Charles Ellicott Commentary 2 Kings 20

In those days — that is, in the time of the Assyrian invasion. The illness may have been caused, or at least aggravated, by the intense anxiety which this grave peril created. Hezekiah reigned 29 years (2 Kings 18:2), and the invasion began in his 14th year (2 Kings 18:13). In 2 Kings 20:6 he is promised 15 years of life, and deliverance from the king of Assyria. That Hezekiah recovered before the catastrophe recorded at the end of the last chapter, is evident from the fact that no allusion to the destruction of his enemies is contained in his hymn of thanksgiving (Isaiah 38:10–20).

Set your house in order. — The margin is right (Compare 2 Samuel 17:23).

Then he turned his face. —And he turned his face round (1 Kings 21:4). Hezekiah did so to avoid being disturbed in his prayer; and perhaps because grief instinctively seeks a hiding-place.

Remember now how I have walked ... —Hezekiah deprecates an untimely death—the punishment of the wicked (Proverbs 10:27)—on account of his zeal for Jehovah and against the idols. As Thenius remarks, there is nothing surprising in his apparent self-praise if we remember such passages as Psalms 18:20; Psalms 7:8; Nehemiah 13:14. Josephus attributes the poignancy of his sorrow to childlessness, and makes him pray to be spared until he could have a son; but this is merely an instance of that “midrashitic” enlargement of the narrative which we find elsewhere in that historian.

Into the middle court. —This is the reading of some Hebrew Manuscripts, and of all the versions. The Hebrew text (city; see margin) is wrong. Before Isaiah had left the precincts of the palace, he was instructed to return. (Keil says that here, as in 2 Kings 10:25, the word rendered “city” denotes “castle,” i.e., the royal residence.)

The captain of my people. —Or, ruler (nâgîd); a designation of honour (1 Kings 1:35; 1 Samuel 10:1). This is missing in Isaiah 38:0, as well as the end of the verse I will heal thee, etc. That narrative looks like an abbreviated transcript of the present account, or of a common original.

On the third day. —Compare Hosea 6:2. Here, however, there is no ground for understanding the expression other than literally. The precise nature of Hezekiah’s malady cannot be ascertained.