Read the Modern Pastor’s Version

The king summoned all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem to join him at the Lord's house. There, he gathered with them all the men of Judah and Jerusalem, as well as the priests, prophets, and every member of the community, from the youngest to the oldest.

Together, they read aloud from the covenant book that had been found in the Lord's house, which contained all the words of the agreement. The king stood before a pillar, making a solemn promise before the Lord that he would follow his ways and keep all his commands, testimonies, and statutes with every ounce of his being. He committed to fulfilling the terms of this covenant written in the book. All the people joined him in this commitment.

The king ordered Hilkiah, the high priest, along with the priests who served at the second altar and those responsible for guarding the entrance to the temple, to remove all the objects used to worship Baal, Asherah, and other gods from the temple. He then took these items outside Jerusalem to the Kidron Valley and burned them there, scattering their ashes in Bethel.

The king also dismantled the idolatrous priests whom the kings of Judah had appointed to burn incense at high places throughout the cities of Judah and around Jerusalem, including those who worshiped Baal, the sun, moon, stars, and the entire host of heaven. He brought out Asherah from the temple in Jerusalem, located just outside the city, to the Kidron Valley, where he burned it, ground its remains into dust, and scattered that dust on graves.

The king also tore down the houses of male shrine prostitutes near the Lord's house, where women had woven hangings for Asherah. He removed all the priests from their cities in Judah and defiled the high places they used to burn incense at, from Geba to Beersheba, including those found at the city gates.

The priests who served at these high places no longer went up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem but instead ate unleavened bread among their brothers. The king also desecrated Topheth, which was located in the valley of the children of Hinnom.

The king took away the horses given by Judah's kings for sun worship at the entrance of the temple and burned those chariots dedicated to the sun with fire. He destroyed the altars that Ahaz and Manasseh had built on top of a chamber and in two courts within the Lord's house, scattering their dust into the Kidron Valley.

The king also defiled the high places built before Jerusalem, including those located on Mount Corruption, which Solomon, Israel's king, had constructed for Ashtoreth, Chemosh, and Milcom. He smashed these idols, cut down the sacred poles, and filled their places with human bones.

Josiah tore down the altar at Bethel and the high place that Jeroboam had built there to lead Israel astray. The king burned this altar, crushed it into powder, and then lit a fire on it by burning Asherah. While Josiah was destroying the altar, he saw tombs nearby in the mountains; he ordered them opened, removed the bones inside, and burned those bones on the altar as God had commanded through the prophet.

Josiah asked about the tomb, and the city residents explained that it belonged to a man of God who had come from Judah to denounce the altar at Bethel. Josiah said not to disturb the man's remains or those of the prophet who came from Samaria. The bones were left alone with the prophet's bones.

The king destroyed all the high places in cities across Samaria, which Israel's kings had built to provoke God's anger, doing exactly what he had done at Bethel. Josiah removed the priests who served at these high places and scattered human ashes on them before returning to Jerusalem.

The king instructed all the people to celebrate a Passover in honor of the Lord their God, just as it was written in the book of this covenant. This marked the first time since Israel's judges that a Passover had been observed, nor during any of Israel's or Judah's kings' reigns until Josiah's day in Jerusalem.

Josiah organized a Passover celebration in Jerusalem during his eighteenth year as king. He also expelled all those practicing divination, sorcery, idolatry, and other detestable practices discovered on the land from Judah and Jerusalem to fulfill God's words written in the book found by Hilkiah, the high priest.

No king before Josiah had ever sought God with such sincerity as he did, nor was there any king after him who matched his devotion to following Moses' law. However, God still harbored great anger toward Judah because of Manasseh's many provocations.

The Lord declared that He would remove Judah from His sight just like Israel and reject Jerusalem, which He had chosen as the place where He would put His name, along with the house associated with it.

A record of Josiah's actions and all he did is found in the book of the kings' chronicles for Judah.

During Josiah's reign, Pharaoh-necoh, king of Egypt, marched against the king of Assyria at the Euphrates River. King Josiah met him at Megiddo, where he was killed.

Servants carried his lifeless body back to Jerusalem and buried it in his own tomb. The people appointed his son Jehoahaz as the new king, who began ruling when he was twenty-three years old and reigned for just three months in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Hamutal, daughter of Jeremiah from Libnah.

Jehoahaz did evil in God's sight, following the path of all his predecessors.

Pharaoh-necoh put Jehoiakim in chains at Riblah in the land of Hamath and forbade him to reign in Jerusalem. He also exacted a tribute of one hundred talents of silver and one talent of gold from Judah's people.

Pharaoh-necoh made Eliakim, Josiah's son, king instead of his father, renaming him Jehoiakim. He took Jehoahaz captive to Egypt, where he died.

Jehoiakim collected the imposed tribute in silver and gold and gave it to Pharaoh, as commanded. He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign and ruled for eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Zebidah, daughter of Pedaiah from Rumah.

Like all his predecessors, Jehoiakim did evil in God's sight.