Study Desk

^(C1)Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned for thirty-one years in Jerusalem.

^(C1)He did what was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of his father David and did not turn aside to the right or the left.

For in the eighth year of his reign while he was still a youth, he began to ^(C1)seek the God of his father David; and in the twelfth year he began ^(C2)to purge Judah and Jerusalem of the high places, the ^(F1)Asherim, the carved images, and the cast metal images.

They tore down the altars of the Baals in his presence, and he chopped down ^(C1)the incense altars that were high above them; also he broke in pieces the Asherim, the carved images, and the cast metal images, and ^(C2)ground them to powder, and scattered it on the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.

Then ^(C1)he burned the bones of the priests on their altars and purged Judah and Jerusalem.

^(C1)In the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, Simeon, and as far as Naphtali, in their surrounding spaces,

he also tore down the altars and ^(C1)crushed the ^(F1)Asherim and the carved images into powder, and chopped down all the incense altars throughout the land of Israel. Then he returned to Jerusalem.

^(C1)Now in the eighteenth year of his reign, when he had purged the land and the house, he sent Shaphan the son of Azaliah, Maaseiah ^(C2)an official of the city, and Joah the son of Joahaz the secretary, to repair the house of the LORD his God.