Beginning

Azariah, King of Judah^(A)

15 In the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Azariah son of Amaziah, king of Judah, became king. ² He was sixteen years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jekoliah from Jerusalem. ³ He did what was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his father Amaziah had done. ⁴ But the high places were not removed. The people continued sacrificing and making offerings on the high places.

⁵ The Lord afflicted the king, and he was leprous until the day of his death. He lived in a separate house. Jotham the king’s son was in charge of the house, judging the people of the land.

⁶ Now the rest of the deeds of Azariah, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? ⁷ So Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the City of David. Jotham his son reigned in his place.

Zechariah, King of Israel

⁸ In the thirty-eighth year of Azariah king of Judah, Zechariah the son of Jeroboam became king of Israel in Samaria for six months. ⁹ He did evil in the sight of the Lord, as his fathers had done. He did not turn aside from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin.

¹⁰ Shallum the son of Jabesh conspired against him, struck him at Ibleam, and killed him. Then Shallum reigned in his place. ¹¹ Now the rest of the deeds of Zechariah are written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel. ¹² This was the word of the Lord which He spoke to Jehu, “Your sons will sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation.” And it was so.

Shallum, King of Israel

¹³ Shallum son of Jabesh became king in the thirty-ninth year of Uzziah king of Judah. He reigned for a month in Samaria. ¹⁴ Then Menahem son of Gadi went up from Tirzah, entered Samaria, and struck Shallum son of Jabesh in Samaria and killed him. Then Menahem reigned in his place.

¹⁵ Now the rest of the deeds of Shallum and the conspiracy he made are written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel.

¹⁶ Then Menahem struck Tiphsah and all who were in it, and the territories around Tirzah. Because they did not open up the city to him, he attacked it. Then he split open all its pregnant woman.

Menahem, King of Israel

¹⁷ In the thirty-ninth year of Azariah king of Judah, Menahem son of Gadi became king over Israel for ten years in Samaria. ¹⁸ He did evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not turn aside all his days from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin.

¹⁹ Pul the king of Assyria came against the land, and Menahem gave Pul a thousand talents^[a] of silver, that he might help him strengthen his control of the kingdom. ²⁰ Menahem exacted the money from Israel, from all the very wealthy men, fifty shekels^[b] of silver each, to give to the king of Assyria. So the king of Assyria left and did not stay there in the land.

²¹ The rest of the deeds of Menahem, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel? ²² And Menahem slept with his fathers, and Pekahiah his son reigned in his place.

Pekahiah, King of Israel

²³ In the fiftieth year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekahiah the son of Menahem became king over Israel in Samaria for two years. ²⁴ He did evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not turn aside from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin. ²⁵ But Pekah son of Remaliah, his officer, conspired against him and struck him in Samaria, in the palace of the king’s house, with Argob, Arieh, and fifty men of the Gileadites with him. He killed him and reigned in his place.

²⁶ Now the rest of the deeds of Pekahiah and all that he did are written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel.

Pekah, King of Israel

²⁷ In the fifty-second year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekah son of Remaliah became king over Israel in Samaria for twenty years. ²⁸ He did evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not turn aside from the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin.

²⁹ In the days of Pekah king of Israel, Tiglath-Pileser king of Assyria came and took Ijon, Abel Beth Maakah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, Galilee, and all the land of Naphtali, and then exiled them to Assyria. ³⁰ Then Hoshea son of Elah made a conspiracy against Pekah son of Remaliah and struck and killed him. Then he reigned in his place in the twentieth year of Jotham son of Uzziah.

³¹ The rest of the deeds of Pekah and all that he did are written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel.

Jotham, King of Judah^(B)

³² In the second year of Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, Jotham son of Uzziah, king of Judah, became king. ³³ He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jerusha daughter of Zadok. ³⁴ He did what was right in the sight of the Lord. He did according to all that his father Uzziah had done. ³⁵ Only he did not remove the high places. The people continued sacrificing and making offerings on the high places. He built the upper gate of the house of the Lord.

³⁶ Now the rest of the deeds of Jotham, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? ³⁷ In those days the Lord began to send Rezin king of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah against Judah. ³⁸ Jotham slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the City of David his father. Then Ahaz his son reigned in his place.

Ahaz, King of Judah^(C)

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 became king, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. He did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord his God like David his father. ³ He walked in the way of the kings of Israel and even made his son pass through the fire according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord dispossessed before the children of Israel. ⁴ He sacrificed and made offerings on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.

⁵ Then Rezin king of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem to battle, and they besieged Ahaz but could not subdue him. ⁶ At that time Rezin king of Aram recovered Elath for Aram and expelled the Judeans from Elath. The Edomites came to Elath and live there to this day.

⁷ So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-Pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and save me from the hand of the king of Aram and from the hand of the king of Israel, who are rising up against me.” ⁸ Then Ahaz took the silver and gold that was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasures of the king’s house, and sent a present to the king of Assyria. ⁹ So the king of Assyria listened to him. The king of Assyria went up to Damascus, captured it, exiled the people to Kir, and killed Rezin.

¹⁰ Then King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-Pileser king of Assyria and saw an altar that was in Damascus. King Ahaz sent to Uriah the priest a pattern of the altar and model of it, according to the manner of its construction. ¹¹ Uriah the priest built an altar according to all that King Ahaz had sent from Damascus. Thus Uriah the priest worked until King Ahaz came from Damascus. ¹² When the king came back from Damascus and saw the altar, the king approached the altar and made offerings on it. ¹³ He offered his burnt offering and his grain offering, poured out his libations, and sprinkled the blood of his peace offerings upon the altar. ¹⁴ And the bronze altar that was before the Lord he moved from the front of the house, from between the altar and the house of the Lord. He put it on the north side of the new altar.

¹⁵ Then King Ahaz commanded Uriah the priest, “Upon the great altar offer the morning burnt offering, the evening grain offering, the king’s burnt offering, and his grain offering with the burnt offering of all the people of the land, their grain offering, and their libations. Sprinkle on it all the blood of the burnt offering and all the blood of the sacrifice, and the bronze altar will be for me to inquire by.” ¹⁶ So Uriah the priest did everything that King Ahaz commanded.

¹⁷ King Ahaz cut off the bases of the stands and removed the basin from them. He took down the sea from off the bronze oxen that were under it and put it on stone pavement. ¹⁸ The structure for the Sabbath that they had built in the house and the king’s outer entrance he removed from the house of the Lord for the king of Assyria.

¹⁹ Now the rest of the deeds of Ahaz that he did, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? ²⁰ Ahaz slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the City of David. Then Hezekiah his son reigned in his place.

Hoshea, King of Israel^(D)

17 In the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah, Hoshea son of Elah became king in Samaria over Israel for nine years. ² He did evil in the sight of the Lord, only not as the kings of Israel who were before him.

³ Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against him. Hoshea became his servant and gave him gifts. ⁴ But the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea, for he had sent messengers to So king of Egypt and offered up no gift to the king of Assyria as he had done year by year. So the king of Assyria detained him, and then put him in prison.

Israel Exiled to Assyria

⁵ Then the king of Assyria went throughout all the land, went up to Samaria, and besieged it for three years. ⁶ In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria seized Samaria and exiled Israel to Assyria. He put them in Halah, in Habor by the River of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.

⁷ This happened because the children of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up from the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. They had feared other gods ⁸ and walked in the statutes of the nations, whom the Lord dispossessed before the children of Israel, and walked in the statutes which the kings of Israel had made. ⁹ The children of Israel ascribed things to the Lord their God that were not so, and they built for themselves high places in all their cities from the watchtower to the fortified city. ¹⁰ They set up standing stones and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree. ¹¹ There they burned incense on all the high places, as the nations did whom the Lord had carried away before them. And they did wicked things to provoke the Lord to anger, ¹² for they served idols, of which the Lord had said to them, “You shall not do this thing.” ¹³ But the Lord warned Israel and Judah by all the prophets and by all the seers, saying, “Turn from your evil ways, and keep My commandments and My statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers and which I sent to you by My servants the prophets.”

¹⁴ But they would not listen. They stiffened their necks, like the neck of their fathers, who did not believe in the Lord their God. ¹⁵ They rejected His statutes and His covenant that He had made with their fathers and the decrees He had given them. They followed idols, and became idolaters, and followed the surrounding nations, concerning whom the Lord commanded them, that they should not do like them.

¹⁶ They forsook all the commandments of the Lord their God, made themselves cast images (two calves), made an Asherah pole, worshipped all the host of heaven, and served Baal. ¹⁷ They caused their sons and daughters to pass through the fire, used divination and omens, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord to anger Him.

¹⁸ Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel and removed them from His presence. None remained except the tribe of Judah. ¹⁹ Judah also did not keep the commandments of the Lord their God, but walked in the statutes of Israel which they made. ²⁰ The Lord rejected all the seed of Israel, afflicted them, and gave them into the hand of plunderers until He had cast them out of His presence.

²¹ For He had torn Israel from the house of David, and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. Jeroboam diverted Israel from following the Lord and caused them to sin greatly. ²² For the children of Israel walked in all the sins which Jeroboam committed. They did not turn aside from them ²³ until the Lord removed Israel from His presence as He had said by all His servants the prophets. So Israel was exiled from their land to Assyria until this day.

Assyria Resettles Samaria

²⁴ Then the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Kuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim and put them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel. They possessed Samaria and lived in its cities. ²⁵ Right at the beginning of their settling there, they did not fear the Lord, so the Lord sent lions among them, and they killed some of them. ²⁶ So they said to the king of Assyria, “The nations which you have exiled and settled in the cities of Samaria do not know the law of the god of the land. Therefore He has sent lions among them; they are killing them, because they do not know the requirements of the god of the land.”

²⁷ Then the king of Assyria commanded, “Escort back one of the priests whom you exiled from there and let him go and dwell there. Let him teach them the law of the god of the land.” ²⁸ Then one of the priests whom they had exiled from Samaria came and lived in Bethel. He taught them how they should fear the Lord.

²⁹ But each nation was making its own gods, and they put them in the houses of the high places that the people of Samaria had made, each nation in the cities where they were living. ³⁰ The men of Babylon made Sukkoth Benoth, the men of Kuthah made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, ³¹ the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak. The Sepharvites were burning their children in fire to Adrammelek and Anammelek, the gods of Sepharvaim. ³² They feared the Lord and made from amongst themselves priests of the high places, who were working for them in the houses of the high places. ³³ They feared the Lord, and they were serving their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they exiled from there.

³⁴ To this day they continue to practice their former customs. They do not fear the Lord, nor are they doing according to the statutes, requirements, the law or commandment that the Lord commanded the children of Jacob, whom He named Israel. ³⁵ The Lord had made a covenant and commanded them, saying, “You shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them. You shall not serve them or sacrifice to them. ³⁶ Rather, the Lord, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and an outstretched arm, Him you shall fear, to Him you shall bow down, and to Him you shall sacrifice. ³⁷ The statutes, the ordinances, the law, and the commandment, which He wrote for you, you shall observe to do forever. And you shall not fear other gods. ³⁸ The covenant that I have made with you, you shall not forget. You shall not fear other gods. ³⁹ Rather the Lord your God you shall fear, and He will deliver you from the hand of all your enemies.”

⁴⁰ But they did not listen; rather they were practicing their former customs. ⁴¹ So these nations feared the Lord and were serving their carved images, both their children and their grandchildren, as their fathers did, and so they are doing to this day.