2 Kings 18:17 - Exposition

And the King of Assyria sent Tartan and Rabsaris and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King Hezekiah with a great host against Jerusalem. Sennacherib appears, by his great inscription, to have returned to Nineveh, with his Judaean captives (more than two hundred thousand in number) and his rich booty, towards the close of the year B.C. 701. In the following year he was called into Babylonia, where troubles had broken out, and Hezekiah, left to himself, seems to have made up his mind to revolt, and to have called in the assistance of Egypt ( Isaiah 30:4 ; 2 Kings 18:21 ). Sabatok was probably the nominal sovereign, but Tirhakah, who held his court at Meres, was lord paramount. An alliance was made; and hopes held out that, if Sennacherib again marched into Judaea, Hezekiah would receive effectual aid, especially in chariots and horsemen ( 2 Kings 18:24 ). Under these circumstances, Sennacherib made his second expedition, probably in B.C. 699. Regarding Egypt as his main enemy, and Judaea as of small account, he led his army by the ordinary route into the Philistian plain, pressing southward, while he detached a moderato force to hold Jerusalem in check, to threaten it, and, if an opportunity offered, to seize it. At the head of this force were three commanders, who seem to have borne, all of them, official titles; viz. the Tartan, or "commander-in-chief;" the Rabsaris, or "chief eunuch;" and the Rabshakeh, or "chief cupbearer." The Tartan was the highest of all the officials of the empire, and ranked next to the king. Sennacherib detached this force from Lachish, which seems to have revolted, and to have been undergoing a second siege. And when they were come up, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool. It was, perhaps, this army which Isaiah saw in vision, advancing on Jerusalem from the pass of Michmash ( Isaiah 10:28-32 ), and "shaking its hand" at the city from the northern plateau outside the walls—the traditional "camp of the Assyrians." At any rate, the "upper pool" and the" fuller's field" were in this direction (see the comment on Isaiah 7:3 ). Which is in the highway of the fuller's field.