Beginning
23 The king ordered an assembly of all of Judah’s and Jerusalem’s elders. 2 He then went to the Eternal’s temple with all the citizens of Jerusalem and the men of Judah, as well as the priests and prophets and people of all statuses, and he read to them everything in the covenant book that was discovered in the Eternal’s house.
3 While standing next to the sacred pillar, the king proclaimed a covenant before the Eternal One. He promised to follow the Eternal, to obey His commands and laws and testaments with all his being. He promised to honor every word of the covenant book that had been discovered in the temple. Everyone who was present entered into the covenant with the king.
4 The king gave a command to the high priest, Hilkiah, and to the priests of the second order, as well as the doormen. He told them to remove from the Eternal’s house all the vessels that were crafted to honor Baal, Asherah, and all the other gods of the skies. He set them on fire in the fields of Kidron outside of Jerusalem, and then he transported the ashes to Bethel.
5 He got rid of the corrupted priests who worshiped false gods and whom the old kings of Judah had instructed to burn incense in the high places in Judah’s cities and in the land all around Jerusalem, and those who honored Baal and the sun and moon and stars and all the gods of the skies by burning incense.
6 The king removed the sacred pole from the Eternal’s temple, and he set it on fire at the Kidron brook just outside Jerusalem. He crushed it until it was nothing more than a pile of dust, and then he tossed the dust onto ordinary graves, further contaminating it by contact with dead bodies. 7 He destroyed the houses of cult prostitutes next to the house of the Eternal, where women were weaving hangings for the sacred pole. 8 He assembled in Jerusalem all of Judah’s priests and destroyed the high places from Geba to Beersheba where they had burned incense. He tore down the high places of the gates located on the left side of the city gates near the gate of Joshua, who was governor of Jerusalem.
9 The corrupted priests of the high places did not approach the Eternal’s altar in Jerusalem, but they filled their bellies with unleavened bread in the company of their families, since they would not travel to Jerusalem to perform their religious duties.
10 The king destroyed Topheth as well. Topheth is in the valley of Hinnom’s son. He did this so that no man could offer his children as a burnt sacrifice to Molech.
11 Close to the entrance to the Eternal’s house, near the official Nathan-melech’s chamber in the area around the temple, were horses that Judah’s kings had dedicated to the sun. The king removed the horses and set fire to the chariots of the sun as well.
12 The king also tore down the roof altars, Ahaz’s upper room which was crafted by Judah’s kings, and the altars crafted by Manasseh for the two courts in the Eternal’s house. He crushed them into piles of dust, and then he tossed the dust into the Kidron brook. 13 The king also destroyed the high places south of the mountain of corruption, which Solomon (Israel’s king) constructed east of Jerusalem to honor Ashtoreth, the corrupt Sidonian goddess; Chemosh, the corrupt Moabite god; and Milcom, the corrupt Ammonite god. 14 He shattered the sacred pillars and chopped down the sacred poles. In their place, he desecrated their sites by contact with corpses.
15 He tore down the altar at Bethel, the high place—the one erected by Jeroboam (Nebat’s son), the very Jeroboam who caused the Israelites to live sinful lives. He crushed the rocks and pounded them into dust and set fire to the sacred pole.
16 Josiah turned and observed the graves there on the mountain; and he sent men to gather up the bones and set fire to them on the altar, defiling the altar by contact with corpses exactly as the Eternal One had spoken through the man of God.[a]
Josiah (noticing a specific burial plot): 17 What is the significance of that marker?
Men of the City: This is a grave marker for the man of God from Judah who prophesied the very things which you have just done to the altar at Bethel.
Josiah: 18 Leave him be. No one is to lay a finger on his bones, so that he may rest in peace.
They let his bones rest in peace next to the bones of the Samaritan prophet.[b]
19 Josiah tore down all the temples of the high places built by Israel’s kings in the Samaritan cities. These high places had caused the Eternal’s anger to boil. Josiah did the same thing to these houses as he did to the houses in Bethel.
20 Josiah also killed all the priests who were present at the high places. He killed them on the altars and set fire to their bones. Then he went back to the place from which he came—Jerusalem.
Josiah (to the people): 21 The covenant book that was found in the temple says we must observe the Passover and rejoice in the Eternal One our God, who led us out of bondage in Egypt.
22 The Passover had not been observed from the time when the judges judged Israel, even throughout all the generations of Israel’s kings and Judah’s kings. 23 But during King Josiah’s 18th year, the Passover was celebrated in honor of the Eternal One in Jerusalem.
24 In addition, Josiah destroyed the clairvoyants, necromancers, household gods, idols, and every other corruption in Judah and in Jerusalem, so that he could make things right according to the laws and commands of the covenant book Hilkiah the priest had discovered in the Eternal’s house.
25 No king before him or after him ever gave himself to the Eternal so fully and deeply as Josiah did. He offered to the Eternal with all his being: all of his heart, all of his soul, and all his might, in accordance with the sacred law given through Moses.
26 Still the Eternal did not abandon His immense wrath. It boiled against Judah, because of all the wickedness Manasseh had committed against Him.
Eternal One: 27 I will remove Judah from before My presence. I will do this just as I have done it to Israel. I will cast aside Jerusalem, the city I chose for My temple when I said, “This will be the dwelling place for My name.”
28 Is not the rest of Josiah’s story—his actions and lasting legacy—documented in the book of the chronicles of Judah’s kings?
29 Josiah’s death happened this way: Pharaoh Neco, Egypt’s king, marched north with his army to the Euphrates River to meet with Assyria’s king. King Josiah mustered his forces and attempted to block Neco’s advance.
The situation has changed for Assyria in the 100 years since the Northern Kingdom was conquered. About 7 years after the Babylonians conquer the Assyrian capital of Nineveh, Neco is actually rushing to the aid of Assyria instead of fighting to destroy her. The Egyptian and Assyrian plan is to defeat Babylonia; and unfortunately, Josiah is in the way. The death of the good king Josiah and the victory of Babylonia over both Assyria and Egypt doom Judah to becoming part of the Babylonian Empire.
In the ensuing battle, Neco and his forces killed Josiah at Megiddo. 30 Josiah’s servants took his body back to Jerusalem from Megiddo in a chariot. They laid him to rest in his own tomb instead of in a tomb with his fathers. The people of Judah then took Josiah’s son, Jehoahaz, and anointed him and set him upon the throne of his father as king.
31 Jehoahaz was 23 years old when he inherited the throne. His reign in Jerusalem lasted three months. His mother was Hamutal (Jeremiah’s daughter from Libnah). 32 He committed evil in the Eternal’s eyes, just as his ancestors had done before him.
33 Pharaoh Neco put him in prison at Riblah in Hamath so that he would no longer sit on the throne in Jerusalem. He forced a fee on Judah—7,500 pounds of silver and 75 pounds of gold. 34 Pharaoh Neco appointed Eliakim (Josiah’s son) as king and gave him a new name—Jehoiakim. He transported Jehoahaz to Egypt, where he spent his last days. 35 Jehoiakim handed over all the silver and gold to Pharaoh. It was all tax money he had quickly gathered from the people of the land. He demanded silver and gold from the citizens, according to the tax assessment of each person, and he gave it to Pharaoh Neco.
36 Jehoiakim was 25 years old when he was given the throne by Neco. His reign in Jerusalem lasted 11 years. His mother was Zebidah (Pedaiah’s daughter from Rumah). 37 He committed evil in the Eternal’s eyes. He was just like his ancestors.
24 Early in Jehoiakim’s reign, Nebuchadnezzar, Babylon’s king, came into the land; and Jehoiakim was in his service three years. Then Jehoiakim rebelled. 2 The Eternal One dispatched Chaldeans, Arameans, Moabites, and Ammonites to demolish Judah, in accordance with the message the Eternal spoke through His servants the prophets.
3 Because of Manasseh’s abhorrent wickedness and all he did, Judah was removed from the presence of the Eternal One, just as He had commanded. 4 His wrath came because of the innocent blood Manasseh had flooded Jerusalem with. He would not forgive them.
5 Is not the rest of Jehoiakim’s story—his actions and lasting legacy—documented in the book of the chronicles of Judah’s kings? 6 Jehoiakim left this world to sleep with his fathers. His son, Jehoiachin, then inherited the throne.
7 Egypt’s king never departed from his own country again because Babylon’s king, Nebuchadnezzar, ruled everything that had formerly been in the possession of Egypt’s king, all the way from the brook of Egypt to the Euphrates River.
8 Jehoiachin was 18 years old when he inherited the throne. His reign in Jerusalem lasted 3 months. His mother was Nehushta (Elnathan’s daughter from Jerusalem). 9 He committed evil in the Eternal’s eyes. He was just like his father.
10-11 During that time, the servants of Nebuchadnezzar (king of Babylon) put Jerusalem under siege, and Nebuchadnezzar entered the city during the siege. 12 Jehoiachin, Judah’s king, met with Nebuchadnezzar face-to-face in a peaceful surrender, along with Jehoiachin’s mother, servants, commanders, and administrators. The king of Babylon took Jehoiachin captive during the eighth year of his reign. 13 He cleaned out all the treasuries in the Eternal’s temple and in the king’s palace, and he also took and cut into pieces all the gold vessels Solomon (king of Israel) had crafted in the Eternal’s temple, just as the Eternal One had said.[c] He left nothing. 14 Nebuchadnezzar then gathered up all of Jerusalem—the commanders, warriors, craftsmen, and artisans (10,000 in all)—and forced them into exile. Only the poorest people remained.
Like Assyria, Babylonia exiles the people when they conquer any new territory. There is an important difference, however. When the Assyrians conquered a city, they sent all the people into different parts of their empire and filled that city with foreigners of several other nationalities. This “shook up” the nations, kept them from retaining their prior identities, and lowered the chance of civil war. The Babylonians, on the other hand, leave some people in Judah and allow those who are exiled to continue practicing their religion. Because they are able to retain their religious and national identities, the Judeans (now known as “Jews”) will be able to move back into the land and rebuild one day.
15 Nebuchadnezzar forced Jehoiachin, his mother, his wives, his administrators, and the elders of Judah into exile in Babylon. 16 He also forced 7,000 warriors and 1,000 craftsmen and artisans into exile in Babylon. 17 Nebuchadnezzar then appointed Jehoiachin’s uncle, Mattaniah, to take his place as king, and Nebuchadnezzar gave Mattaniah a new name—Zedekiah.
18 Zedekiah was 21 years old when he was given the throne by Nebuchadnezzar. His reign in Jerusalem lasted 11 years. His mother was Hamutal (Jeremiah’s daughter) from Libnah. 19 Zedekiah committed evil in the Eternal’s eyes. He was wicked like Jehoiakim.
20 This all took place in Jerusalem and Judah because of the Eternal’s boiling anger. The Eternal One moved them out of the land and away from His presence.
Then, Zedekiah turned his back on Nebuchadnezzar.
25 On the 10th day of the 10th month, during the 9th year of his reign, Nebuchadnezzar (Babylon’s king) and his entire army surrounded Jerusalem. They camped outside the city and built siege ramps around it. 2 The city remained under siege until the 11th year of Zedekiah’s reign.
3 On the 9th day of the 4th month, there was a food shortage in the city, and no one had anything to eat. Everyone became afraid of starvation. 4 The city wall was breached, and all the warriors ran out during the night through the gateway between the two walls near the king’s garden, in spite of the Chaldeans surrounding the city. The warriors went on the Arabah road. 5 The Chaldean army chased after the fleeing king and caught up to him in the fields of Jericho. His army dispersed in all directions. 6 They took the king captive and escorted him to Babylon’s king at Riblah. Nebuchadnezzar decided on a punishment for the king: 7 they killed Zedekiah’s sons right in front of Zedekiah; then they gouged out Zedekiah’s eyes so that the slaughter of his sons was the last thing he ever saw, and they put him in bronze shackles and transported him to Babylon.
8 On the 7th day, during the 5th month of Nebuchadnezzar’s 19th year as king over Babylon, Nebuzaradan, a servant of the king and captain of Nebuchadnezzar’s guards, arrived in Jerusalem. 9 Nebuzaradan set fire to the Eternal’s temple, the palace, and every house in Jerusalem. He burned down every large house and structure in Jerusalem. 10 The entire Chaldean army, who was with Nebuzaradan, tore down Jerusalem’s walls. 11 Nebuzaradan captured everyone who was still in the city, even the renegades who had fled to Nebuchadnezzar, and he forced them into exile. 12 But Nebuzaradan spared the poorest people and left them to take care of the land as farmers and gardeners.
13 The Chaldeans took everything of value. They took the bronze pillars, stands, and the bronze sea in the Eternal’s temple; and they broke them up into pieces and took the bronze to Babylon. 14 They also took the pans, the shovels, the snuffers, the bronze objects, and every bronze cup that was used during the rituals of the temple. 15 Nebuzaradan took the coal pans and bowls and all the gold and purified silver. 16 The amount of bronze (including the two bronze pillars, the bronze sea, and the bronze stands Solomon crafted for the Eternal’s temple) was so great that it could not be weighed. 17 Each pillar was 27 feet high with a bronze capital. The capital was 54 inches high, and it was covered with bronze network and bronze pomegranates. Both pillars were exactly alike.
18 Nebuzaradan gathered Seraiah, the head priest, and Zephaniah, the second priest, along with the three doorkeepers. 19 In the city, he gathered up one officer of the army, five of the king’s counselors, the army captain’s aide for mustering the troops, and 60 other Judahite men. 20 Nebuzaradan (captain of the guard) escorted them to Babylon’s king at Riblah. 21 Nebuchadnezzar killed them all at Riblah in Hamath. Thus Judah was separated from the land and forced into exile.
22 Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had allowed some people to remain in Judah, so he appointed Gedaliah (son of Ahikam, Shaphan’s son) to govern the land. 23 When all the army commanders received word that Nebuchadnezzar had appointed Gedeliah to govern the land, they went to visit Gedeliah in Mizpah. Those who visited him were Ishmael (Nethaniah’s son), Johanan (Kareah’s son), Seraiah (Tanhumeth the Netophathite’s son), and Jaazaniah (the Maacathite’s son), including their men. 24 Gedaliah attempted to assuage them and swore an oath before them.
Gedaliah: Do not fear those Babylonian officials who serve the Chaldeans. If you dwell here and give your service to the Babylonian king, then you will live in peace and have nothing to fear.
25 But during the 7th month, Ishmael, (son of Nethaniah, Elishama’s son) of the royal family, attacked Gedaliah with 10 male accomplices. Gedaliah and all the Jews and Chaldeans at Mizpah were killed. 26 Everyone in the community, both rich and poor, even the commanders of the army, traveled to Egypt because they greatly feared the Chaldeans.
27 On the 27th day of the 12th month during the 37th year of the exile of Jehoiachin (Judah’s king), Evil-merodach (Babylon’s king) released Jehoiachin from prison. Evil-merodach did this the same year he inherited the throne. 28 Evil-merodach was good to Jehoiachin, and he gave Jehoiachin an honorary throne that was higher than all the thrones of the other kings held captive in Babylon. 29 Jehoiachin removed his prison garments and put on new clothes. He ate his meals with the king every day for the rest of his life. 30 The king also gave him a stipend on a daily basis for the rest of his life.
Sitting in a foreign country and getting comfortable with pagan ways isn’t the end of the story for Judah. A remnant will return to re-found Jerusalem and Israel, a story that is told in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. God will lift out of captivity those people who remain faithful to Him in spite of difficult circumstances.
For the Northern Kingdom of Israel, their fate is not so clear. When Assyria exiles the northern Israelites all over the empire, those ten tribes are lost. For centuries people have developed theories as to what happened to them, some more far-fetched than others, but one thing is certain: whatever is left of the proper worship of God when they are captured dies among those people. Without that connection to Him, there is no one to save them.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.