2 Kings 23-25

2 Kings 23

¹Then the king summoned all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem.

²And he went up to the house of the LORD with all the people of Judah and Jerusalem, as well as the priests and the prophets—all the people small and great—and in their hearing he read all the words of the Book of the Covenant that had been found in the house of the LORD.

³So the king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the LORD to follow the LORD and to keep His commandments, decrees, and statutes with all his heart and all his soul, and to carry out the words of the covenant that were written in this book. And all the people entered into the covenant.

⁴Then the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, the priests second in rank, and the doorkeepers to remove from the temple of the LORD all the articles made for Baal, Asherah, and all the host of heaven. And he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel.

⁵Josiah also did away with the idolatrous priests ordained by the kings of Judah to burn incense on the high places of the cities of Judah and in the places all around Jerusalem—those who had burned incense to Baal, to the sun and moon, to the constellations, and to all the host of heaven.

⁶He brought the Asherah pole from the house of the LORD to the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem, and there he burned it, ground it to powder, and threw its dust on the graves of the common people.

⁷He also tore down the quarters of the male shrine prostitutes that were in the house of the LORD, where the women had woven tapestries for Asherah.

⁸Then Josiah brought all the priests from the cities of Judah and desecrated the high places, from Geba to Beersheba, where the priests had burned incense. He tore down the high places of the gates at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which was to the left of the city gate.

⁹Although the priests of the high places did not come up to the altar of the LORD in Jerusalem, they ate unleavened bread with their fellow priests.

¹⁰He also desecrated Topheth in the Valley of Ben-hinnom so that no one could sacrifice his son or daughter in the fire to Molech.

¹¹And he removed from the entrance to the house of the LORD the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun. They were in the court near the chamber of an official named Nathan-melech. And Josiah burned up the chariots of the sun.

¹²He pulled down the altars that the kings of Judah had set up on the roof near the upper chamber of Ahaz, and the altars that Manasseh had set up in the two courtyards of the house of the LORD. The king pulverized them there and threw their dust into the Kidron Valley.

¹³The king also desecrated the high places east of Jerusalem, to the south of the Mount of Corruption, which King Solomon of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians, for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites, and for Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.

¹⁴He smashed the sacred pillars to pieces, cut down the Asherah poles, and covered the sites with human bones.

¹⁵He even pulled down the altar at Bethel, the high place set up by Jeroboam son of Nebat, who had caused Israel to sin. Then he burned the high place, ground it to powder, and burned the Asherah pole.

¹⁶And as Josiah turned, he saw the tombs there on the hillside, and he sent someone to take the bones out of the tombs, and he burned them on the altar to defile it, according to the word of the LORD proclaimed by the man of God who had foretold these things.

¹⁷Then the king asked, “What is this monument I see?” And the men of the city replied, “It is the tomb of the man of God who came from Judah and proclaimed these things that you have done to the altar of Bethel.”

¹⁸“Let him rest,” said Josiah. “Do not let anyone disturb his bones.” So they left his bones undisturbed, along with those of the prophet who had come from Samaria.

¹⁹Just as Josiah had done at Bethel, so also in the cities of Samaria he removed all the shrines of the high places set up by the kings of Israel who had provoked the LORD to anger.

²⁰On the altars he slaughtered all the priests of the high places, and he burned human bones on them. Then he returned to Jerusalem.

²¹The king commanded all the people, “Keep the Passover of the LORD your God, as it is written in this Book of the Covenant.”

²²No such Passover had been observed from the days of the judges who had governed Israel through all the days of the kings of Israel and Judah.

²³But in the eighteenth year of Josiah’s reign, this Passover was observed to the LORD in Jerusalem.

²⁴Furthermore, Josiah removed the mediums and spiritists, the household gods and idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem. He did this to carry out the words of the law written in the book that Hilkiah the priest had found in the house of the LORD.

²⁵Neither before nor after Josiah was there any king like him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his strength, according to all the Law of Moses.

²⁶Nevertheless, the LORD did not turn away from the fury of His burning anger, which was kindled against Judah because of all that Manasseh had done to provoke Him to anger.

²⁷For the LORD had said, “I will remove Judah from My sight, just as I removed Israel. I will reject this city Jerusalem, which I chose, and the temple of which I said, ‘My Name shall be there.’”

²⁸As for the rest of the acts of Josiah and all his accomplishments, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

²⁹During Josiah’s reign, Pharaoh Neco king of Egypt marched up to help the king of Assyria at the Euphrates River. King Josiah went out to confront him, but Neco faced him and killed him at Megiddo.

³⁰From Megiddo his servants carried his body in a chariot, brought him to Jerusalem, and buried him in his own tomb. Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz son of Josiah, anointed him, and made him king in place of his father.

³¹Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. His mother’s name was Hamutal daughter of Jeremiah; she was from Libnah.

³²And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as his fathers had done.

³³And Pharaoh Neco imprisoned Jehoahaz at Riblah in the land of Hamath so that he could not reign in Jerusalem, and he imposed on Judah a levy of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.

³⁴Then Pharaoh Neco made Eliakim son of Josiah king in place of his father Josiah, and he changed Eliakim’s name to Jehoiakim. But Neco took Jehoahaz and carried him off to Egypt, where he died.

³⁵So Jehoiakim paid the silver and gold to Pharaoh Neco, but to meet Pharaoh’s demand he taxed the land and exacted the silver and the gold from the people, each according to his wealth.

³⁶Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eleven years. His mother’s name was Zebidah daughter of Pedaiah; she was from Rumah.

³⁷And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as his fathers had done.

2 Kings 24

¹During Jehoiakim’s reign, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon invaded. So Jehoiakim became his vassal for three years, until he turned and rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar.

²And the LORD sent Chaldean, Aramean, Moabite, and Ammonite raiders against Jehoiakim in order to destroy Judah, according to the word that the LORD had spoken through His servants the prophets.

³Surely this happened to Judah at the LORD’s command, to remove them from His presence because of the sins of Manasseh and all that he had done,

⁴and also for the innocent blood he had shed. For he had filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, and the LORD was unwilling to forgive.

⁵As for the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, along with all his accomplishments, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

⁶And Jehoiakim rested with his fathers, and his son Jehoiachin reigned in his place.

⁷Now the king of Egypt did not march out of his land again, because the king of Babylon had taken all his territory, from the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates River.

⁸Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. His mother’s name was Nehushta daughter of Elnathan; she was from Jerusalem.

⁹And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as his father had done.

¹⁰At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched up to Jerusalem, and the city came under siege.

¹¹And Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to the city while his servants were besieging it.

¹²Jehoiachin king of Judah, his mother, his servants, his commanders, and his officials all surrendered to the king of Babylon. So in the eighth year of his reign, the king of Babylon took him captive.

¹³As the LORD had declared, Nebuchadnezzar also carried off all the treasures from the house of the LORD and the royal palace, and he cut into pieces all the gold articles that Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of the LORD.

¹⁴He carried into exile all Jerusalem—all the commanders and mighty men of valor, all the craftsmen and metalsmiths—ten thousand captives in all. Only the poorest people of the land remained.

¹⁵Nebuchadnezzar carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, as well as the king’s mother, his wives, his officials, and the leading men of the land. He took them into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.

¹⁶The king of Babylon also brought into exile to Babylon all seven thousand men of valor and a thousand craftsmen and metalsmiths—all strong and fit for battle.

¹⁷Then the king of Babylon made Mattaniah, Jehoiachin’s uncle, king in his place and changed his name to Zedekiah.

¹⁸Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem eleven years. His mother’s name was Hamutal daughter of Jeremiah; she was from Libnah.

¹⁹And Zedekiah did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as Jehoiakim had done.

²⁰For because of the anger of the LORD, all this happened in Jerusalem and Judah, until He finally banished them from His presence. And Zedekiah also rebelled against the king of Babylon.

2 Kings 25

¹So in the ninth year of Zedekiah’s reign, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Jerusalem with his entire army. They encamped outside the city and built a siege wall all around it.

²And the city was kept under siege until King Zedekiah’s eleventh year.

³By the ninth day of the fourth month, the famine in the city was so severe that the people of the land had no food.

⁴Then the city was breached; and though the Chaldeans had surrounded the city, all the men of war fled by night by way of the gate between the two walls near the king’s garden. They headed toward the Arabah,

⁵but the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king and overtook him in the plains of Jericho, and his whole army deserted him.

⁶The Chaldeans seized the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah, where they pronounced judgment on him.

⁷And they slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. Then they put out his eyes, bound him with bronze shackles, and took him to Babylon.

⁸On the seventh day of the fifth month, in the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign over Babylon, Nebuzaradan captain of the guard, a servant of the king of Babylon, entered Jerusalem.

⁹He burned down the house of the LORD, the royal palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem—every significant building.

¹⁰And the whole army of the Chaldeans under the captain of the guard broke down the walls around Jerusalem.

¹¹Then Nebuzaradan captain of the guard carried into exile the people who remained in the city, along with the deserters who had defected to the king of Babylon and the rest of the population.

¹²But the captain of the guard left behind some of the poorest of the land to tend the vineyards and fields.

¹³Moreover, the Chaldeans broke up the bronze pillars and stands and the bronze Sea in the house of the LORD, and they carried the bronze to Babylon.

¹⁴They also took away the pots, shovels, wick trimmers, dishes, and all the articles of bronze used in the temple service.

¹⁵The captain of the guard also took away the censers and sprinkling bowls—anything made of pure gold or fine silver.

¹⁶As for the two pillars, the Sea, and the movable stands that Solomon had made for the house of the LORD, the weight of the bronze from all these articles was beyond measure.

¹⁷Each pillar was eighteen cubits tall. The bronze capital atop one pillar was three cubits high, with a network of bronze pomegranates all around. The second pillar, with its network, was similar.

¹⁸The captain of the guard also took away Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the priest of second rank, and the three doorkeepers.

¹⁹Of those still in the city, he took a court official who had been appointed over the men of war, as well as five royal advisors. He also took the scribe of the captain of the army, who had enlisted the people of the land, and sixty men who were found in the city.

²⁰Nebuzaradan captain of the guard took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah.

²¹There at Riblah in the land of Hamath, the king of Babylon struck them down and put them to death. So Judah was taken into exile, away from its own land.

²²Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon appointed Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, over the people he had left behind in the land of Judah.

²³When all the commanders of the armies and their men heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah as governor, they came to Gedaliah at Mizpah—Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan son of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah son of the Maacathite, as well as their men.

²⁴And Gedaliah took an oath before them and their men, assuring them, “Do not be afraid of the servants of the Chaldeans. Live in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it will be well with you.”

²⁵In the seventh month, however, Ishmael son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, who was a member of the royal family, came with ten men and struck down and killed Gedaliah, along with the Judeans and Chaldeans who were with him at Mizpah.

²⁶Then all the people small and great, together with the commanders of the army, arose and fled to Egypt for fear of the Chaldeans.

²⁷On the twenty-seventh day of the twelfth month of the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Judah’s King Jehoiachin, in the year Evil-merodach became king of Babylon, he released King Jehoiachin of Judah from prison.

²⁸And he spoke kindly to Jehoiachin and set his throne above the thrones of the other kings who were with him in Babylon.

²⁹So Jehoiachin changed out of his prison clothes, and he dined regularly at the king’s table for the rest of his life.

³⁰And the king provided Jehoiachin a daily portion for the rest of his life.