Hezekiah's Illness and Recovery

1In those days was Hezekiah sick to death. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him, and said to him, Thus said the LORD, Set your house in order: for you shall die, and not live. 2Then Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the LORD, 3And said, Remember now, O LORD, I beseech you, how I have walked before you in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in your sight. And Hezekiah wept sore.

4Then came the word of the LORD to Isaiah, saying, 5Go, and say to Hezekiah, Thus said the LORD, the God of David your father, I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears: behold, I will add to your days fifteen years. 6And I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria: and I will defend this city.

7And this shall be a sign to you from the LORD, that the LORD will do this thing that he has spoken; 8Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, which is gone down in the sun dial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward. So the sun returned ten degrees, by which degrees it was gone down.

Hezekiah's Song of Thanksgiving

9The writing of Hezekiah king of Judah, when he had been sick, and was recovered of his sickness:

10I said in the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave: I am deprived of the residue of my years.

11I said, I shall not see the LORD, even the LORD, in the land of the living: I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world.

12My age is departed, and is removed from me as a shepherd's tent: I have cut off like a weaver my life: he will cut me off with pining sickness: from day even to night will you make an end of me.

13I reckoned till morning, that, as a lion, so will he break all my bones: from day even to night will you make an end of me.

14Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter: I did mourn as a dove: my eyes fail with looking upward: O LORD, I am oppressed; undertake for me.

15What shall I say? he has both spoken to me, and himself has done it: I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

16O LORD, by these things men live, and in all these things is the life of my spirit: so will you recover me, and make me to live.

17Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but you have in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption: for you have cast all my sins behind your back.

18For the grave cannot praise you, death can not celebrate you: they that go down into the pit cannot hope for your truth.

19The living, the living, he shall praise you, as I do this day: the father to the children shall make known your truth.

20The LORD was ready to save me: therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our life in the house of the LORD.

21For Isaiah had said, Let them take a lump of figs, and lay it for a plaster on the boil, and he shall recover. 22Hezekiah also had said, What is the sign that I shall go up to the house of the LORD?