2 Kings 23–24

23RD CHAPTER

King Josiah’s Religious Reforms—2 Chronicles 34:29–33, 4–7; 35:1–27; 36:1

¹Then the king sent for all the respected leaders of Judah and Jerusalem to join him. ²The king, everyone in Judah, everyone living in Jerusalem, the priests, the prophets, and all the people (young and old) went to the Lord’s temple. Josiah read everything written in the Book of the Promise^afound in the Lord’s temple so that they could hear it. ³The king stood beside the pillar and made a promise to the Lord that he would follow the Lord and obey his commands, instructions, and laws with all his heart and soul. He confirmed the terms of the promise written in this book. And all the people joined in the promise. 

⁴Then the king ordered the chief priest Hilkiah, the priests who served under Hilkiah, and the doorkeepers to take out of the Lord’s temple all the utensils that had been made for Baal, Asherah, and the entire army of heaven. Josiah burned the utensils outside Jerusalem in an open field near the Kidron Brook. Then he carried their ashes to Bethel. 

⁵He got rid of the pagan priests whom the kings of Judah had appointed to sacrifice at the illegal places of worship in the cities of Judah and all around Jerusalem. They had been sacrificing to Baal, the sun god, the moon god, the zodiac, and the entire army of heaven. ⁶He took the pole dedicated to the goddess Asherah from the temple to the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem. He burned it in the Kidron Valley, ground it to dust, and threw its ashes on the tombs of the common people. ⁷He tore down the houses of the male temple prostitutes who were in the Lord’s temple, where women did weaving for Asherah. 

⁸He brought all the priests out of the cities of Judah from Geba to Beersheba and made the places where those priests sacrificed unclean.^bHe tore down the worship site at the entrance of the Gate of Joshua, the gate named after the mayor of the city. (The worship site was to the left of anyone going through the city gate.) 

⁹The priests of the illegal worship sites had never gone to the Lord’s altar in Jerusalem. Instead, they ate their unleavened bread among the other worshipers. 

¹⁰Josiah also made Topheth in the valley of Ben Hinnom unclean so that people would never again sacrifice their sons or daughters by burning them to the god Molech. 

¹¹He removed the horses that Judah’s kings had dedicated to the sun god at the entrance of the Lord’s temple. They were in the temple courtyard near the room of the eunuch Nathan Melech. He also burned the chariots of the sun god, ¹²the altars that Judah’s kings had made and placed on the roof of Ahaz’s upstairs room, and the altars Manasseh had made in the two courtyards of the Lord’s temple. The king tore them down from there, crushed them, and dumped their rubble in the Kidron Valley. 

¹³The king made the illegal places of worship east of Jerusalem unclean. They were on the southern part of the Hill of Destruction. King Solomon of Israel had built them for Astarte (the disgusting goddess of the Sidonians), Chemosh (the disgusting god of Moab), and Milcom (the disgusting god of the Ammonites). ¹⁴Josiah crushed the sacred stones, cut down the poles dedicated to Asherah, and filled their places with human bones. ¹⁵He also tore down the altar at Bethel—the place of worship made by Jeroboam (Nebat’s son), who had made Israel sin. He tore down both the altar and the place of worship. They burned the worship site, crushing it to powder and burning the pole dedicated to Asherah. 

¹⁶When Josiah turned and saw the tombs on the hill there, he sent men to take the bones out of the tombs and burn them on the altar to make it unclean. This fulfilled the Lord’s word announced by the man of God. ¹⁷Then he asked, “What is this monument that I see?” 

The people of the city answered him, “It’s the tomb of the man of God who came from Judah to announce that you would do these things to the altar of Bethel.” 

¹⁸So Josiah said, “Let him rest. Don’t disturb his bones.” So they left his bones with the bones of the prophet who had come from Samaria. 

¹⁹Josiah also got rid of all the temples at the illegal places of worship in the cities of Samaria. The kings of Israel had built these places to make the Lord furious. He did to them everything that he had done to the worship places at Bethel. ²⁰He slaughtered all the priests of the illegal worship sites on their altars and then burned human bones on them. He went back to Jerusalem. 

²¹The king ordered all the people to celebrate the Passover for the Lord their God as it is written in this Book of the Promise. ²²The Passover had never been celebrated like this during the time of the judges who governed Israel or during the entire time of the kings of Israel and Judah. ²³But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah’s reign, this Passover was celebrated in Jerusalem for the Lord. 

²⁴Josiah also got rid of the mediums, psychics, family idols, other idols, and disgusting gods that could be seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem. He did this to confirm the words of the Teachings written in the book that the priest Hilkiah found in the Lord’s temple. 

²⁵No king before Josiah had turned to the Lord with all his heart, soul, and strength, as directed in Moses’ Teachings. No other ⸤king⸥ was like Josiah. 

²⁶But the Lord still didn’t turn his hot, burning anger from Judah. After all, Manasseh had done all these things to make him furious. ²⁷The Lord had said, “I will put Judah out of my sight as I put Israel out of my sight. I will reject Jerusalem, the city that I chose, and I will reject the temple where I said my name would be.” 

²⁸Isn’t everything else about Josiah—everything he did—written in the official records of the kings of Judah? 

²⁹In Josiah’s days Pharaoh Necoh (the king of Egypt) came to help the king of Assyria at the Euphrates River. King Josiah went to attack Necoh. When Pharaoh saw him at Megiddo, Pharaoh killed him. ³⁰His officers put his dead body in a chariot and brought it from Megiddo to Jerusalem. They buried Josiah in his tomb. 

King Jehoahaz of Judah—2 Chronicles 36:1–4

Then the people of the land took Josiah’s son Jehoahaz, anointed him, and made him king in place of his father. ³¹Jehoahaz was 23 years old when he became king, and he was king for 3 months in Jerusalem. His mother was Hamutal, daughter of Jeremiah from Libnah. ³²He did what the Lord considered evil, as his ancestors had done. ³³Pharaoh Necoh made him a prisoner at Riblah in the territory of Hamath during his reign^cin Jerusalem and fined the country 7,500 pounds of silver and 75 pounds of gold. 

³⁴Then Pharaoh Necoh made Josiah’s son Eliakim king in place of his father Josiah and changed Eliakim’s name to Jehoiakim. He took Jehoahaz away to Egypt, where he died. ³⁵Jehoiakim gave Pharaoh the silver and the gold. But he had to tax the country to pay the silver Pharaoh had demanded. He taxed each person according to his wealth so that he could get the silver and gold from the people of the land and give it to Pharaoh Necoh. 

King Jehoiakim of Judah—2 Chronicles 36:5–8

³⁶Jehoiakim was 25 years old when he began to rule, and he was king for 11 years in Jerusalem. His mother was Zebidah, daughter of Pedaiah from Rumah. ³⁷Jehoiakim did what the Lord considered evil, as his ancestors had done. 

24TH CHAPTER

¹During Jehoiakim’s reign King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon attacked ⸤Judah⸥, and Jehoiakim became subject to him for three years. Then Jehoiakim turned against him and rebelled. 

²The Lord sent raiding parties of Babylonians, Arameans, Moabites, and Ammonites against Jehoiakim to destroy Judah as the Lord had predicted through his servants the prophets. ³Without a doubt, this happened to Judah because the Lord had commanded it to happen. He wanted to remove the people of Judah from his sight because of Manasseh’s sins—everything he had done, ⁴including the innocent blood he had shed. He had a lot of innocent people in Jerusalem killed, and the Lord refused to forgive him. 

⁵Isn’t everything else about Jehoiakim—everything he did—written in the official records of the kings of Judah? ⁶Jehoiakim lay down in death with his ancestors, and his son Jehoiakin succeeded him as king. 

⁷The king of Egypt didn’t leave his own country again because the king of Babylon had taken all the territory from the River of Egypt to the Euphrates River. This territory had belonged to the king of Egypt. 

King Jehoiakin of Judah—2 Chronicles 36:9–10

⁸Jehoiakin was 18 years old when he began to rule as king. He was king for three months in Jerusalem. His mother was Nehushta, daughter of Elnathan from Jerusalem. ⁹Jehoiakin did what the Lord considered evil, as his father had done. 

¹⁰At that time the officers of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon attacked Jerusalem. (The city was blockaded.) ¹¹King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon arrived while his officers were blockading the city. ¹²King Jehoiakin of Judah, his mother, officials, generals, and eunuchs surrendered to the king of Babylon. In the eighth year of his reign, the king of Babylon captured Jehoiakin. ¹³He also took away all the treasures in the Lord’s temple and the royal palace. As the Lord had predicted, Nebuchadnezzar stripped the gold off all the furnishings that King Solomon of Israel had made for the Lord’s temple. ¹⁴He captured all Jerusalem, all the generals, all the soldiers (10,000 prisoners), and all the craftsmen and smiths. Only the poorest people of the land were left. ¹⁵He took Jehoiakin to Babylon as a captive. He also took the king’s mother, wives, eunuchs, and the leading citizens of the land from Jerusalem as captives to Babylon. ¹⁶The king of Babylon brought all 7,000 of the prominent landowners, 1,000 craftsmen and smiths, and all the men who could fight in war as captives to Babylon. 

King Zedekiah of Judah—2 Chronicles 36:11–13; Jeremiah 52:1–3

¹⁷The king of Babylon made King Jehoiakin’s Uncle Mattaniah king in his place and changed Mattaniah’s name to Zedekiah. ^18…