And Rabshakeh said unto them, Speak ye now to Hezekiah, Thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria, What confidence is this wherein thou trustest?
Rab-shakeh said. It appears from 2 Kings 18:26; 2 Kings 18:28 that this man spoke in the Hebrew tongue, whence, as well as from the tenor of some remarks that he made, several eminent writers have supposed that he was a renegade Jew, an apostate captive of Israel. The insolent tone he assumed appears surprising. But this boasting, both as to matter and manner, his highly coloured picture of his master's powers, and the impossibility of Hezekiah making any effective resistance, heightened by all the arguments and figures which an Oriental imagination could suggest, has been paralleled in all, except the blasphemy, by other messages of defiance sent on similar occasions in the history of the East.
Thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria. This title (cf. Isaiah 36:4; also Josephus, 'Antiquities,' b. 10:, ch.
i., sec. 2; Rawlinson's 'Ancient Monarchies,' 2:, p. 328) was given to the king of Assyria not only from the vast extent of his empire, but because he was king of princes or viceroys (Isaiah 10:8; Hosea 8:10), and king of kings (Ezekiel 26:8; Daniel 2:37). "The king of Assyria" х 'Ashuwr (H804)]. Assyria proper was bounded on the north by Armenia, the Gordiaean mountains, and especially by mount Niphates; on the south by Persia; on the east by Media, particularly mount Choatres and Zagros; and on the west by Mesopotamia and the river Tigris. It corresponded nearly to the modern Koordistan. But the Assyrian empire was vastly more extensive; and though its limits varied at different periods, it may be described as embracing all the nations and countries between the Mediterranean on the west and the Indus on the east-between the steppes of Scythia on the north and the Indian Ocean on the south. [The Septuagint has here: Basileus Assurioon, king of the Assyrians; Herodotus styles him, Sanacheribos basileus Arabioon te kai Assurioon, referring to the extensive range of the Assyrian power.]
What confidence is this wherein thou trustest? х Mah (H4100)] - What, used to express contempt (cf. 1 Kings 9:13), 'What is this confidence?' i:e., the ground of confidence, referring tauntingly to the fortifications Hezekiah had erected round Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 32:6), and to his expectations of aid from Egypt (cf. Isaiah 30:7).