While the northern kingdom was rapidly descending into the pit of
destruction, a mighty upward impulse was given to Judah, both
spiritually and materially, by its king Hezekiah. In his infancy the
king had been destined as a sacrifice to Moloch. His mother had saved
him from death only by rubbing him with the blood of a salamander,
which made him fire-proof. (47) In every respect he was the opposite of
his father. As the latter is counted among the worst of sinners, so
Hezekiah is counted among the most pious of Israel. His first act as
king is evidence that he held the honor of God to be his chief concern,
important beyond all else. He refused to accord his father regal
obsequies; his remains were buried as though he had been poor and of
plebeian rank. Impious as he was, Ahaz deserved nothing more dignified.
(48) God had Himself made it known to Hezekiah, by a sign, that his
father was to have no consideration paid him. On the day of the dead
king's funeral daylight lasted but two hours, and his body had to be
interred when the earth was enveloped in darkness. (49)
Throughout his reign, Hezekiah devoted himself mainly to the task of
dispelling the ignorance of the Torah which his father had caused.
While Ahaz had forbidden the study of the law, Hezekiah's orders read:
"Who does not occupy himself with the Torah, renders himself subject to
the death penalty." The academies closed under Ahaz were kept open day
and night under Hezekiah. The king himself supplied the oil needed for
illuminating purposes. Gradually, under this system, a generation grew
up so well trained that one could search the land from Dan even to
Beer-sheba and not find a single ignoramus. The very women and the
children, both boys and girls, knew the laws of "clean and unclean."
(50) By way of rewarding his piety, God granted Hezekiah a brilliant
victory over Sennacherib.
This Assyrian king, who had conquered the whole world, (51) equipped an
army against Hezekiah like unto which there is none, unless it be the
army of the four kings whom Abraham routed, or the army to be raised by
God and Magog in the Messianic time. Sennacherib's army consisted of
more than two millions and a half of horsemen, among them forty-five
thousand princes sitting in chariots and surrounded by their paramours,
by eighty thousand armor-clad soldiers, and sixty thousand swordsmen.
The camp extended over a space of four hundred parasangs, and the
saddle-beasts standing neck to neck formed a line forty parasangs long.
The host was divided into four divisions. After the first of them had
passed the Jordan, it was well nigh dry, for the soldiers had all
slaked their thirst with water of the river. The second division found
nothing to quench their thirst except the water gathered under the
hoofs of the horses. The third division was forced to dig wells, and
when the fourth division crossed the Jordan, they kicked up great
clouds of dust. (52)
With this vast army Sennacherib hastened onward, in accordance with the
disclosures of the astrologers, who warned him that he would fail in
his object of capturing Jerusalem, if he arrived there later than the
day set by them. His journey having lasted but one day instead of ten,
as he had expected, he rested at Nob. A raised platform was there
erected for Sennacherib, whence he could view Jerusalem. On first
beholding the Judean capital, the Assyrian king exclaimed: "What! Is
this Jerusalem, the city for whose sake I gathered together my whole
army, for whose sake I first conquered all other lands? Is it not
smaller and weaker than all the cities of the nations I subdued with my
strong hand?" He stretched himself and shook his head, and waved his
hand contemptuously toward the Temple mount and the sanctuary crowning
it. When his warriors urged him to make his attack upon Jerusalem, he
bade them take their ease for one night, and be prepared to storm the
city the next day. It seemed no great undertaking. Each warrior would
but have to pick up as much mortar from the wall as is needed to seal a
letter and the whole city would disappear. But Sennacherib made the
mistake of not proceeding directly to the attack upon the city. If he
had made the assault at once, it would have been successful, for the
sin of Saul against the priest at Nob had not yet been wholly expiated;
on that very day it was fully atoned for. (53) In the following night,
which was the Passover night, when Hezekiah and the people began to
sing the Hallel Psalms, (54) the giant host was annihilated. The
archangel Gabriel (55) sent by God to ripen the fruits of the field,
was charged to address himself to the task of making away with the
Assyrians, and he fulfilled his mission so well that of all the
millions of the army, Sennacherib alone was saved with his two sons,
his son-in-law (56) Nebuchadnezzar, and Nebuzaradan. (57) The death of
the Assyrians happened when the angel permitted them to hear the "song
of the celestials." (58) Their souls were burnt, though their garments
remained intact. (59) Such an end was too good for Sennacherib. To him
a disgraceful death was apportioned. On his flight away from Jerusalem,
he met a Divine apparition in the guise of an old man. He questioned
Sennacherib as to what he would say to the kings allied with him, in
reply to their inquiry about the fate of their sons at Jerusalem.
Sennacherib confessed his dread of a meeting with those kings. The old
man advised him to have his hair cut off, which would change his
appearance beyond recognition. Sennacherib assented, and his advisor
sent him to a house in the vicinity to fetch a pair of shears. Here he
found some people angels in disguise busying themselves with a
hand-mill. They promised to give him the shears, provided he ground a
measure of grain for them. So it grew late and dark by the time
Sennacherib returned to the old man, and he had to procure a light
before his hair could be cut. As he fanned the fire into a flame, a
spark flew into his beard and singed it, and he had to sacrifice his
beard as well as his hair. On his return to Assyria, Sennacherib found
a plank, which he worshipped as an idol, because it was part of the ark
which had saved Noah from the deluge. He vowed that he would sacrifice
his sons to this idol if he prospered in his next ventures. But his
sons heard his vows, and they killed their father, (60) and fled to
Kardu where they released the Jewish captives confined there in great
numbers. With these they marched to Jerusalem, and became proselytes
there. The famous scholars Shemaiah and Abtalion were the descendants
of these two sons of Sennacherib. (61)