⁴⁵ Meanwhile the attendants (guards) had gone back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, Why have you not brought Him here with you?

⁴⁶ The attendants replied, Never has a man talked as this Man talks! [No mere man has ever spoken as He speaks!]

⁴⁷ The Pharisees said to them, Are you also deluded and led astray? [Are you also swept off your feet?]

⁴⁸ Has any of the authorities or of the Pharisees believed in Him?

⁴⁹ As for this multitude (rabble) that does not know the Law, they are contemptible and doomed and accursed!

⁵⁰ Then Nicodemus, who came to Jesus before at night and was one of them, asked,

⁵¹ Does our Law convict a man without giving him a hearing and finding out what he has done?

⁵² They answered him, Are you too from Galilee? Search [the Scriptures yourself], and you will see that no prophet comes (will rise to prominence) from Galilee.

^53 [a]And they went [back], each to his own house.

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15 In the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam [II] king of Israel, Azariah (Uzziah) son of Amaziah king of Judah began to reign.

² He was sixteen years old when he began his fifty-two-year reign in Jerusalem. His mother was Jecoliah of Jerusalem.

³ He did right in the Lord’s sight, in keeping with all his father Amaziah had done—

⁴ Except the high places were not removed; the people sacrificed and burned incense still on the high places.

⁵ And the Lord smote the king, so that he was a leper to his dying day, and dwelt in a separate house. Jotham the king’s son was over the household, judging the people of the land.^(A)

⁶ The rest of Azariah’s acts, all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

⁷ Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with them in the City of David. Jotham his son reigned in his stead.

⁸ In the thirty-eighth year of Azariah king of Judah Zechariah son of Jeroboam [II] reigned over Israel in Samaria six months.

⁹ He did evil in the sight of the Lord, as his fathers had done; he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam [I] son of Nebat, with which he made Israel to sin.

¹⁰ Shallum son of Jabesh conspired against Zechariah and struck and killed him before the people and reigned in his stead.

¹¹ The rest of the acts of Zechariah, see, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

¹² This was the fulfillment of the promise to Jehu from the Lord: Your sons shall sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation. And so it came to pass.^(B)

¹³ Shallum son of Jabesh, in the thirty-ninth year of Uzziah king of Judah, began his reign of a full month in Samaria.

¹⁴ For Menahem son of Gadi went up from Tirzah and came to Samaria, and smote and killed Shallum son of Jabesh in Samaria and reigned in his stead.

¹⁵ The rest of Shallum’s acts, his conspiracy, see, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

¹⁶ Then Menahem smote Tiphsah and all who were in it and its territory from Tirzah on; he attacked it because they did not open to him. And all ^[a]the women there who were with child he ripped up.

¹⁷ In the thirty-ninth year of Azariah king of Judah, Menahem son of Gadi began his ten-year reign over Israel in Samaria.

¹⁸ He did evil in the sight of the Lord; he did not depart all his days from the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he caused Israel to sin.

¹⁹ There came against the land Pul king of Assyria, and Menahem gave Pul 1,000 talents of silver, that he might help him to confirm his kingship.

²⁰ Menahem exacted the money from Israel, from all the men of wealth, from each man fifty shekels of silver to give to the king of Assyria. So the king of Assyria turned back and did not stay in the land.

²¹ The rest of Menahem’s acts, all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?

²² Menahem slept with his fathers; Pekahiah his son reigned in his stead.

²³ In the fiftieth year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekahiah son of Menahem began his two-year reign over Israel in Samaria.

²⁴ He did evil in the sight of the Lord; he did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam [I] son of Nebat, which he made Israel sin.

²⁵ But Pekah son of Remaliah, his captain, conspired against [Pekahiah] and attacked him in Samaria, in the citadel of the king’s house, with Argob and Arieh; [for] with [Pekah] were fifty Gileadites. And he killed him and reigned in his stead.

²⁶ The rest of the acts of Pekahiah, all he did, see, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

²⁷ In the fifty-second year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekah son of Remaliah began his twenty-year reign over Israel in Samaria.

²⁸ He did evil in the Lord’s sight; he did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam [I] son of Nebat, which he made Israel sin.

²⁹ In the days of Pekah king of Israel, Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria came and took Ijon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and carried the people captive to Assyria.

³⁰ Hoshea son of Elah conspired against Pekah son of Remaliah [of Israel]; he smote and killed him, and reigned in his stead in the twentieth year of Jotham son of Uzziah king of Judah.

³¹ The rest of Pekah’s acts, all that he did, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of Israel’s Kings.

³² In the second year of Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel, Jotham son of Uzziah king of Judah became king.

³³ When he was twenty-five years old, he began his reign of sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jerusha daughter of Zadok.

³⁴ He did right in the Lord’s sight, according to all his father Uzziah had done.

³⁵ Yet the high places were not removed; the people sacrificed and burned incense still on the high places. He built the Upper Gate of the house of the Lord.

³⁶ The rest of the acts of Jotham, all he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of Judah’s Kings?

³⁷ In those days the Lord began sending Rezin king of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah against Judah.

³⁸ Jotham slept with his fathers and was buried [with them] in the city of David his [forefather]. Ahaz his son succeeded him.

16 In the seventeenth year of Pekah son of Remaliah, Ahaz son of Jotham king of Judah became king.

² Ahaz was twenty years old when he began his sixteen-year reign in Jerusalem. He did not do right in the sight of the Lord his God, like David his [forefather].

³ But he walked in the ways of Israel’s kings, yes, and made his son pass through the fire [and offered him as a sacrifice], in accord with the abominable [idolatrous] practices of the [heathen] nations whom the Lord drove out before the Israelites.

⁴ He sacrificed and burned incense in the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.

⁵ Then Rezin king of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war; they besieged Ahaz, but could not conquer him.

⁶ At that time, Rezin king of Syria got back Elath [in Edom] for Syria and drove the Jews from [it]. The Syrians came to Elath and dwell there to this day.

⁷ So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, saying, I am your servant and son. Come up and save me out of the hands of the kings of Syria and of Israel, who are attacking me.

⁸ And Ahaz took the silver and gold in the house of the Lord and in the treasuries of the king’s house and sent a present to the king of Assyria.

⁹ Assyria’s king hearkened to him; he went up against Damascus, took it, carried its people captive to Kir, and slew Rezin.

¹⁰ King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, and saw there their [heathen] altar. King Ahaz sent to Urijah the priest a model of the altar and an exact pattern for its construction.

¹¹ So Urijah the priest built an altar according to all that King Ahaz had sent from Damascus, finishing it before King Ahaz returned.

¹² When the king came from Damascus, he looked at the altar and offered on it.

¹³ King Ahaz burned his burnt offering and his cereal offering, poured his drink offering, and dashed the blood of his peace offerings upon that altar.

¹⁴ The bronze altar which was before the Lord he removed from the front of the house, from between his [new] altar and the house of the Lord, and put it on the north side of his altar.

¹⁵ And King Ahaz commanded Urijah the priest: Upon the principal (the new) altar, burn the morning burnt offering, the evening cereal offering, the king’s burnt sacrifice and his cereal offering, with the burnt offering and cereal offering and drink offering of all the people of the land; and dash upon the [new] altar all the blood of the burnt offerings and the sacrifices. But the [old] bronze altar shall be kept for me to use to inquire by [of the Lord].

¹⁶ Urijah the priest did all this as King Ahaz commanded.

¹⁷ [To keep Assyria’s king from getting them] King Ahaz cut off the panels of the bases [of the ten lavers] and removed the laver from each of them; and he took down the Sea from off the bronze oxen that were under it and put it upon stone supports.

¹⁸ And the covered way for the Sabbath that they had built in the temple court, and the king’s outer entrance, he removed from the house of the Lord, because of the king of Assyria [who if he heard of them might seize them].

¹⁹ The rest of the acts of Ahaz, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

²⁰ Ahaz slept with his fathers and was buried [with them] in the City of David. Hezekiah his son reigned in his stead.