from Lachish against Jerusalem, to summon the city to surrender. The fortification of Jerusalem which the Chronicle records began before these negotiations, and was continued while they were in progress.
Verse 9
2Ch 32:9The advance of an Assyrian army against Jerusalem, and the attempts of Sennacherib's generals to induce the population of the capital to submit by persuasive and threatening speeches, are very breifly narrated, in comparison with 2 Kings 18:17-36. In 2Ch 32:9, neither the names of the Assyrian generals, nor the names of Hezekiah's ambassadors with whom they treated, are given; nor is the place where the negotiation was carried on mentioned. עבדיו, his servants, Sennacherib's generals. על־לך, while he himself lay near (or against) Lachish, and all the army of his kingdom with him. ממשׁלתּו, his dominion, i.e., army of his kingdom; cf. Jer 34:1.
Verses 10-12
Only the main ideas contained in the speech of these generals are reported; in 2Ch 32:10-12 we have the attempt to shake the trust of the people in Hezekiah and in God (2Ki 18:19-22). וישׁבים is a continuation of the question, In what do ye trust, and why sit ye in the distress, in Jerusalem? מסּית as in 2Ki 18:32 : Hezekiah seduces you, to give you over to death by hunger and thirst. This thought is much more coarsely expressed in 2Ki 18:27. - On 2Ch 32:12, cf. 2Ki 18:22 : אחד מזבּח is the one altar of burnt-offering in the temple.
Verses 13-19
The description of Sennacherib's all-conquering power: cf. 2Ki 18:35; Isa 36:20, and Isa 37:11-13. “Who is there among all the gods of these peoples, whom my fathers utterly destroyed, who could have delivered his people out of my hand, that your God should save you?” The idea is, that since the gods of the other peoples, which were mightier than your God, have not been able to save their peoples, how should your God be in a position to rescue you from my power? This idea is again repeated in 2Ch 32:15, as a foundation for the exhortation not to let themselves be deceived and misled by Hezekiah, and not to believe his words, and that in an assertative form: “for not one god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his people, ... much less then (כּי אף) your gods: they will not save you;” and this is done in order to emphasize strongly the blasphemy of the Assyrian generals against the Almighty God of Israel. To communicate more of these blasphemous speeches would in the chronicler's view be useless, and he therefore
