2 Kings 23

1So they reported the word to the king: and the king sent and gathered all the elders ofJuda and Jerusalem to himself. 2And the king went up to the house of the Lord, and every man of Juda and all who livedin Jerusalem with him, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people small and great; and he readin their ears all the words of the book of the covenant that was found in the house of the Lord. 3And the king stood by a pillar, and made a covenant before the Lord, to walk after theLord, to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his ordinances with all the heart and with allthe soul, to confirm the words of this covenant;even the things written in this book. And all the people stood to the covenant. 4And the king commanded Chelcias the high priest, and the priests of the second order,and them that kept the door, to bring out of the temple of the Lord all the vessels that were made forBaal, and for the grove, and all the host of heaven, and he burned them without Jerusalem in the fieldsof Kedron, and took the ashes of them to Baethel. 5And he burned the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Judahad appointed, (and they burned incense in the high places and in the cities of Juda, and theplaces around about Jerusalem); and them that burned incense to Baal, and to the sun, and to the moon,and to Mazuroth, and to all the host of heaven. 6And he carried out the grove from the house of the Lord to the brook Kedron, and burnedit at the brook Kedron, and reduced it to powder, and cast its powder on the sepulchres of the sons ofthe people. 7And he pulled down the house of the sodomites that were by the house of the Lord, wherethe women wove tents for the grove. 8And he brought up all the priest from the cities of Juda, and defiled the high placeswhere the priests burned incense, from Gaebal even to Bersabee; and he pulled down the house of the gatesthat was by the door of the gate of Joshua the ruler of the city, on a man's left hand at the gate ofthe city. 9Only the priests of the high places went not up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem,for they only ate leavened bread in the midst of their brethren. 10And he defiled Taphes which is in the valley of the son of Ennom,constructed for a man to cause his son or his daughter to pass through fire to Moloch. 11And he burned the horses which the king of Juda had given to the sun in the entranceof the house of the Lord, by the treasury of Nathan the king's eunuch, in the suburbs; and he burned thechariot of the sun with fire. 12And the altars that were on the roof of the upper chamber of Achaz, which the kings ofJuda had made, and the altars which Manasses had made in the two courts of the house of the Lord, didthe king pull down and forcibly remove from thence, and cast their dust into the brook of Kedron. 13And the king defiled the house that was before Jerusalem, on the right hand of the mountof Mosthath, which Solomon king of Israel built to Astarte the abomination of the Sidonians, and to Chamosthe abomination of Moab, and to Moloch the abomination of the children of Ammon. 14And he broke in pieces the pillars, and utterly destroyed the groves, and filled theirplaces with the bones of men. 15Also the high altar in Baethel, which Jeroboam the son of Nabat, who made Israel to sin,had made, even that high altar he tore down, and broke in pieces the stones of it, and reduced it to powder,and burnt the grove. 16And Josias turned aside, and saw the tombs that were there in the city, and sent, andtook the bones out of the tombs, and burnt them on the altar, and defiled it, according to the word ofthe Lord which the man of God spoke, when Jeroboam stood by the altar at the feast: and he turned andraised his eyes to the tomb of the man of God that spoke these words. 17And he said, Whatis that mound which I see? And the men of the city said to him,It is the grave of the man of God that came out of Juda, and uttered these imprecations whichhe imprecated upon the altar of Baethel. 18And he said, Let him alone; let no one disturb his bones. So his bones were spared, togetherwith the bones of the prophet that came out of Samaria. 19Moreover Josias removed all the houses of the high places that were in the cities ofSamaria, which the kings of Israel made to provoke the Lord, and did to them all that he did in Baethel. 20And he sacrificed all the priests of the high places that were there on the altars, andburnt the bones of men upon them, and returned to Jerusalem. 21And the king commanded all the people, saying, Keep the passover to the Lord your God,as it is written in the book of this covenant. 22For a passoversuch as this had not been kept from the days of the judges who judged Israel, even all thedays of the kings of Israel, and of the kings of Juda. 23But in the eighteenth year of king Josias, was the passover kept to the Lord in Jerusalem. 24Moreover Josias removed the sorcerers, and the wizards, and the theraphin, and the idols,and all the abominations that had been set up in the land of Juda and in Jerusalem, that he might keepthe words of the law that were written in the book, which Chelcias the priest found in the house of theLord. 25There was no king like him before him, who turned to the Lord with all his heart, andwith all his soul, and with all his strength, according to all the law of Moses; and after him there rosenot one like him. 26Nevertheless the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his great anger, wherewith hewas angry in his anger against Juda, because of the provocations, wherewith Manasses provoked him. 27And the Lord said, I will also remove Juda from my presence, as I removed Israel, andwill reject this city which I have choseneven Jerusalem, and the houseof which I said, My name shall be there. 28And the rest of the acts of Josias, and all that he did,are not these things written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Juda? 29And in his days went up Pharao Nechao king of Egypt against the king of the Assyriansto the river Euphrates: and Josias went out to meet him: and Nechao killed him in Mageddo when he sawhim. 30And his servants carried him dead from Mageddo, and brought him to Jerusalem, and buriedhim in his sepulchre: and the people of the land took Joachaz the son of Josias, and anointed him, andmade him king in the room of his father. 31Twenty and three years old was Joachaz when he began to reign, and he reigned three monthsin Jerusalem: and his mother's namewas Amital, daughter of Jeremias of Lobna. 32And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his fathersdid. 33And Pharao Nechao removed him to Rablaam in the land of Emath, so that he should notreign in Jerusalem; and imposed a tribute on the land, a hundred talents of silver, and a hundred talentsof gold. 34And Pharao Nechao made Eliakim son of Josias king of Juda king over them in the placeof his father Josias, and he changed his nameto Joakim, and he took Joachaz and brought him to Egypt, and he died there. 35And Joakim gave the silver and the gold to Pharao; but he assessed the land to give themoney at the command of Pharao: they gave the silver and the goldeach man according to his assessment together with the people of the land to give to PharaoNechao. 36Twenty-five years oldwas Joakim when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and his mother'snamewas Jeldaph, daughter of Phadail of Ruma. 37And he did that which was evil in the eyes of the lord, according to all that his fathershad done.