2 Kings 23:23

THE MESSAGE

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, the Lord’s Passover was observed in Jerusalem.

Hebrew Names Version
but in the eighteenth year of king Yoshiyahu was this Pesach kept to the LORD in Yerushalayim.

King James Version
But in the eighteenth year of king Josiah, wherein this passover was holden to the Lord in Jerusalem.

English Standard Version
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah this Passover was kept to the Lord in Jerusalem.

New Century Version
This Passover was celebrated to the Lord in Jerusalem in the eighteenth year of King Josiah's rule.

New English Translation
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah's reign, such a Passover of the Lord was observed in Jerusalem.

Amplified Bible
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover to the LORD was kept in Jerusalem.

New American Standard Bible
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was celebrated to the LORD in Jerusalem.

World English Bible
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this Passover kept to Yahweh in Jerusalem.

Geneva Bible (1587)
And in the eightenth yere of King Iosiah was this Passeouer celebrated to the Lord in Ierusalem.

Legacy Standard Bible
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was celebrated to Yahweh in Jerusalem.

Berean Standard Bible
But in the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah this Passover was observed to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Contemporary English Version
But in Josiah's eighteenth year as king of Judah, everyone came to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover.

Complete Jewish Bible
But in the eighteenth year of King Yoshiyahu this Pesach was observed to Adonai in Yerushalayim.

Darby Translation
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this passover holden to Jehovah in Jerusalem.

Easy-to-Read Version
They celebrated this Passover for the Lord in Jerusalem during Josiah's 18th year as king.

George Lamsa Translation
Like that in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, when this passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Good News Translation
Now at last, in the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah, the Passover was celebrated in Jerusalem.

Lexham English Bible
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was kept for Yahweh in Jerusalem.

Literal Translation
but in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was prepared to Jehovah in Jerusalem.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
but in the eightenth yeare of kynge Iosias, was this Easter kepte vnto the LORDE at Ierusalem.

American Standard Version
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this passover kept to Jehovah in Jerusalem.

Bible in Basic English
In the eighteenth year of the rule of King Josiah this Passover was kept to the Lord in Jerusalem.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
In the eighteenth yere of king Iosia, was this Passouer holden to the Lord in Hierusalem.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this passover kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

King James Version (1611)
But in the eighteenth yeere of king Iosiah, wherein this Passeouer was holden to the Lord in Ierusalem.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
But in the eighteenth year of king Josias, was the passover kept to the Lord in Jerusalem.

English Revised Version
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this passover kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
as this pask was maad to the Lord in Jerusalem in the eiytenthe yeer of kyng Josias.

Update Bible Version
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this passover kept to Yahweh in Jerusalem.

Webster's Bible Translation
But in the eighteenth year of king Josiah, [in which] this passover was held to the LORD in Jerusalem.

New King James Version
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah this Passover was held before the LORD in Jerusalem.

New Living Translation
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah's reign, this Passover was celebrated to the Lord in Jerusalem.

New Life Bible
But this Passover was kept to the Lord in Jerusalem in the eighteenth year of King Josiah.

New Revised Standard
but in the eighteenth year of King Josiah this passover was kept to the Lord in Jerusalem.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
save only, in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, when this passover was held unto Yahweh, in Jerusalem.

Douay-Rheims Bible
As was this Phase, that was kept to the Lord in Jerusalem, in the eighteenth year of king Josias.

Revised Standard Version
but in the eighteenth year of King Josi'ah this passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Young's Literal Translation
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah, hath this passover been made to Jehovah in Jerusalem.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was observed to the LORD in Jerusalem.

Contextual Overview

⁴Then the king ordered Hilkiah the high priest, his associate priest, and The Temple sentries to clean house—to get rid of everything in The Temple of God that had been made for worshiping Baal and Asherah and the cosmic powers. He had them burned outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron and then disposed of the ashes in Bethel. He fired the pagan priests whom the kings of Judah had hired to supervise the local sex-and-religion shrines in the towns of Judah and neighborhoods of Jerusalem. In a stroke he swept the country clean of the polluting stench of the round-the-clock worship of Baal, sun and moon, stars—all the so-called cosmic powers. He took the obscene phallic Asherah pole from The Temple of God to the Valley of Kidron outside Jerusalem, burned it up, then ground up the ashes and scattered them in the cemetery. He tore out the rooms of the male sacred prostitutes that had been set up in The Temple of God ; women also used these rooms for weavings for Asherah. He swept the outlying towns of Judah clean of priests and smashed the sex-and-religion shrines where they worked their trade from one end of the country to the other—all the way from Geba to Beersheba. He smashed the sex-and-religion shrine that had been set up just to the left of the city gate for the private use of Joshua, the city mayor. Even though these sex-and-religion priests did not defile the Altar in The Temple itself, they were part of the general priestly corruption and had to go. ¹⁰Then Josiah demolished the Topheth, the iron furnace griddle set up in the Valley of Ben Hinnom for sacrificing children in the fire. No longer could anyone burn son or daughter to the god Molech. He hauled off the horse statues honoring the sun god that the kings of Judah had set up near the entrance to The Temple. They were in the courtyard next to the office of Nathan-Melech, the warden. He burned up the sun-chariots as so much rubbish. ¹²The king smashed all the altars to smithereens—the altar on the roof shrine of Ahaz, the various altars the kings of Judah had made, the altars of Manasseh that littered the courtyard of The Temple—he smashed them all, pulverized the fragments, and scattered their dust in the Valley of Kidron. The king proceeded to make a clean sweep of all the sex-and-religion shrines that had proliferated east of Jerusalem on the south slope of Abomination Hill, the ones Solomon king of Israel had built to the obscene Sidonian sex goddess Ashtoreth, to Chemosh the dirty-old-god of the Moabites, and to Milcom the depraved god of the Ammonites. He tore apart the altars, chopped down the phallic Asherah-poles, and scattered old bones over the sites. Next, he took care of the altar at the shrine in Bethel that Jeroboam son of Nebat had built—the same Jeroboam who had led Israel into a life of sin. He tore apart the altar, burned down the shrine leaving it in ashes, and then lit fire to the phallic Asherah-pole. ¹⁶ As Josiah looked over the scene, he noticed the tombs on the hillside. He ordered the bones removed from the tombs and had them cremated on the ruined altars, desacralizing the evil altars. This was a fulfillment of the word of God spoken by the Holy Man years before when Jeroboam had stood by the altar at the sacred convocation. ¹⁷ Then the king said, "And that memorial stone—whose is that?" The men from the city said, "That's the grave of the Holy Man who spoke the message against the altar at Bethel that you have just fulfilled." ¹⁸ Josiah said, "Don't trouble his bones." So they left his bones undisturbed, along with the bones of the prophet from Samaria. ¹⁹But Josiah hadn't finished. He now moved through all the towns of Samaria where the kings of Israel had built neighborhood sex-and-religion shrines, shrines that had so angered God . He tore the shrines down and left them in ruins—just as at Bethel. He killed all the priests who had conducted the sacrifices and cremated them on their own altars, thus desacralizing the altars. Only then did Josiah return to Jerusalem. ²¹ The king now commanded the people, "Celebrate the Passover to God , your God, exactly as directed in this Book of the Covenant." ²²This commanded Passover had not been celebrated since the days that the judges judged Israel—none of the kings of Israel and Judah had celebrated it. But in the eighteenth year of the rule of King Josiah this very Passover was celebrated to God in Jerusalem. ²⁴ Josiah scrubbed the place clean and trashed spirit-mediums, sorcerers, domestic gods, and carved figures—all the vast accumulation of foul and obscene relics and images on display everywhere you looked in Judah and Jerusalem. Josiah did this in obedience to the words of God 's Revelation written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in The Temple of God .

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Reciprocal: Deuteronomy 16:7 - in the place Ezekiel 4:6 - forty days

Gill's Notes on the Bible

But in the eighteenth year of king Josiah, wherein this passover was holden to the Lord in Jerusalem. This shows that Josiah must begin the reformation very early that year, since he did all that is before recorded in this and the preceding chapter by the fourteenth of Nisan, the day on which the passover was kept, which month answers to part of our March and part of April, see 2 Kings 22:3 and was the same year the repairs of the temple were finished.