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Isaiah describes the Assyrian king commanded by Israel's God to attack Israel, similar to Assyrian traditions where the king Sennacherib describes himself as commanded by the gods to conquer several nations surrounding Assyria.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
The Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib
Ancient Near East
In which since time immemorial earlier kings, my ancestors, before me exercised dominion over Assyria and ruled the subjects of the land, and wherein annually, without interruption, they received an income unsurpassed in amount, the tribute of rulers of the four quarters of the world, but not one among them had paid heed to or shown interest in the palace inside it, the seat of lordly dwelling whose site had become too small, nor had anyone of them conceived of and put his mind toward the straightening of the city’s streets and the widening of its squares, the dredging of the river, and the planting of orchards. But as for me, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, the performing of this work came to my attention by the will of the gods and I put my mind to it. I forcibly removed the people of Chaldea, Aramean tribes, the Manneans, and the lands Que and Hilakku, who had not submitted to my yoke, then I made them carry baskets of earth and they made bricks. I cut down canebrakes in Chaldea and I had their splendid reeds hauled to Nineveh for the palace’s construction by enemy soldiers whom I had defeated.
Date: 704 B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Isaiah 36:10
Hebrew Bible
8 Now make a deal with my master the king of Assyria, and I will give you 2,000 horses, provided you can find enough riders for them. 9 Certainly you will not refuse one of my master’s minor officials and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen. 10 Furthermore it was by the command of the Lord that I marched up against this land to destroy it. The Lord told me, ‘March up against this land and destroy it!’”’” 11 Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah said to the chief adviser, “Speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it. Don’t speak with us in the Judahite dialect in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.”
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Notes and References
"... The two episodes report the gods’ reply to the kings’ supplication. Because of the different nature of the divine messages, the literary styles are substantially different, but let us point out some important similarities. In order to underline the importance of the divine support, both narratives reported the content of divine messages in direct speeches. Moreover, both divinities replied through a legitimate diviner. Ashurbanipal received the confirming answer through a dream interpreter and Hezekiah through a prophet. As the insulting messages were sent to the kings repeatedly, both kings also received the messages of divine support and assurance multiple times. Hezekiah received several oracles from Isaiah ... there are also some basic similarities in the contents of the divine messages. The gods exhorted the two kings, “Don’t be afraid!” (Isaiah 37:6; RINAP 5 3 v 46). The divine messages assured the kings that the divinities would protect the king and fight for him, foretelling the fall of the enemy. Such divine support became the basis for the punishment of the arrogant enemies ..."
Dubovský, Peter
"Inverting Assyrian Propaganda in Isaiah’s Historiography: Writing the Hezekiah–Sennacherib Conflict in the Light of the Ashurbanipal–Teumman War" in Stromberg, Jacob and J. Todd Hibbard (eds.) The History of Isaiah: The Formation of the Book and Its Presentation of the Past
(pp. 365-405) Mohr Siebeck, 2021
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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