Uzziah (Azariah) King of Judah

26 All the people of Judah took Uzziah,^[a] who was sixteen years old, and made him king in place of his father Amaziah.

² He was the one who built Elat and restored it to Judah after King Amaziah rested with his fathers.

³ Uzziah was sixteen years old when he became king, and he ruled in Jerusalem for fifty-two years. His mother’s name was Jekoliah^[b] from Jerusalem.

⁴ He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, like everything that his father Amaziah had done. ⁵ He continued to seek God throughout the days of Zechariah, who trained him in the fear^[c] of God. As long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper.

⁶ He went out and waged war against the Philistines. He broke down the wall of Gath, the wall of Javneh, and the wall of Ashdod. He built cities in the territory of Ashdod and among the Philistines. ⁷ God helped him against the Philistines, against the Arabs who lived in Gur Baal, and against the Meunites.

⁸ The Ammonites paid tribute to Uzziah. His reputation spread as far as the border of Egypt because he had become very strong. ⁹ Uzziah built towers in Jerusalem at the Corner Gate, at the Valley Gate, and at the Angle, and he fortified them.

¹⁰ He built towers in the wilderness. He dug many cisterns because he had large herds both in the Shephelah and on the plains. He also had farmers and vineyard workers in the highlands and in the fertile lands,^[d] because he loved the soil.

¹¹ Uzziah had an army, well trained and ready for war, organized in divisions based on the numbers from the census taken by Jeiel the secretary and Ma’aseiah the officer, under the direction of Hananiah, one of the king’s officials.

¹² The total number of the leading fathers^[e] who led the powerful warriors was 2,600. ¹³ Under their command there was a strong army of 307,500 men, able to wage war as a very powerful force, to help the king against the enemy. ¹⁴ Uzziah supplied the whole army with shields, spears, helmets, coats of mail, bows, and stones for slingshots. ¹⁵ In Jerusalem he made war machines produced by clever inventors to be mounted on the towers and at the corners, to shoot arrows and hurl large stones. His reputation spread far and wide because he received marvelous help until he was strong.

Uzziah’s Sinful Pride and Death

¹⁶ But when he had grown powerful, the pride in his heart led to his destruction. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God. He entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense.

¹⁷ Azariah the priest went in after him. He was followed by eighty priests of the Lord, brave men. ¹⁸ They confronted King Uzziah and said to him, “It is not right for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord. That is for the priests, the sons of Aaron, who are consecrated to burn incense. Get out of the sanctuary, because you have been unfaithful. This action will not result in any praise for you from the Lord God.”

¹⁹ Uzziah became angry. He had a censer for burning incense in his hand. When he became angry with the priests, leprosy^[f] broke out on his forehead in the presence of the priests, beside the altar of incense in the House of the Lord. ²⁰ When Azariah, the head priest, and all the other priests looked at him, they immediately realized he had leprosy on his forehead. They rushed him out of there. He himself also was in a hurry to leave because the Lord had struck him.

²¹ King Uzziah remained a leper until the day of his death. He lived in a quarantined house because he was a leper. He was excluded from the House of the Lord. Jotham his son was in charge of the palace of the king and administered justice for the people of the land.

²² The rest of the acts of Uzziah, from first to last, were recorded by Isaiah son of Amoz, the prophet.

²³ Uzziah rested with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the burial field that belonged to the kings, because they said, “He is a leper.” His son Jotham ruled as king in his place.