King Josiah alarmed as he hears the Torah found in the Temple when he had it restored
Hezekiah's son and heir Manasseh undid all his reforms, and his grandson continued in that. The nation of Judah seemed hopelessly lost in utter wickedness. Then Josiah is made king at only 8 years of age. He turns his heart to God, purges the kingdom of idolatry, renovates the Temple. The Torah is found therein, and when it is read to him, he is so affected by it that he becomes even more determined to right all the wrongs his predecessors have committed. There was never a king like him! And then his heirs bring ruin, and the kingdom is destroyed and taken captive by Babylon.
Manasseh--heir of Hezekiah, 2 Kings 21:1-18, 2 Chron 33:1-20
“Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign, and reigned fifty and five years in Jerusalem.”
It seems amazing that after all the good that his father Hezekiah did, Manasseh could go so wrong! Was he rebelling like a Bishop’s son? Was he influenced by bad friends? Was he an admirer of the wealth & power of Assyrian kings who reigned in Nineveh, or was he turned by the bribery of Assyrian spies or infiltrators as indicated in Nahum 3? He was only 12, so no doubt he was led by counselors. Did they turn him bad, or did he go bad when he came of age?
Manasseh’s crimes:
1. Abominations of the heathens/Amorites whom the Lord cast out before Israel
2. Built up the high places for idolatrous worship his father had destroyed
3. Reared up altars and a grove for Baal (plural Baalim), like Ahab, king of Israel, who had married Jezebel--such an adversary to Elijah the Prophet
4. Worshipped all the host of heaven (all kinds of false gods), and served them
5. Built altars for all the host of heaven in the Lord’s Temple
6. Made his son/children pass through the fire (burnt him in sacrifice to a false god)
7. Used sorcery
8. Directly rebelled against the instructions of the Lord to Kings David & Solomon, and Moses
9. Led his people astray (“seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom the Lord destroyed before the children of Israel.” And/or coerced them through his power.) It’s one thing to do evil, far worse to seduce/persuade/coerce others to do evil.
10. Filled Jerusalem “from one end to another” with the shedding of innocent blood (probably sacrificing children to idols, but could just as well be killing like the mafia for profit, or both).
The Lord sends prophets to warn about the consequences of Manasseh’s evils. Yet He allows Manasseh a good long reign, so no doubt people failed to take the Lord seriously. The Lord warns that Jerusalem (capital of the kingdom of Judah) will suffer the fate of Samaria (capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, that had been conquered & carried away captive by the Assyrians). They’ll be wiped out like a dirty dish is wiped clean and turned upside down to dry. All the accumulated rebellions since the Exodus from Egypt will come to a reckoning.
2 Chron 33:11-19 says that the Assyrians came and took Manasseh in chains back to Babylon (under Assyrian rule at the time, it seems). Through his afflictions Manasseh humbles himself, repents, and prays for forgiveness. The Lord has mercy on him and Manasseh is reinstated on his throne in Jerusalem. He recognizes the hand of the Lord, rebuilds Jerusalem’s walls and reinforces all the walled cities of Judah with soldiers. He tries to rectify his atrocities by cleaning the idols out of the Temple, repairing the altar, and renewing the worship of God there. He commands his people to serve the Lord God of Israel. The people still sacrificed in the high places (hills outside Jerusalem), but at least it was in worship of the Lord only.
Amon—inherits the kingdom of Judah from his father Manasseh, 2 Kings 21:19-26, 2 Chron 33:20-25
“Amon was twenty and two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned two years in Jerusalem.”
Amon follows in his father’s wicked footsteps. But his servants conspire and kill him in his own house. The people of the land kill the conspirators and make Amon’s son Josiah king.
Josiah--2 Kings 22-23, 2 Chron 34-36
1 Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned thirty and one years in Jerusalem. And his mother’s name was Jedidah, the daughter of Adaiah of Boscath.
2 And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in all the way of David his father, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left.
Josiah
Age 8—becomes king
+18 yrs—(Josiah age 26; 2 Chron 34 says he was only 16 when he turned to the Lord, and 20 when he
began to purge Judah & Jerusalem from idolatry, 26 when he had the Temple repaired with
monies gathered by the Levites from the remnant of Israel after the Assyrian captivity) Josiah
sends his scribe to Hilkiah the High Priest to give the silver people have offered at the Temple
door to those in charge to have the Temple repaired (no reckoning/oversight was made because
they were honest)
--Hilkiah finds the Torah in the Temple and sends it to King Josiah; when Josiah hears his scribe
read the book, he rends/tears his clothes in anguish:
“Go ye, inquire of the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words
of this book that is found: for great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because
our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according unto all that which
is written concerning us.”
--Hilkiah & a set of envoys go to Huldah the prophetess (wife of the grandson of a court
attendant, who lives in the court complex at Jerusalem). She affirms the prophecies of ill for
Jerusalem for the sins of the people, but because King Josiah is humble and tender-hearted he
will die in peace before the destruction prophesied.
--King Josiah gathers all the elders of the people, then brings them, the priests & prophets, and
the people (small and great) to the Temple and reads the words of the Torah/Covenant to them.
First he covenants to live the Law of God, then the people in turn covenant likewise.
--King Josiah cleans out all the false gods & vessels of their worship from the Temple and has
them burned at Kidron, the ashes taken to Bethel. He puts down all the priests of false worship.
He breaks down the houses of the sodomites next to the Temple (a hint of the kind of idol
worship that had gone on). He defiles all the places of idol worship throughout Judah, including
where people had sacrificed their children in the fire to Molech. He clears away the horses &
chariots offered to the sun god, and stamps to dust the idolatrous altars King Ahaz & Manasseh
had made in the Temple. He defiles with bones the high places King Solomon had built to
Ashtoreth, Chemosh, and Milcom, for his foreign wives. Likewise he destroys the places of false
worship King Jeroboam had long ago created when he separated the northern tribes of Israel
from the kingdom of Judah, and all the houses of false worship in Samaria and their priests. He
purges the idols from the cities of the tribes of Manasseh, Ephraim, Simeon, & Naphtali as well.
--King Josiah calls a great Passover celebration, the greatest since the days of the Judges
--King Josiah puts away all the sorcerers and their like
--"And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord with all his heart, and
with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; neither after him arose
there any like him.”
Age 39—King Josiah is killed in battle at Megiddo when the Egyptian Pharoah goes against Assyria, even
to the river Euphrates (more details 2 Chron 35:20-27, including Jeremiah’s lament for him) Perhaps he should not have involved his people in a fight that would embroil them in the conflict of the contemporary superpowers, Egypt & Assyria. Let them fight their own battles.
The Book of Zephaniah
“The word of the Lord which came unto Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hizkiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah.”
The book of Zephaniah is only 3 chapters long. It is full of dire warnings of the destruction of Judah & Jerusalem, and their neighbors of the Near East. Maybe his prophecies had some effect on Josiah’s reforms. In chapter 3 hope is held out, Zeph 3:9-20
13 The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid.
14 ¶ Sing, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel; be glad and rejoice with all the heart, O daughter of Jerusalem.
15 The Lord hath taken away thy judgments [the calamities brought on by thier wickedness], he hath cast out thine enemy: the king of Israel, even the Lord, is in the midst of thee: thou shalt not see evil any more.Josiah’s heirs--2 Kings 23:30-24:16, 2 Chron 36:1-10
Josiah’s 23 year old wicked son Jehoahaz is anointed by the people as his successor. He only reigns 3 months when Pharaoh-hechoh imprisons him in Egypt (where he eventually dies), installs his likewise wicked 25 year old brother Eliakim (whom he renames Jehoiakim) as a puppet king, and forces Judah to pay a heavy tribute. Jehoiakim reigns 11 years. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, carries him and the treasures of Temple, “all” of Jerusalem (the princes, military, craftsmen: 10,000 people) to Babylon, leaving only the poorest people in the land. Jehoiakim’s son Jehoiachin, only 8 years old, then evilly reigns for 3 months (no doubt with wicked influencers), before he is also carried away captive into Babylon with more treasures from the Temple. King Nebuchadnezzar makes his brother Mattaniah (renamed Zedekiah), age 21, king in his place.
scripturescript 