Sanhedrin

And he fought against them, he and his servants, by night [lailah]  and smote them.  R. Johanan said: The angel who was appointed to [aid] Abraham was named lailah [Night]. as it is written, [Let the day perish wherein I was born], and the Lailah which said, There is a man child conceived.  R. Isaac, the smith, said: He [the angel] set into motion the activities of the night [viz.. the stars] on his behalf, as it is written, They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera.  Resh Lakish said: The smith's interpretation is better than the son of the smith's.  And he pursued them unto Dan.  R. Johanan said: As soon as that righteous man came unto Dan, his strength failed him, for he [prophetically] saw his descendants who would practise idolatry in Dan, as it is written, And he set the one in Beth-el, and the other put he in Dan.  That wicked man [Nebuchadnezzar] too did not prevail until he reached Dan, as it is written, The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan. R. Zera said: Though R. Judah b. Bathyra  sent a message from Nisibis,  [saying]. Observe [the respect due to] a scholar  who has forgotten his learning through a misfortune [e.g., illness]; and be careful [to cut] the jugular veins, in accordance with R. Judah's ruling;  and be heedful of the honour due to the children of the ignorant, for from them proceedeth the Torah:  yet such a thing as this is made known to them.  [Viz..] Righteous art thou, O Lord, when I plead with thee: Yet let me talk to thee of thy judgments: wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper? Wherefore are all they happy that deal very treacherously? Thou hast planted them, yea, they have taken root: they grow, yea, they bring forth fruit.  What was he answered? — If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with the horses? And if in the land of peace, wherein thou trustedst, they wearied thee, then how wilt thou do in the swelling of the Jordan?  This may be compared to a man who boasted, 'I can run three parasangs in front of horses on marshy land.' But happening to meet a pedestrian, he ran three mils  before him on dry land, and was exhausted. Thereupon he said to him: 'If thou art thus before a pedestrian, how much more so before horses: and if three mils have so [tired thee], how much more so three parasangs; and if on dry land it is thus, how much more so on marshy swamps!' It is even so with thee: if thou art thus astonished at the reward wherewith  requited that wicked man for the four steps which he ran in my honour,  how much more when I give their due reward to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who ran before me like horses [i.e., eagerly and swiftly]! Hence it is written, My heart within me is broken because of the prophets;  all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine hath overcome; because of the Lord, and because of the words of his holiness. To what does the 'four steps' refer? — As it is written, At that time, Merodach-baladan, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah: [for he had heard that he had been sick, and was recovered].  But just because Hezekiah had fallen sick and was recovered, he sent him letters and a present!  Indeed 'to enquire of the wonder that was done in the land.'  For R. Johanan said: The day on which Ahaz died consisted of but two hours;  and when Hezekiah sickened and recovered, the Holy One, blessed be He, restored those ten hours, as it is written, Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, which is gone down in the sun dial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward. So the sun returned ten degrees, by which degrees it was gone down.  Thereupon he [Merodach-baladan] inquired of them [his courtiers], 'What is this?' They replied, 'Hezekiah has sickened and recovered.' 'There is such a [great] man,' exclaimed he, 'and shall I not send him a greeting! Write thus to him: "Peace to King Hezekiah, peace to the city of Jerusalem, and peace to the great God!"' Now Nebuchadnezzar was Baladan's scribe, but just then he was not present. When he came, he asked them, 'How did ye write?' And they told him, 'We wrote thus and thus.' 'Ye called him the great God,' said he, 'yet ye mentioned him last! Thus,' said he, 'should ye have written: "peace to the great God, peace to the city of Jerusalem, and peace to King Hezekiah."' 'Let the reader of the letter,' said they to him, 'become the messenger.'  So he ran after him;  but when he had taken four steps, Gabriel came and made him halt. R. Johanan observed: Had not Gabriel come and stopped him, nothing could have saved  the enemies of Israel. Why was he called [Merodach-]Baladan the son of Baladan?  It is told: Baladan was a king whose face turned into that of a dog,  so that his son sat upon his throne instead. In his documents he wrote his own name, and the name of his father, King Baladan, [i.e., Merodach-baladan]. This is the meaning of the verse, A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master. Now, 'a son honoureth his father' refers to what has just been said. 'And a servant his master' — as it is written, Now in the fifth month, in the tenth day of the month, which was the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard, and stood before the king of Babylon in Jerusalem, And burned the house of the Lord, and the king's house.