And it came to pass, as he was worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god, that Adrammelech and Sharezer his sons smote him with the sword; and they escaped into the land of Armenia: and Esarhaddon his son reigned in his stead.
Nisroch - Nisr, in Semitic, means eagle, the termination och, means great. The eagle-headed human figure in Assyrian sculptures is no doubt Nisroch, the same as Asshur, the chief Assyrian god, the corresponding goddess was Asheera, or Astarte: this means a 'grove,' or sacred tree, often found as the symbol of the heavenly hosts ( tsaabaa' (H6635)) in the sculptures, as Asshur, the Eponymus hero of Assyria (Genesis 10:11), answered to the sun, or Baal, Belus, the title of office, Lord. This explains "image of the grove" (2 Kings 21:7). The eagle was worshipped by the ancient Persians and Arabs. Moses of Chorene confirms the Scripture statement, that the two brother Sharezer and Ardumazanes (as he names him, instead of Adrammelech) fled to Armenia after assassinating Sennacherib, and adds, that their descendants afterward populated that part of the country (G. Rawlinson). The cuneiform inscriptions represent Armenia as an independent state generally hostile to Assyria; a confirmation of Isaiah's statement.
Esar-haddon. In Ezra 4:2 he is mentioned as having brought colonists into Samaria. He is also thought to have been the king who carried Manasseh captive to Babylon (2 Chronicles 33:11). He built the palace called the southwest palace of Nimroud, He boasts of his Nineveh palace in the inscriptions, that it was 'a building, such as the kings, his fathers, who went before him, had never made,' and that his temples, no fewer than 30, were 'shining with silver and gold.' He is the only Assyrian king who reigned in Babylon-13 years there, according to the canon of Ptolemy. The Nimroud southwestern palace was destroyed by fire, but his name and wars are recorded on the great bulls taken from the building. He obtained his building materials from the northwest palaces of ancient dynasty, ending in Pul.
Remarks: "The house of the Lord" is the resort of the saint in his "day of trouble." There, in communion with God and with his fellow- saints, he gets a glimpse of the purpose of God's afflictive dealings with him and with the Church. The intercessions of the righteous and of the ministers of God are another instrumentality for averting dangers which threaten to overwhelm us: and as Hezekiah applied to Isaiah, so we do well, when the enemy has already advanced far in his course, to enlist our pastors and fellow-believers in a concert of prayer "for the remnant that is left." If our cause be identified with God's cause, His honour is at stake to deliver us from the blasphemous enemy; and we can plead this in prayer, with the confident assurance of being delivered. The Lord can in a moment "send a blast upon" the foe, which shall utterly set aside his schemes of injury to the Lord's people.