Around 2,600 years ago, the Kingdom of Judea was under grave threat. The neighboring Kingdom of Israel had been conquered by the mighty Assyrian Empire, and most of the Judean Kingdom as well. In the Biblical book of II Kings,1 we read how the Assyrian army had besieged Jerusalem and encircled it with 185,000 troops. The noble and pious King Hezekiah was facing doom. In the end, the entire Assyrian force perished during the course of a single night, and the Judean Kingdom survived.

One of the fascinating aspects of this story is an inflammatory speech made by one of the three delegates sent by the Assyrian King, Sennacherib: Tartan (supreme commander), Rav-Saris (chief officer), and Ravshakeh.2 What and who was this last person? Possibly the royal butler, or royal spokesman? Most translations of the Bible don’t offer a translation. Listed third, he was presumably the most junior.

Upon arrival at the walls of Jerusalem, Ravshakeh proceeded to deliver a lengthy diatribe, questioning Hezekiah’s ability to stand up to the Assyrians, and mocking the trust the Judeans had in their G‑d. Ravshakeh declared that the Judeans were unprepared and that they would all die from hunger and thirst. He mockingly offered the Judeans 2,000 horses to confront the Assyrians, “if they could even find competent riders for them.”3

We may wonder why Ravshakeh was doing all the talking. This is especially perplexing, considering that he was the most junior in rank of the three delegates.4

How Did He Know Hebrew?

All those verbal attacks and insults were delivered, we are told, in “Judean” (Yehudit).5 Of course, there is no such language. The language spoken was Hebrew. What this means is that Ravshakeh was speaking to them in the Judean dialect of the Hebrew language, which would have been moderately different from the dialect spoken in the now-exiled Israelite Kingdom. The result of Ravshakeh’s linguistic abilities was that the assembled Judeans fully understood – which was his intention. When Hezekiah’s representatives begged Ravshakeh to speak in Aramaic, so the people would not understand, Ravshakeh made it clear that his choice of language was deliberate.6

If so, it is understood why the Assyrian king appointed Ravshakeh as the main spokesman, because he could deliver his barbs and threats in excellent Hebrew and even deliver them with a pitch-perfect accent. However, this raises an obvious question: How would an Assyrian official be so perfectly fluent in Hebrew, and how would he have mastered the exact inflection? Remember that Hebrew was the language of only a small Israelite nation, and there was little chance that an Assyrian official would have been conversant in it, never mind being fully proficient.

A Renegade Jew

The clues to this mystery are revealed within the early rabbinic literature. The Talmud states that Ravshakeh was a Jewish apostate, meaning a renegade Jew who had disowned his own religion and people.7 That would explain how he spoke Hebrew like a native.

But we are then left with a different question: how did a common man from the statelet of Judea rise to such a prominent role in the world’s great superpower. The Assyrians would not have rushed to allow an alien into their government.

Another perplexing detail is that the prophet Isaiah referred to Ravshakeh as “the Assyrian lads.”8 Is this not a surprising term for a statesman representing such a prestigious empire?

In the story, we read that Ravshakeh’s words had a devastating psychological impact on the Judeans. Hezekiah’s representatives rent their garments, while the king himself tore his clothes and wore sackcloth as a sign of mourning, declaring the day a national disaster.9

One may ask why they were so badly affected by Ravshakeh’s hecklings, most of which were illogical bluster.

For example, he taunted them that they would die from hunger and thirst; yet, the Judeans had plenty of food stores and had diverted the river into the city, ensuring them an endless supply of water. The ones with no water to drink at that point were the Assyrians! Ravshakeh mocked the Judeans for their lack of horses and horsemen; but what use were horses when defending a siege. The horses the Assyrians had were only a useless burden, as they had to provide copious water and food to keep them alive. Most other arguments forwarded by Ravshakeh were vacuous, and should have been viewed as such by the Judeans. So, why were they so unsettled?

True, Ravshakeh had blasphemed G‑d’s name and they were halachically obligated to mourn, but an added layer of significance appears when we know the identity of this Ravshakeh.

A Wayward Prince

To do so we need to turn to a surprising and cryptic statement in the Talmud. The discussion begins with Isaiah rebuking Hezekiah for not having children. Hezekiah justifies his reluctance to have children because he foresaw that they would lead wayward lives. Isaiah rejects Hezekiah’s reasoning, whereupon Hezekiah insists on marrying Isaiah’s daughter. In some versions of the Talmud,10 we then have the following passage:

In the end, the prophet Isaiah gave his daughter [as a wife] to Hezekiah. They gave birth to two sons: Menashe [who succeeded Hezekiah to the throne] and Ravshakeh. One day, Hezekiah was carrying the boys on his shoulders… whereupon one of them said, “father’s head would be suitable for roasting a small fish, while the other boy said father’s head would be suitable for offering an idolatrous offering. When Hezekiah heard this, he cast them down to the ground. Menashe survived, while Ravshakeh died.

As the commentators11 explain, this is to be understood somewhat allegorically. Hezekiah would not have literally tried to kill his very small sons due to their insulting words, however rude. Rather, it means that Hezekiah could see early on that his his divine inspiration was correct and his sons looked like they were headed to no good. He therefore lost hope that they would follow in his footsteps, and gave up on trying to raise them properly.

According to this rabbinic tradition, the person who was sent by the Assyrian King to taunt the Judeans was in fact Hezekiah’s own son! His name at birth has been lost to posterity, but we know him by the rank he attained in Assyria, and which he used to such terrible effect on that fateful day. If Ravshakeh had disowned his faith and renounced his Judaism, it is not surprising that the Talmud would say he “died,” for indeed that is often how an apostate is viewed in traditional Jewish literature. Indeed, the Ancient Aramaic translation to the book of Ecclesiastes states clearly that Hezekiah had a son called Ravshakeh who became an apostate.12

(Now there is an alternate tradition13 that puts the birth of Hezekiah’s son(s) at a later period. But for the purpose of this essay, let us accept this chronology.)

Now we understand how Ravshakeh spoke Hebrew and with a perfect dialect. We also now understand how he knew so well how to get under the skin of the Judeans, because he was originally one of them. We now also understand how come he was appointed to a senior position in the Assyrian Empire – because he was a royal. He was the perfect messenger to upset the Jews, because what could be more unsettling than have the king’s own son switching over to the enemy?! And, most significantly, it is now easy to understand how upsetting it would have been to hear those awful barbs and threats coming from a former prince—especially since he blasphemed G‑d himself.14

At the time, Ravshakeh was merely fourteen years old, according to this tradition, and it would therefore be completely unsurprising that Isaiah referred to Ravshakeh (his own grandson!) as a “lad.” The only reason that Ravshakeh has arisen to his high status was due to his royal blood, and because he was useful in bringing down Judea.

Ravshakeh’s brother Menashe became a wicked and sinful king, but at least he wasn’t a turncoat who abandoned his own people. By contrast, Ravshakeh had done the unthinkable and joined his own people’s powerful enemy. The boy fantasizing about practicing idolatry of Hezekiah’s head was Ravshakeh, who indeed went on to join the idolatrous Assyrians.

As it turns out, the entire Assyrian army perished that very night, as Isaiah foretold by Divine decree:

Therefore, so has the Lord said concerning the king of Assyria: 'He shall not enter this city, neither shall he shoot there an arrow, nor shall he advance upon it with a shield, nor shall he pile up a siege mound against it. By the way he comes he shall return, and this city he shall not enter,' says the Lord… It came to pass on that night that an angel of the Lord went out and slew one hundred eighty-five thousand of the camp of Assyria. They arose in the morning, and behold they were all dead corpses.

As a member of the Assyrian delegation, Ravshakeh also perished that night.15 If so, indeed he indeed died as a result of his estrangement from Hezekiah’s pious ways, which fits in perfectly with the Talmudic narrative.

Despite the deep disappointment that Hezekiah must have felt from the behavior of his own sons, the Talmud tells us that Hezekiah carried out a comprehensive religious revival, restoring his kingdom to a path of righteousness and scholarship.16 Hezekiah cemented his legacy as one of the great noble kings of the Jewish People.