7. Then Isaiah told the king's attendants to put on his boil a paste made of figs, and he would get well.
8. King Hezekiah asked, “What is the sign to prove that the Lord will heal me and that three days later I will be able to go to the Temple?”
9. Isaiah replied, “The Lord will give you a sign to prove that he will keep his promise. Now, would you prefer the shadow on the stairway to go forward ten steps or go back ten steps?”
10. Hezekiah answered, “It's easy to make the shadow go forward ten steps! Make it go back ten steps.”
11. Isaiah prayed to the Lord, and the Lord made the shadow go back ten steps on the stairway set up by King Ahaz.
12. About that same time the king of Babylonia, Merodach Baladan, the son of Baladan, heard that King Hezekiah had been ill, so he sent him a letter and a present.
13. Hezekiah welcomed the messengers and showed them his wealth — his silver and gold, his spices and perfumes, and all his military equipment. There was nothing in his storerooms or anywhere in his kingdom that he did not show them.
14. Then the prophet Isaiah went to King Hezekiah and asked, “Where did these men come from and what did they say to you?”Hezekiah answered, “They came from a very distant country, from Babylonia.”
15. “What did they see in the palace?”“They saw everything. There is nothing in the storerooms that I didn't show them.”
16. Isaiah then said to the king, “The Lord Almighty says that
17. a time is coming when everything in your palace, everything that your ancestors have stored up to this day, will be carried off to Babylonia. Nothing will be left.
18. Some of your own direct descendants will be taken away and made eunuchs to serve in the palace of the king of Babylonia.”