2 Kings 19:3

Isaiah Assures Deliverance

1 And ^aso it was, when King Hezekiah heard it, that he tore his clothes, covered himself with ^bsackcloth, and went into the house of the Lord.

2 Then he sent Eliakim, who was over the household, Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

3 And they said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah: ‘This day is a day of trouble, and rebuke, and blasphemy; for the children have come to birth, but there is no strength to¹ bring them forth.

4 ^aIt may be that the Lord your God will hear all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to ^breproach the living God, and will ^crebuke the words which the Lord your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.’ ”

5 So the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah.

Commentaries:

Adam Clarke

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2 Kings 19:3

The children are come to the birth - The Jewish state is here represented under the emblem of a woman in travail, who has been so long in the pangs of parturition, that her strength is now entirely exhausted, and her deliverance is hopeless, without a miracle. The image is very fine and highly appropriate.

A similar image is employed by Homer, when he represents the agonies which Agamemnon suffers from his wound: -

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̔ ' ̔,

' ̔ ͅ ,

, ̈́

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Il. xi., ver. 266.

This, while yet warm, distill' d the purple flood;

But when the wound grew stiff with clotted blood,

Then grinding tortures his strong bosom rend.

Less keen those darts the fierce Ilythiae send,

The powers that cause the teeming matron' s throes,

Sad mothers of unutterable woes.

Pope

Better translated by Macpherson; but in neither well:

\ri720 "So long as from the gaping wound gushed forth, in its warmth, the blood; but when the wound became dry, when ceased the blood to flow amain, sharp pains pervade the strength of Atrides. Racking pangs glide through his frame; as when the Ilythiae, who preside over births, the daughters of white armed Juno, fierce dealers of bitter pains, throw all their darts on hapless women, that travail with child. Such pains pervade the strength of Atrides."

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