Study Sanhedrin folio 26B with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
אמרו ליה: משירייתך היכא? אמר: הדרו בי. אמרו ליה: אם כן, אחוכי קא מחייכת בן! נקבוהו בעקביו ותלאוהו בזנבי סוסיהם, והיו מגררין אותו על הקוצים ועל הברקנין.
The Assyrians said to him: Where is your camp? Shebna said: They backed out on me. They said to him: If so, you are mocking us; you led us to believe that behind you stands a large camp of supporters. They punched holes in his heels and hung him by the tails of their horses, and dragged him on the thorns and on the bristles.
אמר רבי אלעזר: שבנא בעל הנאה היה. כתיב הכא: ״לך בא אל הסכן הזה״, וכתיב התם: ״ותהי לו סכנת״.
R' Elazar says: Shebna was a hedonist. It is written here: “Go, get yourself to this steward [hasokhen], to Shebna, who is over the house” (Isaiah 22:15), and it is written there with regard to Abishag the Shunammite: “And let her be a companion [sokhenet] to him; and let her lie in your bosom, that my lord the king may get heat” (I Kings 1:2).
ואומר: ״כי השתות יהרסון צדיק מה פעל״. רב יהודה ורב עינא, חד אמר: אילו חזקיה וסיעתו נהרסים, צדיק מה פעל? וחד אמר: אילו בית המקדש יהרס, צדיק מה פעל? ועולא אמר: אילו מחשבותיו של אותו רשע אינן נהרסות, צדיק מה פעל?
And following the aforementioned verse: “For behold, the wicked bend the bow, they have made ready their arrow upon the string,” the next verse states: “When the foundations are destroyed, what has the Righteous One done?” (Psalms 11:3). Rav Yehuda and Rav Eina interpret this verse. One says: If Hezekiah and his camp are destroyed, what has the Righteous One done? And one says: If the Temple should be destroyed, what has the Righteous One done? And Ulla says: If the intentions of that wicked person, Sennacherib, are not destroyed, what has the Righteous One done?
בשלמא למאן דאמר: אילו מחשבותיו של אותו רשע, היינו דכתיב ״כי השתות יהרסון״.
The Talmud asks: Granted, according to the one who says that the verse means: If the intentions of that wicked person are not destroyed, what has the Righteous One done, this is the reason that it is written: “When the foundations [hashatot] are destroyed,” i.e., the intentions of Sennacherib are destroyed, as intentions are called shatot.
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