Old Testament · 2 Kings

2 Kings 23

Josiah Renews the Covenant

(2 Chronicles 34:29–33)

1And the king sent, and they gathered to him all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. 2And the king went up to the house of the LORD, and every man^a of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people, from small to great; and he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant^b that was found in the house of the LORD.

3And the king stood by the pillar and cut the covenant before the LORD, to walk after the LORD and to keep His commandments^c and His testimonies^d and His statutes^e with all the heart and with all the soul^f, to establish the words of this covenant that were written on this book; and all the people stood in the covenant.

Josiah Destroys Idolatry

(1 Kings 13:1–10; 2 Chronicles 34:3–7)

4And the king commanded^g Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the threshold, to bring out from the temple of the LORD all the vessels made for Baal, and for the Asherah, and for all the host of the heavens; and he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried their dust^h to Bethel.

5And he put down the idolatrous priests whom the kings of Judah had appointed to burn incense in the high places in the cities of Judah and the surroundings of Jerusalem, and those who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the constellations, and to all the host of the heavens.

6And he brought out the Asherah from the house of the LORD, outside Jerusalem, to the wadi Kidron, and burned it at the wadi Kidron, and beat it to dust, and cast its dust on the graves of the sons of the people. 7And he broke down the houses of the male cult prostitutes that were in the house of the LORD, where the womenⁱ were weaving houses for the Asherah.

8And he brought all the priests out of the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had burned incense, from Geba to Beersheba; and he broke down the high places of the gates that were at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were on a man's left at the gate of the city. 9Nevertheless the priests of the high places did not go up to the altar of the LORD in Jerusalem, but they ate unleavened bread among their brothers.

10And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, so that no man might make his son or his daughter pass through the fire to Molech. 11And he removed the horses that the kings of Judah had given to the sun, at the entrance of the house of the LORD, by the chamber of Nathan-melech the officer, which was in the precincts; and the chariots of the sun he burned with fire.

12And the altars that were on the roof of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars which Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of the LORD, the king broke down, and he hurried from there and cast their dust into the wadi Kidron.

13And the high places that were before Jerusalem, which were to the right of the Mount of Destruction, which Solomon king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the detestable thing of the Sidonians, and for Chemosh the detestable thing of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the sons of Ammon, the king defiled. 14And he broke in pieces the pillars and cut down the Asherim, and filled their places with bones of man^j.

15And also the altar that was at Bethel, the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin, had made—both that altar and the high place he broke down; and he burned the high place, beat it to dust, and burned the Asherah. 16And Josiah turned and saw the graves that were there on the mount, and he sent and took the bones from the graves and burned them on the altar and defiled it, according to the word of the LORD which the man of God had proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.

17And he said, "What is that monument which I see?" And the men of the city said to him, "It is the grave of the man of God who came from Judah and proclaimed these things that you have done against the altar of Bethel."

18And he said, "Let him rest; let no man move his bones." So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet who came from Samaria.

19And also all the houses of the high places that were in the cities of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had made to provoke, Josiah removed; and he did to them according to all the deeds that he had done at Bethel. 20And he sacrificed all the priests of the high places who were there upon the altars, and burned bones of man upon them; and he returned to Jerusalem.

Josiah Restores the Passover

(2 Chronicles 35:1–19)

21And the king commanded all the people, saying, "Keep the Passover to the LORD your God, as it is written on this book of the covenant."

22For such a Passover had not been kept from the days of the judges who judged Israel, nor in all the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah; 23but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah this Passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

24And also the mediums, and the spiritists, and the teraphim, and the idols, and all the detestable things that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, Josiah burned away, in order to establish the words of the Torah that were written on the book which Hilkiah the priest found in the house of the LORD.

25And like him there was no king before him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all the Torah of Moses; and after him none arose like him.

26Nevertheless the LORD did not turn from the fierceness of His great wrath, with which His anger burned against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked Him. 27And the LORD said, "Judah also I will remove from before My face, as I removed Israel; and I will reject this city which I have chosen, Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there."

The Death of Josiah

(2 Chronicles 35:20–24)

28And the rest of the matters of Josiah, and all that he did, are they not written on the book of the matters of the days of the kings of Judah?

29In his days Pharaoh-neco king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates; and king Josiah went to meet him, and he put him to death at Megiddo when he saw him.

30And his servants carried him dead in a chariot from Megiddo, and brought him to Jerusalem, and buried him in his grave. And the people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah, and anointed him, and made him king in his father's place.

Jehoahaz Succeeds Josiah

(2 Chronicles 36:1–4)

31Jehoahaz was a son of twenty-three years when he became king, and three months he reigned in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. 32And he did the evil in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that his fathers had done.

33And Pharaoh-neco bound him at Riblah in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Jerusalem; and he imposed a fine on the land of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. 34And Pharaoh-neco made Eliakim the son of Josiah king in place of Josiah his father, and changed his name to Jehoiakim; but Jehoahaz he took away, and he came to Egypt and died there.

35And the silver and the gold Jehoiakim gave to Pharaoh; but he taxed the land to give the silver according to the mouth of Pharaoh; each man according to his valuation he exacted the silver and the gold from the people of the land, to give to Pharaoh-neco.

Jehoiakim Reigns in Judah

(2 Chronicles 36:5–8)

36Jehoiakim was a son of twenty-five years when he became king, and eleven years he reigned in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Zebudah the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah. 37And he did the evil in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that his fathers had done.