2 Kings 21:1–18

JUDAH’S KING MANASSEH

21Manasseh^a was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah.^{b 2}He did what was evil in the Lord’s sight,^c imitating the detestable practices of the nations that the Lord had dispossessed before the Israelites.^{d 3}He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed^e and reestablished the altars for Baal. He made an Asherah,^f as King Ahab of Israel had done;^g he also bowed in worship to all the stars in the sky^h and served them. ⁴He built altars in the Lord’s temple,ⁱ where the Lord had said, “Jerusalem is where I will put my name.”^{j 5}He built altars to all the stars in the sky^k in both courtyards of the Lord’s temple.^{l 6}He sacrificed his son in the fire,^Am practiced witchcraft and divination, and consulted mediums and spiritists.ⁿ He did a huge amount of evil in the Lord’s sight, angering him.^o

⁷Manasseh set up the carved image of Asherah, which he made, in the temple that the Lord had spoken about to David and his son Solomon: “I will establish my name forever in this temple and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel.^{p 8}I will never again cause the feet of the Israelites to wander from the land I gave to their ancestors if only they will be careful to do all I have commanded them—the whole law that my servant Moses commanded them.”^{q 9}But they did not listen; Manasseh caused them to stray so that they did worse evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites.^r

¹⁰The Lord said through his servants the prophets, ¹¹“Since King Manasseh of Judah has committed all these detestable acts^s—worse evil than the Amorites^t who preceded him had done—and by means of his idols has also caused Judah to sin, ¹²this is what the Lord God of Israel says: ‘I am about to bring such a disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that everyone who hears about it will shudder.^{Bu 13}I will stretch over Jerusalem the measuring line used on Samaria and the mason’s level used on the house of Ahab,^v and I will wipe^w Jerusalem clean as one wipes a bowl—wiping it and turning it upside down. ¹⁴I will abandon the remnant^x of my inheritance and hand them over to their enemies. They will become plunder and spoil to all their enemies, ¹⁵because they have done what is evil in my sight and have angered me from the day their ancestors came out of Egypt until today.’ ”^y

¹⁶Manasseh also shed so much innocent blood that he filled Jerusalem with it from one end to another.^z This was in addition to his sin that he caused Judah to commit, so that they did what was evil in the Lord’s sight.

MANASSEH’S DEATH

¹⁷The rest^aa of the events of Manasseh’s reign, along with all his accomplishments and the sin that he committed, are written in the Historical Record of Judah’s Kings.^{ab 18}Manasseh rested with his ancestors and was buried in the garden of his own house, the garden of Uzza. His son Amon became king in his place.