Verses 36-38 conclude the story of the Assyrian invasion of Judah which is told in chapters 36–37. Some versions have a heading here; for example, Bible en français courant has “Departure of the Assyrians, death of Sennacherib,” and New Jerusalem Bible uses “Sennacherib is punished.”

New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh begins this verse with “That night,” but places it within parentheses. The Hebrew text does not have this phrase here, but it does occur at the beginning of the parallel text of 2 Kgs 19.35. We agree with Hebrew Old Testament Text Project that translators should not include it here.

And the angel of the LORD went forth: The Hebrew word for angel (malʾak) is the same one rendered “messengers” in verses 9 and 14, where it refers to the messengers of the Assyrian king. An angel is a messenger or representative of Yahweh, so translators may render angel of the LORD as “messenger of the LORD.” Instead of the angel, Good News Translation and New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh have “an angel.” The angel suggests that there is only one such messenger, but “an angel” suggests that this is one of many angels. The Hebrew grammar allows both renderings, but we prefer “an angel/representative.” This whole clause may be rendered “Then Yahweh sent one of his angels/messengers.”

And slew a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the camp of the Assyrians: Yahweh’s angel killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in the place where they camped. He may have used an infectious disease to kill them (compare 2 Sam 24.15). Some languages say simply “many” when there is a large number, so it may be a problem to render a hundred and eighty-five thousand. A related issue in translation is whether to use numerals or full words to render large numbers. Some languages use both by placing one of them in parentheses; for example, “one hundred eighty-five thousand (185,000).” A camp is a temporary settlement of an army. The camp of the Assyrians may be rendered “the place where the Assyrian army stayed.”

And when men arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies: This statement implies that the 185,000 Assyrian soldiers who died mysteriously did so during the night. People discovered their dead bodies the next morning. Revised Standard Version gives the mistaken impression that it was the dead people who got up in the morning by using the demonstrative pronoun these. When men arose early in the morning is literally “when they got up early in the morning.” The pronoun “they” could refer to the surviving soldiers (so Bible en français courant) or people in general (so New International Version, New Century Version). Helpful models for this clause are “At dawn the next day” (Good News Translation) and “the following morning” (New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). The word Behold expresses the surprise of those who saw the dead bodies. Some languages may have an ideophone to express it well. Good News Translation uses an exclamation point.

Possible translation examples for this verse are:

• Then an angel of the LORD went and killed 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp. When it dawned the next day, there they were, all dead!

• Then an agent of Yahweh went to the Assyrian camp and struck down 185,000 soldiers. Early the next morning they were all found dead.

Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Sterk, Jan. A Handbook on Isaiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2011. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .