23:1
The Great Purge and the Fulfillment of the Beyth-El Decree
And the king sent, and they gathered unto him all the elders of Yahudah and of Yarushalayim.
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2 Malakiym 23
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And the king went up into the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, and all the men of Yahudah and all the inhabitants of Yarushalayim with him, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people, both small and great: and he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄.
23:3
And the king stood by a pillar, and made a covenant before 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, to walk after 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all their heart and all their soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people stood to the covenant.
23:4
The Eradication of the Astral Cults
And the king commanded Hilqiyahu the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the door, to bring forth out of the temple of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the grove (Asharah), and for all the host of heaven: and he burned them without Yarushalayim in the fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of them unto Beyth-El.
23:5
And he put down the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Yahudah had ordained to burn incense in the high places in the cities of Yahudah, and in the places round about Yarushalayim; them also that burned incense unto Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of heaven.
23:6
And he brought out the grove (Asharah) from the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, without Yarushalayim, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the children of the people.
23:7
And he broke down the houses of the sodomites, that were by the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, where the women wove hangings for the grove.
23:8
The Defilement of the False Altars
And he brought all the priests out of the cities of Yahudah, and defiled the high places where the priests had burned incense, from Geba to Beer-sheba, and broke down the high places of the gates that were in the entering in of the gate of Yahoshua the governor of the city, which were on a man's left hand at the gate of the city.
23:9
Nevertheless the priests of the high places came not up to the altar of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 in Yarushalayim, but they did eat of the unleavened bread (matzut) among their brethren.
23:10
And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.
23:11
And he took away the horses that the kings of Yahudah had given to the sun, at the entering in of the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, by the chamber of Natan-melech the chamberlain, which was in the suburbs, and burned the chariots of the sun with fire.
23:12
And the altars that were on the top of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Yahudah had made, and the altars which Manashah had made in the two courts of the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, did the king beat down, and broke them down from thence, and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron.
23:13
And the high places that were before Yarushalayim, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption, which Shalumoh the king of Yashar'al had builded for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Zidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile.
23:14
And he broke in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men.
23:15
The Execution of the 300-Year Decree
Moreover the altar that was at Beyth-El, and the high place which Yarobam the son of Nebat, who made Yashar'al to sin, had made, both that altar and the high place he broke down, and burned the high place, and stamped it small to powder, and burned the grove.
23:16
And as Yoshiyahu turned himself, he spied the sepulchers that were there in the mount, and sent, and took the bones out of the sepulchers, and burned them upon the altar, and polluted it, according to the word of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 which the man of Alahiym proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.
23:17
Then he said, "What title is that that I see?" And the men of the city told him, "It is the sepulcher of the man of Alahiym, which came from Yahudah, and proclaimed these things that thou hast done against the altar of Beyth-El."
23:18
And he said, "Let him alone; let no man move his bones." So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet that came out of Shomron.
23:19
The Slaughter of the False Priesthood
And all the houses also of the high places that were in the cities of Shomron, which the kings of Yashar'al had made to provoke 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 to anger, Yoshiyahu took away, and did to them according to all the acts that he had done in Beyth-El.
23:20
And he slew all the priests of the high places that were there upon the altars, and burned men's bones upon them, and returned to Yarushalayim.
23:21
The Zenith of the Pasach Frequency
And the king commanded all the people, saying, "Keep the passover (Pasach) unto 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 your Alahiym, as it is written in the book of this covenant."
23:22
Surely there was not holden such a passover from the days of the judges that judged Yashar'al, nor in all the days of the kings of Yashar'al, nor of the kings of Yahudah;
23:23
But in the eighteenth year of king Yoshiyahu, wherein this passover was holden to 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 in Yarushalayim.
23:24
The Cleansing of the Necromancers
Moreover the workers with familiar spirits, and the wizards, and the images, and the idols, and all the abominations that were spied in the land of Yahudah and in Yarushalayim, did Yoshiyahu put away, that he might perform the words of the law (Turah) which were written in the book that Hilqiyahu the priest found in the house of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄.
23:25
The Supreme Terrestrial Righteousness
And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law (Turah) of Mushah; neither after him arose there any like him.
23:26
The Inescapable Wrath
Notwithstanding 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 turned not from the fierceness of his great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against Yahudah, because of all the provocations that Manashah had provoked him withal.
23:27
And 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄 said, "I will remove Yahudah also out of my sight, as I have removed Yashar'al, and will cast off this city Yarushalayim which I have chosen, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there."
23:28
The Collision at Megiddo
Now the rest of the acts of Yoshiyahu, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Yahudah?
23:29
In his days Pharaoh-nechoh king of Mitzrayim went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Yoshiyahu went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.
23:30
And his servants carried him in a chariot dead from Megiddo, and brought him to Yarushalayim, and buried him in his own sepulcher. And the people of the land took Yehoahaz the son of Yoshiyahu, and anointed him, and made him king in his father's stead.
23:31
The Brief Reign of Yehoahaz
Yehoahaz was twenty and three years old when he began to reign; and he reigned three months in Yarushalayim. And his mother's name was Hamutal, the daughter of Yirmeyahu of Libnah.
23:32
And he did that which was evil in the sight of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, according to all that his fathers had done.
23:33
The Subjugation to Mitzrayim
And Pharaoh-nechoh put him in bands at Riblah in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Yarushalayim; and put the land to a tribute of a hundred talents of silver, and a talent of gold.
23:34
The Appointment of Yehoyaqim
And Pharaoh-nechoh made Elyaqim the son of Yoshiyahu king in the room of Yoshiyahu his father, and turned his name to Yehoyaqim, and took Yehoahaz away: and he came to Mitzrayim, and died there.
23:35
And Yehoyaqim gave the silver and the gold to Pharaoh; but he taxed the land to give the money according to the commandment of Pharaoh: he exacted the silver and the gold of the people of the land, of every one according to his taxation, to give it unto Pharaoh-nechoh.
23:36
The Reign of Yehoyaqim
Yehoyaqim was twenty and five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Yarushalayim. And his mother's name was Zebudah, the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah.
23:37
And he did that which was evil in the sight of 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, according to all that his fathers had done.