An angel of the Lord killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers

Assyria, the most powerful empire of its time, had destroyed the Kingdom of Israel and exiled the ten tribes. Sennacherib was the greatest of rulers. He conquered most of the known world of its time, including almost the entire Kingdom of Judah. As Sennacherib approached Jerusalem, King Hezekiah urged people to have faith in Hashem as he prepared to meet the challenge.

Standing outside the city, Rabshakeh, an apostate Jew, called out in Hebrew to the people inside, speaking in the name of Sennacherib: “Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. Do not let Hezekiah make you rely on Hashem… Lest Hezekiah mislead you saying, ‘Hashem will save us.’… Who among all the gods of the lands has saved their lands from my hand that Hashem should save Jerusalem from my hand?” 

Melachim II (II Kings) - Chapter 18

28 And Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in Judean, and he spoke and said, "Listen to the word of the great king, the king of Assyria!

29 So has the king said, 'Let not Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you from his hand.

30 And let not Hezekiah make you rely on the Lord, saying, 'The Lord will save us, and this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.'

31 Do not listen to Hezekiah, for so has the king of Assyria said, "Make peace with me, and come out to me, and each man will eat of his vine and each man of his fig tree, and each man will drink the water of his cistern.

32 Until I come and take you to a land like your land, a land of grain and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of oil yielding olives and honey, and you may live and not die, and do not heed Hezekiah for he will mislead you, saying, 'The Lord will save us.'

33 Have the gods of the nations saved each one his land, from the hand of the king of Assyria?

34 Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad, where are the gods of Sepharvaim? He exiled them and twisted them. Now, did they save Samaria from my hand?

35 Who are they among all the gods of the lands who saved their land from my hand, that the Lord should save Jerusalem from my hand?' "

36 And the people remained silent and did not answer him even one word, for it was the king's order, saying, "Do not answer him."

37 And Eliakim the son of Hilkiah who was appointed over the palace and Shebna the scribe and Joah the son of Asaph the recorder, came to Hezekiah, with torn garments, and they related to him the words of Rabshakeh.

During the siege of Jerusalem, Hezekiah dressed in sackcloth (a sign of mourning).

Melachim II (II Kings) - Chapter 19

1 And it was when king Hezekiah heard that he rent his garments, and covered himself with sackcloth, and came to the house of the Lord.

2 And he sent Eliakim who was appointed over the palace, and Shebna the scribe and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz.

3 And they said to him, "So has Hezekiah said, 'This day is a day of distress, debate, and blasphemy, for the children have come as far as the birthstool and there is no strength to give birth.

4 Perhaps the Lord your God will take note of all the words of Rabshakeh whom the king of Assyria, his master, sent to blaspheme the living God, and he brought proof with the words that the Lord your God heard, and you shall offer up a prayer for the remnant that is found.' "

It was the night of Passover in the besieged city of Jerusalem, but gone was the festive and jubilant spirit. King Hezekiah and all the Jews were full of sorrow and grief, and prayed to G‑d for deliverance.

5  And King Hezekiah's servants came to Isaiah.

6  And Isaiah said to them, "So shall you say to your master, 'So has the Lord said, "Have no fear of the words that you have heard, that the servants of the king of Assyria blasphemed Me.

7  Behold I will imbue him with a desire, and he will hear a rumor and return to his land, and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his land.' "

8  And Rabshakeh returned and found the king of Assyria waging war against Libnah, for he heard that he had left Lachish.

9  And he heard [a rumor] about Tirhakah the king of Cush, saying, "He has gone out to wage war against you." And he again sent emissaries to Hezekiah, saying,

10  "So shall you say to Hezekiah the king of Judah, saying, 'Let your God in Whom you trust, not delude you, saying, 'Jerusalem shall not be given into the hand[s] of the king of Assyria.

11  Behold you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands to destroy them. Now will you be saved?

12  Did the gods of the nations whom my forefathers destroyed-Gozan and Haran, and Rezeph and the children of Eden which is in Telassar save them?

13  Where are the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city of Sepharvaim? He exiled [them] and twisted [them]!

14 And Hezekiah took the letters from the hand of the messengers and read them; he went up to the house of the Lord, and Hezekiah spread it out before the Lord.

15 And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said, "O Lord God of Israel, Who dwells between the cherubim, You alone are the God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You made the heavens and the earth.

16 O Lord, incline Your ear and listen, O Lord, open Your eyes and see. And listen to the words of Sennacherib, who sent him to blaspheme the living God.

17 Indeed, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have destroyed the nations and their land.

18 And they have committed their gods to the fire, for they are not gods, but the handiwork of man, wood and stone, and they destroyed them.

19 And now, O Lord our God, please deliver us from his hand, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that You are the Lord God alone."

Soon after the prayers were over, the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz appeared before the king, and brought him G‑d’s message. It was a message of comfort and hope, of victory and triumph: “The G‑d of Israel has heard your prayers. The king of Assyria shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there. By the way he came, by the same way he shall return. For G‑d Himself will defend this city and save it.”

20 And Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, "So has the Lord God of Israel said, 'I have heard what you prayed to me concerning Sennacherib, king of Assyria.

21 This is the word that the Lord has spoken about him: 'The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you and has mocked you. The daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at you.

22 Whom have you insulted and blasphemed, and upon whom have you raised [your] voice? And you have lifted your eyes on high against the Holy One of Israel.

23 Through your messengers you have insulted the Lord, and you said, "With my many chariots I have ascended to the heights of mountains, to the end of the Lebanon, and I will cut down its tallest cedars, its choice cypresses, and I will come to its remotest lodge, to its farmland forest.

24 I dug and drank strange water, and I dry up with the soles of my feet all rivers of the siege."

25 Have you not heard from afar what I did in days of yore, and what I formed? Now I have brought it, and it shall be to make desolate, blossoming hills, [of] fortified cities.

26 And their inhabitants became short of strength, broken and ashamed; they were [like] the grass of the field and green herbage, like grass of the roofs, and blast before becoming standing grain.

27 And your sitting and your going out and your coming I know, and your raging against Me.

28 Because you have raged against Me, and your tumult has ascended into My ears, I will place my ring in your nose and My bit in your lips, and I will return you by the road by which you have come.

29 And this shall be the sign for you, this year you shall eat what grows by itself, and the next year, what grows from the tree stumps, and in the third year, sow and reap, and plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

30 And the remaining survivors of the house of Judah shall continue to take root below and they will produce fruit above.

31 For from Jerusalem shall come out a remnant, and survivors from Mt. Zion; the zeal of the Lord of Hosts shall do this.

32 Therefore, so has the Lord said concerning the king of Assyria: 'He shall not enter this city, neither shall he shoot there an arrow, nor shall he advance upon it with a shield, nor shall he pile up a siege mound against it.

33 By the way he comes he shall return, and this city he shall not enter,' says the Lord.

34 'And I will protect this city to save it, for My sake and for the sake of My servant David.' "

When midnight came, the angel of death went out and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred fourscore and five thousand captains and men of valor. When Sennacherib rose up early in the morning to storm the city of Jerusalem, he found dead corpses in the place of his mighty army.

35 And it came to pass on that night that an angel of the Lord went out and slew one hundred eighty-five thousand of the camp of Assyria. And they arose in the morning, and behold they were all dead corpses.

36 And Sennacherib, the king of Assyria, left and went away, and he returned and dwelt in Nineveh.

37 And he was prostrating himself in the temple of Nisroch his god, and Adramelech and Sharezer, his sons, slew him with a sword, and they fled to the land of Ararat, and his son Esarhaddon reigned in his stead.