1 In those days Hezekiah fell mortally ill. The prophet Isaiah, son of Amoz, came to him and said, ‘This is what the Lord says: “Set your house in order, for you are going to die; you will not recover.”’
- [ČSP: evidently sometime before 701 BC – i.e. before Sennacherib’s invasion]; The ČSP uses the word ‘evidently’ – presumably mainly on the basis of verse 6.
- Isaiah, therefore, does not record events in chronological order.
- Hezekiah is said to have died around 687 BC; fifteen years were added to his life – which would mean that his illness began around 702 BC, that is, shortly before Sennacherib’s invasion in 701 BC.
- The sequence of events could therefore, in theory, be one of two possibilities:
- If Isaiah’s account is ‘out of order’: Hezekiah falls ill – fifteen years are added to his life – shortly after his recovery, he faces an Assyrian invasion
- If the account is chronological (which does not fit with the sixth verse): Hezekiah, with God’s help, ‘repelled’ the Assyrian invasion – shortly afterwards he fell ill, was healed, and negotiated with the Babylonians.
2 Hezekiah turned his face towards the wall and prayed to the Lord.
- This is one of the more enigmatic passages in Scripture, raising more questions than it answers.
- There is no discussion whatsoever as to why Hezekiah fell ill. Was it God’s will? Was it an attack by Satan? We keep coming back to the question of the origin of illness, and it remains unresolved.
- I often find myself thinking that this is simply what life on this planet is like; this is what human life has been like ever since the Fall. – Illnesses strike, and some of them are fatal.
- According to the international classification, there are around 14,000 such possible causes, including, for example, death caused by contact with a marine mammal, being struck by aircraft debris, being attacked by a hen or a crocodile, being bitten by a cow, being in a state of weightlessness, and death whilst playing a musical instrument.
- Hezekiah’s illness was serious (it involved some sort of skin ulcers); everyone, including himself, correctly assumed that he would probably not survive it.
- However, God also sends a prophet to confirm his dire prediction to the king. Why?
- The king was very ill, and he had no trouble taking the prophet’s – God’s – words in all seriousness; the king knew that his condition was serious.
3 He said: ‘Oh Lord, just remember how I walked before you faithfully and with all my heart, and I didspeech,, what "I have good in your eyes. And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
- It does not appear to be an act of ‘surge of faith’; one could not say that the king refused to come to terms with the situation. Nothing of the sort – this is clearly Hezekiah’s outpouring of despair, hopelessness and fear of death.
- Hezekiah was certainly alone in his room, lying on his bed; he was feeling terribly ill and his prognosis was hopeless (even in God’s eyes). He turned towards the wall and gave free rein to his despair. He wept; quite possibly he ‘howled’ in despair, crying out to God. Who amongst us is not familiar with such states of mind?
- At the same time, however, he also gave vent to his frustration – he felt betrayed by God: given his attitude throughout his life, he had expected something better from the Almighty. He regarded his death as premature (and unjust) – he certainly had no desire to die contentedly ‘old and full of days’.
- But – are such expectations justified?
- There are Christians who believe that, if they have faith, God guarantees them a long life in perfect health. Was Hezekiah, then, a follower of the faith movement? Members of this movement interpret this story as ‘merely’ a test of Hezekiah’s faith: God was testing him to see whether his faith in good health would remain steadfast no matter what.
- Conversely, opponents of the faith movement see this story as confirmation of their own views: Illness and death may be God’s will, and by defying God’s will and forcing God to grant him a prolongation of life, the king thwarted God’s plan for his life and, in the additional fifteen years, managed to cause further disruption.
- There is some truth in both approaches – firm faith really is important; and even though we are on the right track with God, we must never let our guard down (we can lose our salvation, or at least jeopardise it).
- However, I believe that neither of these extreme approaches is correct: Personally, I think the reason why the Lord sent Isaiah to the king (apparently to confirm the dire prognosis) was that God wanted to change his fate. It was not because He was testing him, nor because God wished for his death, but because He wanted to help him.
- A sincere, desperate prayer from the depths of his heart was exactly what God ‘wanted to hear from Hezekiah’. Perhaps the king’s problem was that his prayers tended to be perfunctory, and God wanted to ‘draw out’ a sincere, heartfelt prayer from him. And He undoubtedly succeeded – this is one of the most beautiful descriptions of a human being’s desperate prayer from the very depths of the heart.
- In his prayer, the king said that he had walked before God faithfully and with all his heart, and had done speech,, what "I have good in God’s eyes. It is not a matter of boasting, nor of legalism, nor of an attitude along the lines of: ‘I will obey you and you will grant me prosperity.’
- Every Christian can say that they walk before God with sincerity. Job and King David knew this (and would not let anyone take it away from them); we, too, can know it. How is this possible? Because it is not a question of perfection, but of sincerity: we cannot guarantee perfection or sinlessness, nor can we guarantee sincerity.
- Similarly, we can maintain that we carried out God’s will (what is good in His eyes) to the best of our ‘knowledge and conscience’ (to the best of our ability to understand it).
4 Then the word of the Lord came to Isaiah:
- [the only place in Isaiah where a construction common in Ezekiel (49 times) and Jeremiah is used; see 1 Samuel 15:10p]
5 Go and tell Hezekiah: ‘This is what the Lord, the God of your father David, says: I have heard your prayer’ . He saw your tears. Behold, I am adding fifteen years to your life.
- apart from its literal meaning (1 Kings 11:12), it is often used in a figurative sense;
6 I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will be a shield for this city.
- It is clear here why the ČSP note accompanying the first verse states that the disease occurred before the Assyrian invasion.
7 This shall be a sign to you from the Lord that the Lord will do the thing he has said:
- I’d almost say I wouldn’t even need a sign; it would be enough for me if I felt better straight away.
- But that was clearly not what God had planned – the king’s recovery was apparently set to take some time yet.
8 Behold, I will cause the shadow on the steps—the steps down which the sun had descended on Ahaz’s sundial—to return ten degrees. And the sun did return ten degrees, the very steps down which it had previously descended.
- It was a momentous sign of truly cosmological significance:
- It was clearly a sundial – by what mechanism could a sundial be turned back? In principle, the Almighty would have to reverse the Earth’s rotation. If He had actually intervened with our planet, stopped it and turned it back, we would all have felt it very keenly (we would have been flung into space by centrifugal force). It would be no problem for God to turn the Earth back unnoticed, but perhaps it was ‘merely’ a light effect or a ‘resetting of the clock’ rather than any manipulation of the planet.
- However, I did once read an essay suggesting that, at a certain point, cosmological calculations do indeed contain ‘excess’. I can’t remember whether it was a serious article.
- I don’t even know whether flat-Earth believers use this ‘anecdote’ to their advantage (after all, it would surely be less of a problem for God to place a great light on the vault of heaven than to manipulate a planet).
9 The account of Hezekiah, King of Judah, concerning his illness and about how has recovered from his illness:
- The king recorded his experience.
10 I said: ‘In the midst of my days, I must go to the gates of the underworld!’ (I'm readythe the rest of his life.
- n.: defender ;
- n.: I’ve worked out the remainder;
- The king was frustrated by his situation. He regarded his death as untimely and unjust.
- He realised that he was ‘in the prime of his life’ and that he was to be ‘ready’the "the rest of his life".
- We all perceive death at a young age as unfair. It need not be so (no one, not even God, has guaranteed us seventy or eighty years), but that is how we perceive it.
- Hezekiah was not in the least bit mentally prepared for death. He was not ‘old and full of days’, as elderly people who have lived full lives may sometimes view their own death. On the contrary, the king longed intensely to live.
11 I said si: Already I shall not see the Lord, the Lord, in the land of the living; I shall no longer see any human being amongst the inhabitants (places separation.)
- What did he miss the most? What did he long for, what did he want to experience next? (cf. Grossmann’s song ‘Závidím’) – that to experience the Lord in the land of the living.
- He would have met God ‘one way or another’, but he definitely wanted to meet Him whilst he was still alive, and not only on the other side.
12 My sojourn has been cut short and is moving away from me like a shepherd’s tent; like a weaver, I have rolled up my life, since it will pull me out of this state, in which I was woven. (Before the day will grow up as night falls,) . You’ll be the end of me.
- var.: you’ll tear it off;
- h.: from day to night;
- h.: you’ll calm me down;
- Two more beautiful and poetic depictions of death. Both convey its irreversibility and untimeliness.
- A picture of life as shepherd’s tent: Our body is our tent, which accompanies us through life. It protects us, watching over us on our journey through life and at our stops along the way. When it is torn down or demolished, our journey comes to an end.
- The image of life as a strip of tcanvasa. God, like a weaver, adds more and more woven rows (days) to our tapestry. But this comes to an end at the moment of death – the weaver decides that this tapestry is now complete and cuts it from the loom.
- Before the day will grow up as night falls,) . You’ll be the end of me:. Hezekiah expected to die that very day. He must have felt that way; he was clearly breathing with his last breath.
13 (I was building before one’s eyes until morning, all) like a lion, it will shatter all my bones. Before the day will grow up as night falls, . You’ll be the end of me.
- $; n. (homonym): I comforted myself until morning. / var.: I called for help until morning.
- h.: You’ll calm me down
- So perhaps: It had been clear to me since the morning that this was the end for me – God would finish me off by evening.
- God will strike me down swiftly and brutally, like a lion sinking its teeth into its prey.
14 Like a rorejs or The crane cries out, I coo like a dove; my eyes have grown dim by looking Up: O Sovereign, I am oppressed; come to my defence!
- [The term ‘h.’ also means to vouch for someone – Ch. is portrayed as a debtor whom H. is to stand up for before the creditor];
- When someone is really unwell, their voice becomes weak. They are unable to speak clearly – they just wheeze or whisper. I’ve experienced this more than once.
- Nevertheless, it remains clear at all times that the king is expecting help from above – from the Lord.
- He regards what is happening to him as an injustice and expects to be defended.
15 What do I have? (to speak? How he told me, soon and so he did.) I shall spend all my years with a bitter heart.
- var.: to speak and tell him to do it?
- Hezekiah is overcome by despair – my lamentations and cries to God are in vain. The misery I am enduring is God’s will. After all, He Himself told me that I would die.
- So it’s all in vain; there’s no helping me. But I’m not content with this, nor have I come to terms with it – bitterness in my soul is all I have left.
16 (Your Majesty, for these things, people they live, and for everything within them "I have the life of my spirit.) Heal me and keep me alive!
- n.: When the Sovereign is above them, then they live, and in all this there is life … ($)
- Goodness, that’s no small thing, and it’s not a bad thing – the ordinary life of an ordinary believer is worth living, and I want that life.
- So I pray, right here and now – don’t let me die just yet.
17 Behold, (Of all things, bitterness was the most bitter to me. You) (You have held my soul back from) the abyss of nothingness, for you have cast all my sins behind your back.
- n.: just as (/ whilst) I was finding peace, the bitterest bitterness came upon me, but you;
- TM: chašaqtá – you clung to, read as: chásaktá; n.: you loved my (/ clung to my) soul and drew me out of;
- h. negation: no;
- Of all the bitterness, this was the most bitter to me: Presumably irony. My mental state couldn’t have been any worse.
- Hezekiah knows full well that the first step towards salvation is the forgiveness of sins.
- And Hezekiah experienced their forgiveness – he describes it beautifully as God casting them behind His back. God takes our sins and casts them behind Him – so they are no longer before His eyes; they are behind Him, they are forgotten. Who would care about the things of the past? We approach God with trembling, bearing a list of our sins. We hand them over to Him and wait in dread to see what He will do with them – whether He will start ‘picking at’ them, dragging them out and dissecting them. ‘And why did you do this?’ ‘And this?’ ‘Surely you could have refrained from that?’ But it happens quite differently – God takes the list and, without much interest, tosses it behind Him. He isn’t interested in it and has no intention of returning to it in the future. It is a remarkable act of generosity and an immensely beautiful experience.
- This is a situation similar to Jesus’ parable about the debtors: That one the slave fell on the floor, he bowed to him and said, ‘Please bear with me, [Sir,] ‘and I’ll pay you back everything!’ (says the debtor, who owes his master billions) And the master took pity on that slave, set him free and forgave his debt.
- Jesus’s generous disregard for lists of our sins is beautifully captured in the short video ‘Dobrometr’. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABOG89gxxfM&t=116s).
- You have rescued my soul from the abyss of nothingness: My soul, my life, was already heading there, falling inexorably, but You caught me as I fell. Anyone who has ever fallen from a great height, facing certain death, can imagine the relief of being caught mid-fall.
18 For the underworld will not praise you, nor will death; those who go down there will not look for your righteousness He pits.
- n.: faithfulness (Heb. emeth);
- It is a matter of gratitude and, at the same time, of ‘bait’ (if one can set bait for God): ‘If you save me, God, there will be no shortage of those who will praise you and who will seek the truth.’
19 Alive, 21 The living will praise you as I do today; fathers will tell their sons of your truth.
- n.: faithfulness (Heb. emeth);
- If you save me and I survive, I’ll be truly grateful to you. And I won’t keep your kindness to myself. I’ll tell my family all about you and your kindness.
20 O Lord, hurry up to save me! And of We shall play in the house of the Lord all the days of our lives be stringed tools.
- If you save me, you’ll have a grateful admirer for life.
- I will also express my gratitude through song and music.
21 Isaiah said: Whether they take a sheet of dried figs and rub it her a boil, and he’ll survive.
- Verses 21 and 22 come after verse 6 in chronological order;
- The question is whether this was a prophetic act – an act of obedience – or simply some practical ‘old wives’ advice (figs work a treat for this sort of ulcer). It could well have been a combination of both.
- So there was no miraculous, instantaneous recovery, but rather a turning point in the course of the illness – the ulcers (on his legs? on his shins? somewhere else? The diagnosis must have been catastrophic, given that everyone considered his condition hopeless; perhaps it involved blood poisoning or something similar) stopped getting worse from that moment on and began to heal. The recovery process may well have taken a long time.
- Situations like this are common – some patients show no tendency towards improvement: no matter what the doctors or the patient themselves do, nothing works; things simply get worse. Conversely, when there is a tendency towards recovery, things improve and the treatment need not be anything extraordinary. It is enough simply that people do not stand in the way of this tendency towards recovery.
- To put it another way: if God does not will it, the doctors can work themselves to the bone and it will be to no avail. And conversely – if God wills it, things will improve even ‘in spite of’ medical care.
- If this were an act of obedience, the application of dried figs would have been a prophetic act of obedience (such as Naaman’s washing in the Jordan, or the blind man rubbing mud on his eyes, and so on). However, as we have mentioned, the dried figs may well have contained some substance that helped.
22 And Hezekiah said, ‘What 1 "Sing, O barren one, who did not bear; break forth into singing and cry aloud, you who have not been in labor! For the children of the desolate one will be more than the children of her who is married," says the LORD. a sign that I am about to enter He The House of the Lord?
- We already know that: it was a matter of adjusting the sundial.