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And concerning the king of Juda, who sent you to seek the Lord, —thus shall ye say to him, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, As for the words which thou has heard,

And he caused all that were found in Jerusalem and Benjamin to stand; and the inhabitants of Jerusalem made a covenant in the house of the Lord God of their fathers.

And Josias removed all the abominations out of the whole land which belonged to the children of Israel, and caused all that were found in Jerusalem and in Israel, to serve the Lord their God all his days: he departed not from following the Lord God of his fathers.

And Josias kept a passover to the Lord his God; and sacrificed the passover on the fourteenth day of the first month.

And he told the Levites that were able to act in all Israel, that they should consecrate themselves to the Lord: and they put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel built: and the king said, Ye must not carry anything on your shoulders: now then minister to the Lord your God, and to his people Israel.

And his princes gave an offering to the people, and to the priests, and to the Levites: and Chelcias and Zacharias and Jeiel the chief men gave to the priests of the house of God, they even gave for the passover sheep, and lambs, and kids, two thousand six hundred, and three hundred calves.

And he sent messengers to him, saying, What have I to do with thee, O king of Juda? I am not come to-day to war against thee; and God has told me to hasten: beware of the God that is with me, lest he destroy thee.

However, Josias turned not his face from him, but strengthened himself to fight against him, and hearkened not to the words of Nechao by the mouth of God, and he came to fight in the plain of Mageddo.

And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord his God: he was not ashamed before the prophet Jeremias, nor because of the word of the Lord;

in that he rebelled against king Nabuchodonosor, which he adjured him by God not to do: but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart, so as not to return to the Lord God of Israel.

And the Lord God of their fathers sent by the hand of his prophets; rising early and sending his messengers, for he spared his people, and his sanctuary.

And all the vessels of the house of God, the great and the small, and the treasures of the house of the Lord, and all the treasures of the king and the great men; he brought all to Babylon.

Thus says Cyrus king of the Persians to all the kingdoms of the earth, The Lord God of heaven has given me power, and he has commanded me to build a house to him in Jerusalem, in Judea. Who is there of you of all his people? His God shall be with him, and let him go up.

Thus said Cyrus king of the Persians, The Lord God of heaven has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has given me a charge to build him a house in Jerusalem that is in Judea.

Who is there among you of all his people? for his God shall be with him, and he shall go up to Jerusalem that is in Judea, and let him build the house of the God of Israel: he is the God that is in Jerusalem.

And let every Jew that is left go from every place where he sojourns, and the men of his place shall help him with silver, and gold, and goods, and cattle, together with the voluntary offering for the house of God that is in Jerusalem.

And king Cyrus brought out the vessels of the house of the Lord, which Nabuchodonosor had brought from Jerusalem, and put in the house of his god.

And some of the chiefs of families, when they went into the house of the Lord that was in Jerusalem, offered willingly for the house of God, to establish it on its prepared place.

Then stood up Jesus the son of Josedec, and his brethren the priests, and Zorobabel the son of Salathiel, and his brethren, and they built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer upon it whole-burnt-offerings, according to the things that were written in the law of Moses the man of God.

And in the second year of their coming to the house of God in Jerusalem, in the second month, began Zorobabel the son of Salathiel, and Jesus the son of Josedec, and the rest of their brethren the priests and the Levites, and all who came from the captivity to Jerusalem, and they appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, over the workmen in the house of the Lord.