Although the Assyrian threat has spectacularly subsided, Hezekiah’s struggles are the subject of a pair of episodes in 2 Kings 20 that pertain to the king’s person and his progeny. In the first (20:1–11), by means of a flashback the reader discovers that in the midst of the Assyrian attack, Hezekiah was gravely ill. A precise diagnosis of Hezekiah’s sickness is not the point; rather, this sophisticated literary technique allows Hezekiah’s illness to become a moment of parabolic reflection on the Assyrian invasion and its aftermath. Hezekiah is threatened with certain death, just like the city, yet he prays and is miraculously delivered. For the sake of God’s promise, Jerusalem too is delivered, but just as Hezekiah is given fifteen more years, Jerusa…