³ For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young (sixteen), he began to seek after and inquire of the God of his father David; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, the Asherim, and the carved and cast images. ⁴ They tore down the altars of the Baals in his presence; he cut to pieces the incense altars that were high above them; he also smashed the Asherim and the carved images and the cast images to pieces, and ground them to dust and scattered it on the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. ⁵ Then Josiah burned the bones of the [pagan] priests on their altars and purged and cleansed Judah and Jerusalem. ⁶ In the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, Simeon, and as far as Naphtali, in their surrounding ruins, ⁷ he tore down the altars and beat and crushed the Asherim and the carved images into powder, and cut to pieces all the incense altars throughout the land of Israel. Then he returned to Jerusalem.