Bible Strands
2 Kings 19:35
And that very night the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 men in the camp of the Assyrians. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies!
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator reports the immediate fulfillment of God’s promise to defend Jerusalem after assuring Hezekiah that He will save the city for His own sake and for David’s sake. The event occurs overnight, right before Sennacherib discovers the camp empty at dawn.
The words — The text highlights מַלְאַ֣ךְ יְהוָ֗ה (mal.'Akh Yah.weh), meaning the angel of Yahweh, and וַ/יַּךְ֙ (va/i.yaKh), meaning he struck down. These terms specify the divine agent and the decisive action that executes the preceding promise.
The thread — This narrative aligns with 2 Chronicles 32:21, where Yahweh sends an angel to annihilate Assyrian commanders, and echoes 2 Samuel 24:16 and Exodus 12:29 in its pattern of a divine agent executing sudden, large-scale judgment.
Why it lands — The passage demands recognition that the stated outcome rests entirely on the preceding divine declaration rather than human military strategy. It requires the reader to trace the fulfillment of the spoken word directly to the recorded action.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.
Cross-references
- 2 Chronicles 32:21 and the LORD sent an angel who annihilated every mighty man of valor and every leader and commander in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he withdrew to his own land in disgrace. And when he entered the temple of his god, some of his own sons struck him down with the sword.
- 2 Samuel 24:16 But when the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the LORD relented from the calamity and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand now!” At that time the angel of the LORD was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
- Exodus 12:29 Now at midnight the LORD struck down every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner in the dungeon, as well as all the firstborn among the livestock.
- Isaiah 37:36 Then the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 men in the camp of the Assyrians. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies!
- Psalms 76:5 The valiant lie plundered; they sleep their last sleep. No men of might could lift a hand.
- 1 Thessalonians 5:2 For you are fully aware that the Day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.
- Isaiah 10:33 Behold, the Lord GOD of Hosts will lop off the branches with terrifying power. The tall trees will be cut down, the lofty ones will be felled.
- Daniel 5:30 That very night Belshazzar king of the Chaldeans was slain,
- Hosea 1:7 Yet I will have compassion on the house of Judah, and I will save them—not by bow or sword or war, not by horses and cavalry, but by the LORD their God.”
- Acts 12:23 Immediately, because Herod did not give glory to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.