rent his clothes because of the blasphemy in the speech; and he put on sackcloth, in token of mourning, for the calamities he feared were coming on him and his people: and he went into the house of the Lord; the temple, to pray unto him. The message he sent to Isaiah, with his answer, and the threatening letter of the king of Assyria, Hezekiah's prayer upon it, and the encouraging answer he had from the Lord, with the account of the destruction of the Assyrian army, and the death of Sennacherib, are the same "verbatim" as in Isaiah 37:1 throughout; and therefore the reader is referred thither for the exposition of them; only would add what RauwolffF20Travels, par. 3. ch. 22. p. 317. observes, that still to this day (1575) there are two great holes to be seen, wherein they flung the dead bodies (of the Assyrian army), one whereof is close by the road towards Bethlehem, the other towards the right hand against old Bethel.