2 Kings 23:21-37 ▼

21 And 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.

22 Surely no such a passover had been kept from the days of the judges who judged Israel nor in all the days of the kings of Israel nor of the kings of Judah,

23 Like that in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, when this passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

24 Moreover the men with familiar spirits and the wizards and the images and the idols and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem did Josiah put away, that he might perform the words of the law which were written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in the house of the LORD.

25 And like unto him was there no king before him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all that which is written in the law of Moses; neither after him arose there any like him.

26 Nevertheless the LORD did not turn from the fierceness of his great wrath wherewith his anger was kindled against Judah because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked him.

27 And the LORD said, I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel, and I will cast off this city Jerusalem which I have chosen, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there.

28 Now the rest of the acts of Josiah and all that he did, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah.

29 In his days Pharaoh the Lame, king of Egypt went up against Mabog which is by the river Euphrates; and King Josiah went to meet him, to fight against him; and Pharaoh said to him, I have not come against you, turn aside from me; but Josiah did not listen to him; so Pharaoh smote him at Megiddo, when he saw him there.

30 And his servants carried him in a chariot dead from Megiddo, and brought him to Jerusalem and buried him there in his own sepulchre. And the people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah and anointed him and made him king in his father's stead.

31 Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign; and he reigned three months in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Hamutal, the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

32 And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, just as Manasseh had done.

33 And Pharaoh the Lame, king of Egypt put him in bands at Diblath in the land of Hamath, when Pharaoh took over Jerusalem; and levied on the land a tribute of one hundred talents of silver and ten talents of gold.

34 And Pharaoh the Lame made Eliakim the son of Josiah king in the place of Josiah his father, and changed his name to Jehoiakim, and he took Jehoahaz away, and brought him to Egypt and he died there.

35 And Jehoiakim gave the silver and gold to Pharaoh; but he taxed the land to give the money as he was commanded by Pharaoh; he exacted silver and gold from the people of the land, of every one according to his means, to give it to Pharaoh the Lame.

36 Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Zebudah, the daughter of Peraiah of Ramtha.

37 And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his fathers had done.