(1) The son of Ahaz, and his successor in the kingdom of Judah.  He came to the throne at the age of twenty-five, by the Hebrew chronology B.C. 726, by that of Assyria B.C. 727.  He was a devoted servant of Jehovah, and commenced his reign by repairing and cleansing the Temple, re-organising its religious services and its officers, and celebrating a great passover, to which he invited not merely the two tribes, but the ten (2 Chron. xxix. 1—xxx. 13).  He removed the "high places," cast down the images, and even broke in pieces the brazen serpent, which had become an object of idolatrous worship.  He gained a victory over the Philistines, and in other ways became great and prosperous.  In his fourth regnal year, B.C. 724 (?), Shalmaneser commenced, and in B.C. 722 Sargon completed, the siege of Samaria, carrying the ten tribes into captivity (2 Kings xviii. 9, 10).  A comparison of dates shows that the sickness which brought Hezekiah to the brink of death, but ended in his restoration to health, with a gracious promise super-added that he should still live fifteen years, must have occurred as early in his reign as 712 (cf. 2 Kings xviii. 2 and 2 Chron. xxix. 1 with 2 Kings xx. 6; Isa. xxxviii. 5).  That year or the next Merodach-baladan, who in 721 B.C. had conquered Babylon, sent an embassy to Hezekiah, nominally to congratulate him on his recovery from sickness, really to invite him to join a great confederacy which was being secretly formed against the Assyrian power.  Hezekiah was quite elated by the coming of the Babylonian ambassador, even though warned by the prophet Isaiah that the people of Judah would be carried captive to that same place from which the ambassador had come (2 Kings xx. 12-19; 2 Chron. xxxii. 31; Isa. xxxix. 1-8).  He joined the confederacy.  Sargon, who was a very able general, broke in upon the allies before their plans were matured, and vanquished them in detail.  He also took Jerusalem in B.C. 711, ten years before the expedition of Sennacherib.  There is no mention of the event in the Books of Kings or of Chronicles, but it is pretty clearly alluded to in Isa. x. 5-34 (cf. also xxii. 1-14), and is distinctly recorded on the Assyrian monuments.  [Sargon.]  In B.C. 705 Sargon was murdered, and his son Sennacherib ascended the Assyrian throne.  He was a much less able man than his father, and revolts against his authority took place in various parts of his empire.  Hezekiah put himself at the head of a new confederacy, proposed by Tirhakah, the Ethiopian king of Egypt, the Phoenicians, the Ammonites, the Moabites, and the Edomites making common cause with the Jewish king.  To prepare for the probable siege of Jerusalem, he brought a spring of water from the valley of the Kidron into the city by a conduit cut through the rock, for he said, "Why should the kings of Assyria come and find much water?" (2 Kings xx. 20; 2 Chron. xxxii. 30; Isa. xxii. 9 [?], 11 [?].  The revolts had taken place in B.C. 705.  It was not, however, till B.C. 701 that Sennacherib arrived in the west to commence the campaign against the confederates.  The year is called his fourteenth regnal year; this appears to be a copyist's error for the twenty-fourth year.  The Assyrian invaders captured one city after another, as yet, however, keeping away from Jerusalem.  Hezekiah, thoroughly alarmed, sent an embassy to ask forgiveness for his rebellion, and offered to pay any penalty which his late master might impose.  Sennacherib named a price—300 talents of silver (about £102,656) and 30 talents of gold (£164,250).  To obtain it, Hezekiah had to strip the gold from the doors and pillars of the Temple.  Whether the Jewish king failed to raise the whole of the atonement money, or whether the Assyrian ruler as the paramount power claimed the right to enter the capitals of the subordinate kings, and therefore resented Hezekiah's refusal to admit him within the walls of Jerusalem, or whether, with scandalous violation of good faith, he accepted the price of peace, and then went on with war, we do not know.  But certain it is that while Sennacherib was besieging Lachish, he sent an embassy to Jerusalem to demand its surrender.  The embassy consisted of the Assyrian Tartan (the commander-in-chief), the Rabsaris (the chamberlain), and the Rab-shakeh (the prime minister), the last-named personage being the chief speaker.  He spoke in Hebrew not merely to the Jewish dignitaries, but to the soldiers on the walls, declared the impossibility of resisting the Assyrians, the vanity of trusting either to Egypt or Jehovah, and the good character of the land to which, if the people submitted, they would be taken in captivity.  But all was in vain.  Isaiah intimated that Jehovah, insulted by the Rab-shakeh, would interfere for the defence of the city.  Accordingly that very night an angel slew 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp.  Sennacherib soon afterwards quitted Palestine without taking Jerusalem, and never ventured to return to it again (2 Kings xviii. 13—xix. 37; 2 Chron. xxxii. 1-23; Isa. xxxvi. 1—xxxvii. 38).  Sennacherib's account of this invasion is found on a clay cylinder, now in the British Museum. [Sennacherib.]  Besides Isaiah, Hosea (Hosea i. 1) and Micah were contemporaries of Hezekiah.  The king died by the Hebrew chronology about 698, by the Assyrian about 697 B.C., leaving his son Manasseh to ascend the throne (2 Kings xvi. 20; xviii. 1—xx. 21; 2 Chron. xxviii. 27—xxxii. 33; Isa. xxxvi.—xxxix). (Sayce, Times of Isaiah, 48-66, etc.).
    (2) An ancestor of the prophet Zephaniah (Zeph. i. 1—R.V.).  Called in the A.V. Hizkiah.
    (3) A son of Neariah.  He was of the royal family of Judah (1 Chron. iii. 23).
    (4) The "father" of a certain Ater [Ater (1)] (Ezra ii. 16; Neh. vii. 21).
    ¶ Hezekiah's disease.—A disease of which the chief recorded symptom was a boil.  This has been regarded as the "bubo" of the plague, but was probably a carbuncle (Sir Risdon Bennett) 2 Kings xx. 7; Isa. xxxviii. 21). (The Sunday School Teacher's Bible Manual, Hunter, 1894).