Study Desk

Manasseh was a son of twelve years when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem fifty five years.

And he did evil in the eyes of Jehovah, like the abominations of the nations that Jehovah had driven out from before the sons of Israel.

For again he rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had broken down, and raised up altars for the Baals, and made Asherahs and bowed himself to all the host of the heavens, and served them.

And he built altars in the house of Jehovah, of which Jehovah had said, In Jerusalem shall be My name forever.

And he built altars to all the host of the heavens in the two courts of the house of Jehovah.

And he made his sons to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and did magic and divined, and used sorcery, and used mediums and conjurers; he multiplied the doing of the evil in the eyes of Jehovah, to provoke Him to anger.

And he placed the engraved image of the idol that he had made in the house of God, of which God had said to David, and to his son Solomon, In this house, and in Jerusalem that I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put My nameforever.

And I will not again remove the foot of Israel from off the ground that I appointed to your fathers; only, if they take heed to do all that I have commanded them toward all the Law, and the statutes, and the ordinances by the hand of Moses.

And Manasseh caused Judah and the people of Jerusalem to sin, to do evil above the nations that Jehovah destroyed before the sons of Israel.

And Jehovah spoke to Manasseh and to his people, and they did not listen.

And Jehovah brought against them the king of Assyria's army commanders, and they captured Manasseh with hooks, and bound him with bronze fetters, and made him go to Babylon.

And when he was distressed, he sought the face of Jehovah his God, and was humbled exceedingly before the face of the God of his fathers;

and prayed to Him, and He was entreated of him and heard his supplication, and returned him to Jerusalem to his kingdom; and Manasseh knew that Jehovah, He is God.

And after this he built an outer wall to the city of David, on the west of Gihon, in the valley, and at the entrance of the Fish Gate. And it went around to the tower and he made it exceedingly high, and he put commanders of the army in allthe cities of defense in Judah.

And he removed the foreign gods, and the idol out of the house of Jehovah, and all the altars that he had built in the mount of the house of Jehovah and in Jerusalem, and threw them outside the city.

And he built the altar of Jehovah, and sacrificed on it sacrifices of peace offerings and thank offerings, and commanded Judah to serve Jehovah, the God of Israel.

But the people still sacrificed in the high places, only to Jehovah their God.

And the rest of the acts of Manasseh, and his prayer to his God, and the things of the seers, who spoke to him in the name of Jehovah the God of Israel, behold, they are in the Book of the Kings of Israel;

and his prayer, and his entreaty, and all his sin, and his treachery, and the places in which he had built high places and set up the Asherahs and the graven images before he was humbled, behold, they are written in the Matters of the Seers.

And Manasseh lay with his fathers, and they buried him in his own house. And his son Amon reigned in his place.