Now it happened in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, that Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah, and took them.
The king of Assyria sent Rabshakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to king Hezekiah with a great army. He stood by the conduit of the upper pool in the highway of the fuller's field.
Behold, you trust on the staff of this bruised reed, even on Egypt, whereon if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust on him.
But if you tell me, We trust in Yahweh our God: isn't that he, whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, You shall worship before this altar?
Now 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.
Then said Eliakim and Shebna and Joah to Rabshakeh, Please speak, to your servants in the Syrian language; for we understand it: and don't speak to us in the Jews' language, in the ears of the people who are on the wall.
But Rabshakeh said, Has my master sent me to your master, and to you, to speak these words? has he not sent me to the men who sit on the wall, to eat their own dung, and to drink their own water with you?
neither let Hezekiah make you trust in Yahweh, saying, Yahweh will surely deliver us; this city shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.
Don't listen to Hezekiah: for thus says the king of Assyria, Make your peace with me, and come out to me; and eat you everyone of his vine, and everyone of his fig tree, and drink you everyone the waters of his own cistern;
Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, Yahweh will deliver us. Has any of the gods of the nations delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?
Who are they among all the gods of these countries, that have delivered their country out of my hand, that Yahweh should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?
Then came Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder, to Hezekiah with their clothes torn, and told him the words of Rabshakeh.