2 Kings 19:6

And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the LORD, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(6) The servants.—Or, attendants. The word is rather more special in sense than servant, denoting Apparently personal attendant. Delitzsch renders “squires.”. (Comp. 2Kings 4:12; 2Kings 5:20; 2Kings 8:4; Exodus 33:11; Judges 7:10; 2Samuel 9:9; 1Kings 20:15.)

Blasphemed.—Not the same root as in 2Kings 19:3. (Psalm 44:16; Isaiah 51:7; Numbers 15:30.)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

19:1-7 Hezekiah discovered deep concern at the dishonour done to God by Rabshakeh's blasphemy. Those who speak from God to us, we should in a particular manner desire to speak to God for us. The great Prophet is the great Intercessor. Those are likely to prevail with God, who lift up their hearts in prayer. Man's extremity is God's opportunity. While his servants can speak nothing but terror to the profane, the proud, and the hypocritical, they have comfortable words for the discouraged believer.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Will hear - i. e., "will show that he has heard - will notice and punish."

The living God - See 1 Samuel 17:26 note.

And will reprove the words - Rather, "will reprove him for the words."

The remnant - i. e., for the kingdom of Judah, the only remnant of God's people that was now left, after Galilee and Gilead and Samaria had all been carried away captive.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2Ki 19:6, 7. Comforted by Isaiah.

6. Isaiah said … Be not afraid—The prophet's answer was most cheering, as it held out the prospect of a speedy deliverance from the invader. The blast, the rumor, the fall by the sword, contained a brief prediction that was soon fulfilled in all the three particulars—namely, the alarm that hastened his retreat, the destruction that overtook his army, and the violent death that suddenly ended his career.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

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 Rauwolff (t) 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.

(t) Travels, par. 3. ch. 22. p. 317.

Geneva Study Bible

And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the LORD, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. Be not afraid of the words which [R.V. that] thou hast heard, with which [R.V. wherewith] &c.] These slight changes make the rendering like that in Isaiah, where the Hebrew corresponds exactly.

God’s prophet sets down the threats and insults of Rab-shakeh as ‘words’ and no more. That there is a degree of contempt in the whole sentence is shewn in the words for ‘servants’ which is not the same as that so rendered in verse 6, but may be rendered ‘young men’ (the LXX has παιδάρια), not that Rab-shakeh and his comrades were young, but the words of Isaiah estimate their boasts and threatenings as ‘young men’s words’.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - And Isaiah said unto them, Thus shall ye say to your master. Isaiah seems to have been ready with a reply. The news of the words spoken by Rabshakeh had probably flown through the city, and reached him, and he had already laid the matter before God, and received God's instructions concerning it. He was therefore able to return an answer at once. Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard, with which the servants - rather, lackeys; the term used is not the common one for "servants," viz. עַבְדֵי, but a contemptuous one, נַעֲרֵי, "foot-boys," or "lackeys" - of the King of Assyria have blasphemed me. 2 Kings 19:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Isaiah replied with this comforting promise: Hezekiah was not to be afraid of the blasphemous words of the Assyrian king; the Lord would frighten him with a report, so that he would return to his own land, and there would He cause him to fall by the sword. מלך א נערי, the servants or young men of the Assyrian king, is a derogatory epithet applied to the officials of Assyria. "Behold, I put a spirit into him, so that he shall hear a report and return into his own land." שׁמוּעה does not refer to the report of the destruction of his army (2 Kings 19:35), as Thenius supposes, for Sennacherib did not hear of this through the medium of an army, but was with the army himself at the time when it was smitten by the angel of the Lord; it refers to the report mentioned in 2 Kings 19:9. For even if he made one last attempt to secure the surrender of Jerusalem immediately upon hearing this report, yet after the failure of this attempt to shake the firmness of Hezekiah his courage must have failed him, and the thought of return must have suggested itself, so that this was only accelerated by the blow which fell upon the army. For, as O. v. Gerlach has correctly observed, "the destruction of the army would hardly have produced any decisive effect without the approach of Tirhakah, since the great power of the Assyrian king, especially in relation to the small kingdom of Judah, was not broken thereby. But at the prayer of the king the Lord added this miracle to the other, which His providence had already brought to pass. - For the fulfilment of the prophecy of Sennacherib's death, see 2 Kings 19:37.