Chizkiyahu's Monarchy in Jerusalem (V)
Jerusalem in the
Bible
Yeshivat Har Etzion
Shiur #22:
CHIZKIYAHU'S MONARCHY IN JERUSALEM (III)
THE CHARACTER
OF CHIZKIYAHU (II)
Rav Yitzchak
Levi
In the previous shiur we dealt with the similarity between the
works of Chizkiyahu and the actions of David and Shelomo, and with the
relationship between Chizkiyahu and the prophet Yishayahu. In this shiur
we will further discuss the personality of Chizkiyahu and Chazal's
attitude toward him. In conclusion we will attempt to clarify why it was
precisely in the days of Chizkiyahu that calamity arrived.
I. OVERALL ASSESSMENT OF CHIZKIYAHU'S PERSONALITY
1. The
positive elements in CHizkiyahu's works
Chizkiyahu begins his reign on a
very positive footing: He rededicates the house of God and abolishes idol
worship; he observes Pesach together with the survivors of the Kingdom of
Israel; and he establishes a project of committing the Torah and wisdom
literature to writing.
Removal of the bamot and
abolition of idol worship clearly played an important role in the book of
Melakhim's very positive assessment of
Chizkiyahu:
And he did that which was right in
the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his father did. He removed
the high places, and broke the pillars, and cut down the asheira, and
broke in pieces the brazen serpent that Moshe had made. For until that time the
children of Israel did burn incense to it; and he called it Nechustan. He
trusted in the Lord God of Israel; so that after him was none like him among all
the kings of Yehuda, nor among those that were before him. For he held fast to
the Lord, and departed not from following him, but kept his commandments, which
the Lord commanded Moshe. And the Lord was with him; and he prospered wherever
he went out. (II Melakhim 18:3-7)
This is not surprising in light of the book of Melakhim's fixed practice of judging the kings on the issue of the bamot. Scripture describes the works of a particular king, and then adds: "Nevertheless, the high places were not taken away; for the people still offered and burnt incense in the high places" (see, for example, what is stated about Yehoshafat [I Melakhim 22:44], Amatzyahu [II Melakhim 14:4], and Uziyahu [ibid. 15:4]). From the time of Shelomo and until the days of Chizkiyahu, the kings allowed the bamot that were used in the worship of God to stand, and failed to enforce the prohibition of such service which took effect with the establishment of the Mikdash. Chizkiyahu is the first king[1] to initiate the removal of the bamot throughout Yehuda, an operation that apparently required considerable royal effort and much resolve in light of the importance that the people attached to such worship.[2]
The verses that we cited above note four ritual elements that Chizkiyahu
destroyed: removing the bamot, breaking the pillars, cutting down the
asheira, and breaking in pieces the brazen serpent that had been
fashioned by Moshe. Regarding the brazen serpent, Chazal
said:
When Israel sinned, He sent against
them venomous serpents. When they shouted at Moshe, the Holy One, blessed be He,
said to him: "Make you a venomous serpent
And Moshe made a serpent of brass
"
(Bamidbar 21:8-9). And thus stood the brazen serpent. Whenever a person
was bitten, he would look at it and be healed. Until Chizkiyahu stood up and saw
that Israel was straying after it. He said: Now, anyone in need of heeling goes
to it and forsakes the Holy One, blessed be He. He removed it, as it says: "And
he broke in pieces the brazen serpent" (II Melakhim 18:4). The people
began to say: What are you doing? That which Moshe established, you destroy? He
said to them: Whoever is in need of healing should look towards the Holy One,
blessed be He, and be healed. As it says: "They looked to him, and are radiant:
and their faces shall not be ashamed" (Tehillim 34:6). And so it says:
"He trusted in the Lord God of Israel; so that after him there was none like
him" (II Melakhim 18:5). (Aggadat Bereishit,
11)
The brazen serpent which was intended, as in the words of the famous
Mishna (Rosh Ha-shana 3:8), to cause Israel to subjugate their
hearts to their Father in heaven turned into an object of worship in its own
right. Chizkiyahu decided, therefore, to break it into pieces, courageously
standing up to the argument: "That which Moshe established, you
destroy?"
As with respect to the bamot, he was also the first to destroy the
brazen serpent. Chazal said as follows:
Is it possible that Asa came and did
not destroy it, [or] that Yehoshafat came and did not destroy it? Surely Asa and
Yehoshafat destroyed all the idol worship in the world? Rather, [Chizkiyahu's]
predecessors left room for him to distinguish himself. (Chullin
6b-7a)
Another context in which Chizkiyahu's devotion to God is evident is his
prayers. In several places we find Chizkiyahu engaged in
prayer:
·
Already at the
beginning of his reign it is related that he prayed for the pardon of the people
who ate of the Korban Pesach "otherwise than it was written" (II
Divrei Ha-yamim 30:18).
·
In the wake of the
words of Ravshake and the emissaries of Sancheriv, Chizkiyahu offers a prayer in
the house of God, in which he emphasizes God's sovereignty over the entire world
and beseeches for deliverance, so that "all the kingdoms of the earth may know
that You are the Lord God, even You only" (see II Melakhim
19:15-19).
·
During his illness,
Chizkiyahu prays to God, "I beseech You, O Lord, remember now how I have walked
before You in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good
in Your sight," and he weeps bitterly (II Melakhim
20:2-3).
·
When he recovers from
his illness, Chizkiyahu writes an emotional prayer, "the writing of Chizkiyahu
king of Yehuda," which ends with the words: "The Lord was ready to save me:
therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our
life in the house of the Lord" (Yishayahu 38:9-20).
We see then that prayer constitutes
an important component of Chizkiyahu's worship of God, and this testifies to his
strong connection to Him.
In conclusion, let us note another
positive characteristic of Chizkiyahu his attitude toward the prophet.
In the previous shiur we expanded on the relationship between Chizkiyahu
and Yishayahu and noted its complexities and twists. Nevertheless, it should not
be forgotten that Chizkiyahu appears to have been closely connected to the
prophet even before he ascended to the throne, and this greatly impacted on his
actions at the beginning of his reign. While it is true that later he turned to
the prophet of his own initiative on only one occasion, he seems to have related
seriously to what he said and greatly respected him. (It stands to reason that
Shevna's removal was a direct result of Yishayahu's
prophecy.)
2.
THe Negative elements in Chizkiyahu's
works
In the previous lessons, we dealt at
length and in great detail with various problematic aspects of Chizkiyahu's
work: the rebellion against Assyria and the alliance with Egypt; his submitting
to the King of Assyria when he invaded Yehuda, cutting off the doors to the
house of God and using its treasures to pay the tribute; his arrogance; his
attitude toward the Babylonian delegation; and the spiritual, social and moral
state of Jerusalem. In addition to the severe ramifications that it had for his
relationship with God, Chizkiyahu's decision to invest himself in a military
alliance placed a heavy burden on the people and allowed various officers,
Shevna among them, to act in a most corrupt manner and sink Jerusalem almost to
the level of Sodom. Thus, the king failed in his mission to establish the
kingdom on justice and judgment. The common denominator of all these problems is
the king's viewing his kingdom as an independent entity, in which the king acts
in accordance with his own outlook, without regard for the prophet or for the
word of God on his lips, and only expresses his connection to God and the
prophet in times of crisis, when he has no practical solution of his own. The
issue of the connection between king of flesh and blood and the King, King of
kings, stands out prominently throughout the period of Chizkiyahu's reign (here
too there is a similarity between Chizkiyahu and Shelomo).
II.
Chazal's
understanding of Chizkiyahu
Chazal relate in various places to Chizkiyahu's
personality and actions. We shall cite here only two such discussions that deal
with seven of Chizkiyahu's actions, some of which are mentioned in Scripture,
and some of which were known to Chazal by tradition. Thus we learn in
Tractate Pesachim:
King Chizkiyahu did six things:
concerning three of them [the Sages] agreed with him, and concerning three of
them, they did not agree with him.
He dragged his father's bones on a
litter of ropes, and they agreed with him; he broke in pieces the brazen
serpent, and they agreed with him; he concealed the book of remedies, and they
agreed with him.
Concerning three things, they did
not agree with him: he cut off the doors of the sanctuary and sent them to the
King of Assyria, and they did not agree with him; he stopped up the upper
watercourse of the Gichon, and they did not agree with him; he proclaimed a leap
year in Nissan, and they did not agree with him. (Pesachim
4:9)
A different formulation is found in Avot de-Rabbi
Natan:
Yechizkiyahu, King of Yehuda, did
four things, and his opinion turned out to be in agreement with that of God: He
concealed the book of remedies, and his opinion turned out to be in agreement
with that of God; he broke into pieces the brazen serpent, and his opinion
turned out to be in agreement with that of God, as it is stated: "For until that
time the children of Israel did burn incense to it; and he called it Nechushtan"
(II Melakhim 18:4); he removed the bamot and the altars, and his
opinion turned out to be in agreement with that of God, as it is stated: "Has
not Yechizkiyahu taken away his high places and his altars, and commanded Yehuda
and Jerusalem, saying, You shall worship before one altar, and burn incense upon
it?" (II Divrei Ha-yamim 32:12); he stopped up the watercourse of the
Gichon, and his opinion turned out to be in agreement with that of God, as it is
stated: "The same Yechizkiyahu also stopped up the upper watercourse of Gichon,
and brought it straight down to the west side of the City of David. And
Yechizkiyahu prospered in all his works" (ibid. v. 30). (Avot de-Rabbi
Natan 2:4)
In addition to the difference between the formulation "they [the Sages]
agreed with him" and the formulation "his opinion turned out to be in agreement
with that of God," the two sources differ on a number of points: The
Mishna in Pesachim mentions six of Chizkiyahu's actions, whereas Avot
de-Rabbi Natan lists only four, one of which was not mentioned in
Pesachim (the removal of the bamot and the altars); in
Pesachim there is both criticism and praise, whereas in Avot de-Rabbi
Natan, there is only praise; and the two sources differ in their respective
assessments of Chizkiyahu's stopping up of the Gichon
watercourse.
Let us examine in detail each of the seven actions mentioned in these two
sources.
1.
He dragged his father's bones on a litter
of ropes
This incident is mentioned only in
the Mishna in Pesachim, and not in Avot de-Rabbi Natan. We
already (in shiur no. 17) discussed the significance of this act as a
negation of the kingdom of Achaz with all its evils: idol worship, worship of
the Molekh, sealing of the Torah, and denial of prophecy. As Rashi
explains:
He dragged his father's bones for
atonement, and [therefore] he did not provide him with an honorable burial on a
handsome bier, and in order to sanctify God's name, that [Achaz] be disgraced
for his wickedness and the wicked be reprimanded. (Rashi, Pesachim
56a)
2.
He cut into pieces the brazen
serpent
The destruction of the brazen
serpent is mentioned favorably both in the Mishna in Pesachim and in
Avot de-Rabbi Natan, and we have already discussed the issue
above.
3. HE CONCEALED THE BOOK OF REMEDIES
This too is mentioned in the two
sources, and also in the Gemara in Berakhot:
"Remember now how I have walked
before You in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good
in Your sight" (Yishayahu 38:3). What is, "And have done that which is
good in Your sight"?
Rabbi Levi said: He concealed the book of remedies.
(Berakhot 10b)
We find two understandings of the incident involving the book of
remedies. According to one understanding, the reference is to a book explaining
the healing qualities of medicinal herbs which Chizkiyahu concealed so that
people would turn to God and put their trust in him rather than in the book
(see Rashi, ad loc., and in Pesachim 56a; Maharal, Netzach
Yisrael, chap. 30). According to a second understanding, it is forbidden to
conceal a medical text based on natural remedies, and Chizkiyahu concealed a
book containing remedies based on astrology or other forbidden practices after
people had begun to make practical use of the text (see Rambam's commentary to
the Mishna, Pesachim, ad loc.).
The common denominator between the destruction of the brazen serpent and
the concealment of the book of remedies is that the aim of both was to lead to
direct trust in God, unmediated by external elements to which independent power,
removed from God, could erroneously be attributed.
4.
He removed the Bamot and
altars
As stated above, this accomplishment
is mentioned only in Avot de-Rabbi Natan, and we already discussed its
novel and far-reaching significance. Here too Chizkiyahu strengthened the
people's faith and trust in God.
5. HE STOPPED UP THE GICHON WATERCOURSE
On this matter, we must reconcile the contradiction between the Mishna in
Pesachim, according to which the Sages did not approve of Chizkiyahu's
action, and the Baraita in Avot de-Rabbi Natan, according to which here
too Chizkiyahu's opinion turned out to be in agreement with that of
God.
It is possible that the Mishna in
Pesachim views this action, which was intended to withhold water from the
soldiers of the Assyrian army should they lay siege on Jerusalem, as an
expression of lack of confidence in the words of the prophet, "For I will defend
this city, to save it, for My own sake, and for My servant David's sake" (II
Melakhim 19:34);[3][3] according to this understanding, had the
king trusted in God, he would not have had to adopt military actions of this
sort. The Baraita in Avot de-Rabbi Natan, in contrast, maintains that
Chizkiyahu acted appropriately, for the adoption of practical defensive measures
does not contradict trust in God.
Another way to resolve the
difficulty is by distinguishing between the time-frame being addressed by each
of the two sources: Avot de-Rabbi Natan relates to an early stage of the
campaign, even before the alliance with Egypt had been established, whereas the
Mishna in Pesachim relates to the situation following the establishment
of that alliance, when that action clearly reflected a lack of trust in God
which found expression in reliance on a foreign power.
6.
Cutting off the
doors of the sanctuary and sending them to the king of
assyria
The severity of the act is clear: in
his search for funds with which to pay the enormous levy cast upon him by the
King of Assyria after the conquest of Yehuda, Chizkiyahu cuts off the doors of
the Temple and the pilasters which he himself had overlaid with gold (II
Melakhim 18:13-16).
Overlaying the doors of the
sanctuary and the pilasters was a great repair for the actions of Achaz. Sending
the silver and gold from the Temple to the King of Assyria (ibid. 16:8) and
later cutting the Temple vessels and making changes in the structure of the
Temple, and in the end closing it "because of the King of Assyria" (ibid. 17-18;
II Divrei Ha-yamim 28:21, 24) (while it does not state explicitly that
Achaz cut off the doors of the sanctuary, this is implied by the fact that
Chizkiyahu had to plate them). But now Chizkiyahu resembles his father Achaz,
and he goes back on his original plan repairing and rededicating the
Temple.
Moreover, this action symbolically
represents a more general problem in Chizkiyahu's reign, which we already noted
both with respect to the relationship between the beginning of Chizkiyahu's
reign and his later reign, and with respect to the relationship between his
kingdom and the kingdom of God in general. Cutting off the doors of the Temple
means using part of the structure of God's house in order to subjugate himself
to the King of Assyria and pay him tribute: Chizkiyahu, as it were, mortgaged
the place of God's reign to the King of Assyria in order to allow himself to
continue to rule.
7.
He proclaimed a leap
year in Nissan
After having cleansed the Temple of
impurity and idol worship at the beginning of his reign, Chizkiyahu decides, out
of a desire to allow the Kingdom of Israel to participate in the renewal of the
covenant with God, to push Pesach off. Scripture provides two rationales
for the postponement (the numbering is mine; Y.L.):
For the king had taken counsel, and
his princes, and all the congregation of Jerusalem, to keep Pesach in the
second month. For they could not keep it in its time, (1) because the priests
had not sanctified themselves sufficiently, (2) nor had the people gathered
themselves together to Jerusalem. (II Divrei Ha-yamim
30:2-3)
Chizkiyahu's efforts yielded fruits, and a great multitude of people
assembled in Jerusalem (ibid. v. 13). However, despite the important reasons for
postponing Pesach and declaring a leap year, and despite the success in
bringing such a large number of people to bring the paschal offering, Chazal
criticized Chizkiyahu for having proclaimed a leap year when it was already
Nissan, rather than in Adar against the laws of intercalation of months and
did not agree with him on the matter.
III.
Why did the calamity
come specifically in the days of Chizkiyahu?
Without a doubt, Achaz was a most
problematic figure in all respects. As it may be remembered, Achaz introduced
idol worship into the Temple, he cut himself off from prophecy, he sealed the
Torah, he worshipped the Molekh and this led to a difficult spiritual and
moral state of total subjugation to Assyria with hundreds of thousands of
casualties and captives from the Kingdom of Israel. Chizkiyahu tried to repair
the results of his father's actions: he wiped out idol worship, he rededicated
the Temple, he strengthened the Torah, he related seriously to the words of the
prophet, he prayed, he was the first to remove the bamot from the Kingdom
of Yehuda, and he renewed the covenant with God through the keeping of Pesach
together with the Kingdom of Israel.
In light of all this, the question cries out why it was specifically in the days of Chizkiyahu - a righteous king by all standards (as Scripture itself testifies in the book of Melakhim), and certainly in comparison to Achaz that the greatest calamities befell: the Assyrian army invaded Yehuda and destroyed the entire kingdom, except for Jerusalem; for the first time in the history of prophecy, a prophet explicitly prophesies about the destruction of the city and of God's Temple (Mikha 3:12); and for the first time in the history of the kingdom, a prophet explicitly prophesies about exile to Babylonia (II Melakhim 20:17-18)?[4]
One
possibility is that the calamity began already in the days of Achaz, and because
of his deeds, and it continued in the days of Chizkiyahu, who held fast to some
of his father's ways. Indeed, already in the days of Achaz, Yeshayahu foresaw
the arrival of the King of Assyria:
The Lord shall bring upon you, and
upon your people, and upon your father's house, days that have not come since
the day that Ephraim departed from Yehuda, namely the King of Assyria.
(Yishayahu 7:17)
Now, therefore, behold, the Lord
brings up upon them the waters of the river, strong and abundant, namely the
King of Assyria, and all his glory. And he shall come up over all his channels,
and go over all his banks. And he shall sweep through Yehuda; he shall overflow
and go over, he shall reach even to the neck, and the stretching out of his wing
shall fill the breadth of your land, O Immanuel. (ibid.
8:7-8)
A second possibility is that the punishment came for Chizkiyahu's own
actions: whether because of the difficult internal spiritual-social reality, the
wantonness and governmental corruption, or because of the alliance formed with
Egypt and the reliance upon it, which involved a degree of idol worship and
desecration of God's name. Either way, this approach still requires careful
examination: surely far more serious offences were committed in the days of
Achaz, but nonetheless he was not punished for them!
It seems to me that the correct answer is that the calamity was caused by
the two kings together, and it was the combination of their evil acts that in
the end brought to the invasion of the King of Assyria and to prophecies about
the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple (which was postponed by merit of
Chizkiyahu's repentance) and the exile to Babylonia. Following the difficult
days of Achaz, God gave Chizkiyahu a small amount of credit, with the hope that
he would actualize the opportunity to repair the kingdom and establish it on
justice and judgment. However, Chizkiyahu's actions the alliance with Egypt
while submitting to the King of Assyria and paying a tribute from the coffers of
the Temple, on the one hand, and the corrupt spiritual state in Yehuda and
Jerusalem, on the other prevented the realization of this hope, and the
calamity came in the days of Chizkiyahu.
Another possible way of resolving the difficulty requires an overall
consideration of the period. First, one must remember that in the sixth year of
Chizkiyahu, the Kingdom of Israel fell owing to its great sins. At that time,
the Kingdom of Yehuda also found itself in the same process of slow degeneration
which had begun already during the reign of Uziyahu, in whose days the
Shekhina began to shrink from the Temple (Yishayahu 6), and he
himself was afflicted with tzora'at till the day of his death after he
dared enter the Temple to burn incense (II Divrei Ha-yamim 26:16-21). The
situation created by Achaz son of Yotam son of Uziyahu idol worship, worship
of the Molekh, denial of prophecy and sealing of the Torah left a heavy
mark on the Kingdom of Yehuda, one which could not be totally overturned during
the period of Chizkiyahu, despite the great changes that he effected. The best
proof for this is the nature of the days of Menasheh son of Yechizkiyahu, when
idol worship and service of the Molekh returned to the Temple and to Jerusalem,
and the city was filled with innocent blood that had been shed. With all his
righteousness, Chizkiyahu failed to cause the scale to tip favorably, and while
Jerusalem was saved, the Kingdom of Yehuda as a whole suffered a mortal blow.
Despite the essential difference between Chizkiyahu and his father Achaz,
Chizkiyahu failed to overcome his times, and thus his days may be regarded as a
prologue to the end of the Kingdom of Yehuda in the days of Yehoyakim,
Yehoyakhin, and Tzidkiyahu.
***
With this shiur we conclude
our analysis of the kingdom of Yechizkiyahu. In the next shiur, we
will discuss the causes of the destruction of the First Temple and the end of
the kingdom.
(Translated by David Strauss)
[1] Following the days
of Menasheh son of Chizkiyahu, Yoshiyahu once again removed both idol worship
and the bamot. In this sense, Yoshiyahu follows in the footsteps of
Chizkiyahu, and Scripture indeed relates to him in very similar language: "And
he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in all the way
of David his father, and turned not aside to the right hand nor to the left" (II
Melakhim 22:2); "And like him was there no king before him, that turned
to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might,
according to all the Torah of Moshe: neither after him arose there any like him"
(ibid. 23:25). This joins other similarities between Yoshiyahu and Chizkiyahu
(like the observance of Pesach with the remnants of the
[2] It might be
possible to understand this from the words of Ravshake: "But if you say to me,
We trust in the Lord our God: is not that He, whose high places and whose altars
Chizkiyahu has taken away, and has said to Yehuda and
[3] There is room to
discuss whether the fortifications and the stopping up of the Gichon watercourse
were transpired only with the invasion of Sancheriv, or perhaps already in an
earlier part of Chizkiyahu's reign, long before the siege and thus also long
before Yishayahu's promise. This might be an opening to yet another way to
resolve the contradiction: the Baraita in Avot de-Rabbi Nathan deals with
Chizkiyahu's striving to defend his capital city in natural ways prior to the
prophet's promises, whereas the Mishna in Pesachim deals with the
continuation of that project in the aftermath of Yishayahu's
promise.
[4] Rav Yuval Sherlo
dealt with this problem in his article, "Masa Sancheriv" in: Mayim
mi-Dalyo, Annual of the Lifschitz Teachers' Seminary,
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