2 Kings — Chapter 18

He broke in pieces the brazen serpent which Moses had made; for till that time the children of Israel burnt incense to it; and he called it Nahestan. Lapide: Hezekiah wisely destroyed the brazen serpent which Moses had made, which had become an object of idolatrous veneration. He called it contemptuously \"Nahestan\" — a mere piece of brass. This shows the difference between a legitimate sacred object used in accordance with God's command, and the same object kept beyond its purpose and worshipped superstitiously. The example does not, pace heretics, condemn the veneration of holy images rightly used.

In the Lord the God of Israel he trusted; therefore after him there was none like him among all the kings of Juda. Lapide: Hezekiah's praise — \"after him there was none like him\" — must be understood in a limited sense: none like him in destroying the high places and the brazen serpent, which all other kings before him had tolerated. David was holier in other respects. Lapide resolves the apparent contradiction with the praise of Josiah at ch. xxiii, verse 25.

The Lord said to me: Go up against this land, and destroy it. Lapide, with Abulensis: Rabshakeh lied in claiming divine authorisation for the invasion, to intimidate the people. His whole speech is an exercise in psychological warfare — threatening, offering bribes, blaspheming the true God, and boasting of the king of Assyria's victories over the gods of other nations. Yet God in His Providence used even this blasphemous speech to display His power in the sequel.