2 Kings 18:26-27

18:26 Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebna, and Joah said to the chief adviser, “Speak to your servants in Aramaic, 1  for we understand it. Don’t speak with us in the Judahite dialect 2  in the hearing of the people who are on the wall.” 18:27 But the chief adviser said to them, “My master did not send me to speak these words only to your master and to you. 3  His message is also for the men who sit on the wall, for they will eat their own excrement and drink their own urine along with you.” 4 

2 Kings 19:4

19:4 Perhaps the Lord your God will hear all these things the chief adviser has spoken on behalf of his master, the king of Assyria, who sent him to taunt the living God. 5  When the Lord your God hears, perhaps he will punish him for the things he has said. 6  So pray for this remnant that remains.’” 7 

1 sn Aramaic was the diplomatic language of the empire.

2 tn Or “Hebrew.”

3 tn Heb “To your master and to you did my master send me to speak these words?” The rhetorical question expects a negative answer.

4 tn Heb “[Is it] not [also] to the men…?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Yes, it is.”

sn The chief adviser alludes to the horrible reality of siege warfare, when the starving people in the besieged city would resort to eating and drinking anything to stay alive.

5 tn Heb “all the words of the chief adviser whom his master, the king of Assyria, sent to taunt the living God.”

6 tn Heb “and rebuke the words which the Lord your God hears.”

7 tn Heb “and lift up a prayer on behalf of the remnant that is found.”