Kings-2 Chapters

1 | ¹After the death of Ahab, Moab rebelled against Israel. ²In Samaria, King Ahaziah fell through the window from the second floor of his house and was severely injured. So he sent messengers to consult Beelzebub, the god of Ekron, “Ask him whether I shall survive this accident.” ³Then an angel of the Lord said to Elijah of the town of Tishbe, “Arise and go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria. You will say to them: Why have you come to consult Beelzebub, the god of Ekron? Is it because there is no God in Israel? ⁴Now the Lord himself gives you this answer: ‘You shall not rise again from the bed where you lay down, but shall die there.’” So Elijah went.

⁵Then the messengers returned to Ahaziah, who asked, “How have you returned?” ⁶They answered, “A man met us on the way, and he said to us: ‘Return to the king who sent you and say to him in the name of the Lord: Why do you send men to consult Beelzebub, the god of Ekron? Is there no God in Israel? Because of this, you shall not rise again from the bed where you lay down but shall die there.’”

⁷The king asked them, “What was the appearance of the man who met you on the way and told you this?” ⁸They answered him, “The man wore a mantle of fur with a leather belt around his waist.” The king said, “He is Elijah from the town of Tishbe.”

⁹Ahaziah sent a captain of fifty men who went up with his fifty men to get him. Elijah was seated at the top of the mountain. The captain told him, “Man of God, the king commands you to come down.” ¹⁰Elijah answered the captain, “If I am a man of God, then may fire come down from heaven and devour you and your men.” Fire came down from heaven and devoured him with his fifty men. ¹¹The king again sent another captain of fifty who went up and said to him, “Man of God, the king says that you are to come down at once.” ¹²Elijah answered, “If I am a man of God, then may fire come down from heaven and devour you and your men.” Fire came down from heaven and devoured them all.

¹³The king sent a third captain with his fifty men. This third one went up, and, as he came, he fell on his knees before Elijah and said to him, “Man of God, I beg you to pardon me as well as my fifty men; we are all your servants. ¹⁴I have heard that fire came down from heaven twice and devoured the two captains with their fifty men. So now, do spare my life.”

¹⁵Then the angel of the Lord said to Elijah, “Go down with him and do not be afraid.” ¹⁶So he stood up and went down with them to the king. And Elijah said to the king, “Listen to this word of the Lord: ‘Because you sent your messengers to consult Beelzebub, the god of Ekron, you shall not rise again from the bed on which you lie but shall die there.’”

¹⁷Ahaziah died according to what the Lord had said through the mouth of Elijah, and since he had no sons, his brother Jehoram reigned in his place in the second year of the reign of Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah. ¹⁸Everything referring to Ahaziah and his deeds is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

Elijah Is Taken Up to Heaven

2 | •  ¹The Lord took Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind. It happened this way: Elijah and Elisha had left Gilgal, and Elijah said to Elisha, ²“I beg you to stay here, for the Lord is sending me to Bethel.” Elisha said, “I swear by the Lord and by your life that I will never leave you.” So they went down to Bethel together. ³The fellow prophets in Bethel welcomed Elisha and said to him, “Don’t you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?” He answered them, “Yes, I also know it. So, be quiet.”

⁴Elijah told Elisha, “Please stay here, for the Lord is only sending me to Jericho.” Elisha answered, “I swear by the Lord and by your life that I will never leave you.” ⁵So they went on to Jericho.

The fellow prophets in Jericho approached Elisha and said, “Do you not know that the Lord is to take your master away today?” Elisha answered, “Yes, I know it. Be quiet.”

⁶Elijah said again to Elisha, “Stay here, I beg you, for the Lord is only sending me to the Jordan.” But Elisha answered, “I swear by the Lord and by your life that I will never leave you.” And as they went on their way, ⁷fifty fellow prophets of Jericho followed them at a certain distance.

When Elijah and Elisha stood by the Jordan, ⁸Elijah took his mantle, rolled it, and struck the water with it. The water parted to both sides, and they crossed over on the dry ground.

⁹After they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “What shall I do for you before I am taken away from you? Ask me.” Elisha said, “May I receive a double portion of your spirit.” ¹⁰Elijah answered, “Your request is most difficult. Yet if you see me while I am being taken from you, then you shall have it. But if not, you shall not have it.”

¹¹As they were talking on the way, a chariot of fire with horses of fire stood between them, and Elijah was taken up to heaven in a whirlwind. ¹²Elisha saw him and cried out, “Father, my father, chariots of Israel and its horsemen!”

When Elisha lost sight of him, he took hold of his own clothes and tore them. ¹³He then picked up the mantle which had fallen from Elijah and returned to the banks of the Jordan. ¹⁴He took the cloak that had fallen off Elijah, hit the water with it, and asked, “Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?” It divided when he hit the water again, and Elisha crossed over.

¹⁵The fellow prophets of Jericho saw him from the other side and said, “The spirit of Elijah rests upon Elisha.” And as they came to him, they bowed to the ground before him saying, ¹⁶“There are fifty valiant men here with us. Let them go in search of Elijah, for it may be that the spirit of the Lord has left him on some mountain or some valley.” Elisha replied, “Do not send anyone.” ¹⁷But they insisted so much that Elisha let them go, and they sent fifty men to search for Elijah. ¹⁸After three days, they had not found him, and they returned to Elisha, who had stayed in Jericho. He commented, “Did I not tell you not to go?”

•  ¹⁹The men of the city said to Elisha, “The location of this city is good, as my lord can see, but the water is bad, and so the land is unproductive.” ²⁰He told them, “Bring me a new pot with salt in it.” When they brought it to him, ²¹Elisha went to the fountain and threw salt in it, saying, “This is what the Lord says: ‘I have healed this water, never more will it cause death or sickness.’” ²²And the water has remained wholesome to this day, just as Elisha said.

²³From there, he went up to Bethel. He was on his way when some youths came out from the city and made fun of him saying, “Go up, bald head! Go up, bald head!” ²⁴Elisha turned around, looked at them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. At once, two she-bears came out of the forest and killed forty-two of them. ²⁵From there, Elisha set out for Mount Carmel, and from there, he returned to Samaria.

3 | ¹Jehoram, son of Ahab, began to reign over Israel in Samaria in the eighteenth year of the reign of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah. He reigned for twelve years. ²He did what was displeasing to the Lord, but not as his father or mother had done, for he removed the statue of Baal which his father had made. ³Nonetheless, he clung to the sin of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, which had become the sin of Israel and did not depart from it.

Expedition of Israel and Judah Against Moab

⁴Mesha, the king of Moab, had flocks of sheep. He paid the king of Israel a hundred thousand lambs and a hundred thousand rams with their wool annually. ⁵But when Ahab died, the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel.

⁶At that time, King Jehoram set out from Samaria to mobilize the whole of Israel. ⁷He also sent word to Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah: “The king of Moab has rebelled against me; will you come with me to fight against Moab?” Jehoshaphat answered, “I will go with you for you, and I am one. My men and my horses are at your disposal.” ⁸Jehoram asked, “By which way shall we go up?” And he answered, “By the way of the desert of Edom.”

⁹The kings of Israel, Judah, and Edom had been going around for seven days, and there was no water for the soldiers and the animals that followed them. ¹⁰Then the king of Israel said, “The Lord has called us three kings to give us into the hands of Moab.” ¹¹Then Jehoshaphat asked, “Is there no prophet of the Lord here, through whom we may consult the Lord?” One of the servants of the king of Israel said, “Elisha, son of Shaphat, is here. It was he who poured water on the hands of Elijah.” ¹²Jehoshaphat agreed, “Indeed, God’s word comes to him.” So the king of Israel and Edom and Jehoshaphat went down to Elisha.

¹³Elisha asked the king of Israel, “What have I to do with you? Go see the prophets of your father or those of your mother.” But the king of Israel asked him, “Has the Lord perhaps called us three together to deliver us into the hands of Moab?” ¹⁴Elisha replied, “Had not Jehoshaphat the king of Judah been before me, I swear by the Lord God of Hosts whom I serve, that I would not attend to you nor look at you. ¹⁵Now, bring me someone who plays the harp.” As the musician played, the hand of the Lord came upon Elisha, ¹⁶and he said, “This is the word of the Lord: ‘Dig trenches and more trenches in this valley, ¹⁷for the Lord says: “You shall not see wind or rain, but the valley shall be filled with water, and you, your troops and your livestock will drink.’” ¹⁸This is easy for the Lord, for he shall give Moab into your hands. ¹⁹You shall conquer all the fortified cities, cut down all fruit-bearing trees, close up all the springs of water, and scatter stones in all the cultivated fields.”

²⁰In the morning, at the time of the offering, water came from the direction of Edom, and the whole country was flooded.

²¹The Moabites had learned that the kings had come to attack them, so they gathered together all the men able to bear arms and positioned them at the border. ²²When they woke up in the morning, they saw the sun shining upon the water, and this appeared to them as if it were blood. ²³So the Moabites said, “Look at the blood; the kings have surely turned against one another and killed each other. Let us now go and gather the booty!” ²⁴But the Israelites confronted, defeated, and routed them when they came to the camp. The Israelites pursued and entered Moab. ²⁵They destroyed the cities of Moab, and each man threw stones on the fertile land until it was covered. They closed up the springs of water and cut down fruit trees. Only Kir-haroseth was left with stones, but men armed with slings surrounded the city and began harassing it.

²⁶When the king of Moab saw that his enemies were winning, he gathered seven hundred warriors to break through the blockade opposite the king of Edom. But they failed. ²⁷So he took his first-born son who was to succeed him as king and sacrificed him in the fire upon the wall. The fury upon the Israelites was great, so they withdrew from there and returned to their land.

The Widow’s Oil

4 | •  ¹The widow of one of the fellow prophets, Elisha, says, “You know that my husband feared God. But now his creditor has come to collect payment. And as we could not pay, he wanted to take my two sons as slaves.” ²Elisha said, “What can I do for you? Tell me what you have in your house?” She answered, “I have but a little oil.” ³Elisha told her, “Go and ask your neighbors for empty jars. ⁴Get as many as you can. Then go into your house with your sons and close the door. Pour oil into the vessels. And when they are filled, set them aside.”

⁵The woman went and locked herself in her house with her sons. They handed her the vessels, and she filled them all. ⁶She said to one of her sons, “Bring me another vessel,” and he answered, “There are no more.” Then, the oil stopped flowing.

⁷When she went back to tell the man of God, he told her, “Go and sell the oil to pay for your debts. You and your sons can live on the money that is left.”

The Resurrection of the Shunammite’s Son

•  ⁸Elisha went to Shunem one day, and a rich woman invited him to eat. Afterward, whenever he went to that town, he would eat at her house.

⁹The woman said to her husband, “See, this man who constantly passes by our house is a holy man of God. ¹⁰If you want, we can make a small upper room for him and place a bed, a table, a chair and a lamp in it. So when he comes, he may stay and rest.”

¹¹One day, when Elisha came, he lay down in the upper room. ¹²Then he said to Gehazi, his manservant, “Call the Shunammite woman.” She came when called and stood before Elisha.

¹³Elisha told him, "Say to her, ‘You have taken all this trouble for us. Tell me: What can we do for you then? Would you like me to say something to the king or the commander of the army for you?’” But she answered, “I do not need anything in this land.” ¹⁴So Elisha asked Gehazi, “What can we do for her?” The young man answered, “She has no children, and her husband is now old.”

¹⁵And so Elisha said to him, “Call her.” The young man called her, and as the woman stood by the door, ¹⁶Elisha said, “By this time next year, you will hold a son in your arms.” She answered, “No, my lord, O man of God, you are deceiving your maidservant.”

¹⁷But the woman gave birth to a son precisely when Elisha told her.

¹⁸The boy grew. One day, when he had gone out to his father among the harvesters, he had a severe headache. ¹⁹The father ordered his servant to “Carry him to his mother.” ²⁰The servant brought him to his mother, and the boy sat on her lap till noon when he died.

²¹Then the mother went up and laid him on Elisha’s bed, and she left, closing the door. ²²Then she called her husband, “Send me one of the servants with an ass. I am going to the man of God and will return.” ²³He asked, “Why are you going to him? It is not the new moon yet nor the Sabbath.” But she said, “Do not worry.”

²⁴She saddled the ass and said to her servant, “Lead on, and don’t stop until I tell you.” ²⁵So she set off and arrived at Mount Carmel, where the man of God was.

Elisha saw her from afar, so he told his servant, “Here comes our Shunammite ²⁶Run to meet her and ask: Are you well? How is your husband? And your son?” She answered, “Everything is all right.” ²⁷She went to the man of God and embraced his feet. Then Gehazi came to draw her away, but the man of God said to him, “Leave her, for her soul is in bitter distress, and the Lord has not made known to me nor has he revealed it to me.”

²⁸She said, “Did I ask, my lord, for a son? Why have you deceived me?” ²⁹Elisha told Gehazi, “Get ready, take my staff and go. If you meet anyone, do not stop to greet him, and if someone greets you, do not greet him in return. And as soon as you arrive, place my staff on the boy’s face.” ³⁰The boy’s mother said, “I swear by the Lord and by your life that I will not leave you.” So Elisha arose and followed her.

³¹Gehazi went on ahead and laid the staff on the boy’s face, but the boy did not move or give any sign of life, so Gehazi returned to meet them and said, “The boy has not revived.”

³²Elisha came into the house and found the dead boy lying on his bed. ³³He entered, closed the door behind him and prayed to the Lord. ³⁴Then he lay upon the boy, put his mouth upon the boy’s mouth, his eyes upon his eyes, his hands upon the boy’s hands, and warmth returned to the boy’s body. ³⁵Elisha came down and began walking to and fro. Then he went upstairs to stretch himself upon the boy, and the boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

³⁶Elisha then called Gehazi and said, “Call the woman.” And when she came, Elisha told her, “Take your son.” ³⁷She bowed at his feet, took her son, and went out.

³⁸Elisha returned to Gilgal. There was a great scarcity of food in the region, and when the fellow prophets came to sit with Elisha, he said to his servant, “Take the big pot and prepare some broth for the fellow prophets.” ³⁹One of them went out into the field to gather herbs. He found a wild plant, from which he gathered poisonous fruits, enough to fill his cloak. When he returned, he cut them into pieces and put them in the pot where the broth was being prepared, for he did not know what they were. ⁴⁰Then, the broth was served to the men to eat. But as soon as they tasted the soup, they cried out, “Man of God, this is pure poison!” So they did not eat anymore. ⁴¹Then Elisha said, “Bring me flour.” And he put it into the pot. Then he said, “Serve these men and let them eat.” And there was no longer anything harmful in the pot.

The Multiplication of Loaves

•  ⁴²A man came from Baal-shalishah bringing bread and wheat to the man of God. These were twenty loaves of barley and wheat from the first part of the harvest. Elisha told him, “Give the loaves to these men that they may eat.”

⁴³His servant asked him, “How am I to divide these loaves among one hundred men?” Elisha insisted, “Give them to the men that they may eat, for the Lord says: ‘They shall eat and have some left over.’” ⁴⁴So the man set it before them; they ate and had some left, as the Lord had said.

Naaman Healed of Leprosy

5 | •  ¹Naaman was the army commander of the king of Aram. This man was highly regarded and enjoyed the king’s favor, for the Lord had helped him lead the army of the Arameans to victory. But this valiant man was sick with leprosy.

²One day, some Aramean soldiers raided the land of Israel and took a young girl captive who became a servant to the wife of Naaman. She said to her mistress, ³“If my master would only present himself to the prophet in Samaria, he would surely cure him of his leprosy.”

⁴Naaman went to tell the king what the young Israelite maidservant had said. ⁵The king of Aram said to him, “Go to the prophet, and I shall also send a letter to the king of Israel.”

So Naaman took ten silver talents, six thousand gold pieces, and ten festal garments with him. ⁶On his arrival, he delivered the letter to the king of Israel. It said, “I present my servant Naaman to you that you may heal him of his leprosy.

⁷When the king read the letter, he tore his clothes to show his indignation, “I am not God to give life or death. And the king of Aram sends me this man to be healed! You see, he is just looking for an excuse for war.”

⁸Elisha, the man of God, learned that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, so he sent this message to him: “Why have you torn your clothes? Let the man come to me, that he may know that Israel has a prophet.”

⁹So Naaman stopped before Elisha's house with his horses and chariots. ¹⁰Elisha then sent a messenger to tell him, “Go to the river Jordan and wash seven times, and your flesh shall be as it was before, and you shall be cleansed.”

¹¹Naaman was angry, so he went away. He thought: “On my arrival, he should have personally come out and then paused and called on the name of the Lord, his God. And he should have touched the infected part with his hand, and I would have been healed. ¹²Are the rivers of Damascus, Abana, and Pharpar not better than all the rivers of the land of Israel? Could I not wash there to be healed?”

¹³His servants approached him and said, “Father, if the prophet had ordered you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? But how much easier when he said: ‘Take a bath and you will be cleansed.’”

¹⁴So Naaman went down to the Jordan, washing himself seven times as Elisha had ordered. His skin became soft like a child's, and he was cleansed.

¹⁵Then Naaman returned to the man of God with all his men. He entered and said to him, “Now I know that there is no other God anywhere in the world but in Israel. I ask you to accept these gifts from your servant.”

¹⁶But Elisha answered, “I swear by the Lord whom I serve, I will accept nothing.” And however much Naaman insisted, Elisha would not accept his gifts.

¹⁷So Naaman told him, “Since you refuse, let me get some sacks of soil from your land—the amount that two mules can carry. I shall use it to build an altar to the Lord, for I shall not offer sacrifices to any other god but him. ¹⁸But may the Lord pardon me: when my king goes to the temple of his god Rimmon, he leans on my arm, and I bow down with him. May the Lord pardon me for this.” ¹⁹Elisha answered, “Go in peace.” And Naaman went.

Naaman was already at a certain distance, ²⁰when Gehazi, Elisha’s servant, thought: “Imagine that my lord refused to take the gifts that Aramean brought! As the Lord lives, I will run after him and get some of them!”

²¹Gehazi went after Naaman, and Naaman saw Gehazi running after him, so he jumped out of his chariot to greet him. ²² Gehazi said to him, “Pardon me, lord, my master sent me to say to you: ‘Two young men from the community of the prophets have just come to me from the mountain of Ephraim. 'Kindly give me a talent of silver and two new garments for them.’” Naaman replied, ²³“Please accept two talents of silver.”

He insisted that Gehazi accept them, so he put the two talents of silver with two new garments in two sacks and handed them over to two of his servants who carried them before Gehazi. ²⁴When they reached the hill, Gehazi took them from their hands and put them away in his house. Then he sent the two servants of Naaman away, and they left.

²⁵When he appeared before his master, Elisha asked him, “Where have you been, Gehazi?” He answered, “Your servant has not been any place.” ²⁶Elisha replied, “I was there in spirit when a man turned and got down from his chariot to meet you. This is not the proper time to accept silver or clothes, olive groves, vineyards, sheep, cattle, and male and female servants. ²⁷Therefore, Naaman’s skin disease will afflict you and your descendants forever!” When Gehazi left his presence, his skin was as white as snow.

6 | ¹Now the fellow prophets said to Elisha, “See, the place where we are gathered has become too small for us. ²Let us go to the Jordan, and let each of us get a log to build a shed where we can gather.” Elisha answered, “Go.” ³Then one of them asked him, “Why do you not come along with us?” ⁴So Elisha went with them. And when they arrived at the Jordan, they began to cut down the trees. ⁵But as one of them was cutting a tree, the iron ax blade fell into the water, and he exclaimed, “O my master, it was borrowed!” The man of God asked him, ⁶“Where did it fall?” And he showed Elisha the place. Elisha cut off a stick, threw it in there, and the iron piece floated. ⁷Elisha said, “Get it.” The man reached out his hand and took it.

Elisha Captures an Armed Band

of Arameans

•  ⁸At that time, when the king of Aram was raiding Israel, he consulted with his officials and told them, “Let us attack that people.” ⁹But the man of God sent a message to the king of Israel, “Guard this place, for the Arameans shall go there.” ¹⁰So the king of Israel sent men to the place indicated by the man of God, and they kept watch there. And this happened several times. ¹¹The king of Aram was worried because of these things, so he called his officials and told them, “Go and find out who is revealing our plans to the king of Israel.” ¹²One of his officials said, “None of us has betrayed you, my king, but Elisha, the prophet in Israel, makes known to his king even the words you say in your bedroom.”

¹³The king answered them, “Go then and find out where he lives, that I may send people to arrest him.” When they told him that Elisha was in Dothan, ¹⁴he sent chariots, horses and strong troops, who arrived there by night and surrounded the city. ¹⁵On the following day, when the servant of the man of God rose early in the morning, he went out and saw the Arameans surrounding the city with their chariots and horses. He asked Elisha, “O my master, what shall we do?” ¹⁶He answered, “Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.” ¹⁷Elisha prayed, saying, “Lord, open his eyes that he may see.” The Lord opened the eyes of the servant, and he saw the hill full of horses and chariots of fire around Elisha.

¹⁸As the Arameans came down to him, Elisha again prayed to the Lord, “Blind them.” So the Lord made them unable to see as Elisha had asked. ¹⁹Elisha told them, “This is not the way, nor is this the city. Follow me, and I shall bring you to the man you seek.” And he led them to Samaria. ²⁰When they entered Samaria, Elisha said, “Lord, open their eyes so that they may see,” and they saw they were in Samaria.

²¹When the king of Israel saw them, he said to Elisha, “My father, should I kill them?” ²²He answered, “If you do not kill those you have captured with your sword and bow, how can you kill these men? Give them bread and water so they may eat and drink, and let them return to their master.”

²³The king served them a grand banquet, and they ate and drank. Then he sent them away to their master. From that day on, the troops of Aram did not return any more to invade the territories of Israel.

Famine and the Liberation of Samaria

²⁴Afterwards, Ben-hadad, the king of Aram, gathered all his troops together and laid siege on Samaria. ²⁵There was a great famine in Samaria; so great was the misery that the head of an ass was sold for eighty pieces of silver and a half-liter of wild onions for five pieces of silver.

²⁶The king of Israel was walking by upon the wall when a woman cried out to him, “Save me, my lord, King!” ²⁷The king answered, “In what way can I help you? Where shall I get bread if the Lord does not give you bread? ²⁸What is the matter?” She answered, “That woman told me: ‘Give up your son that we may eat him today, and then we will eat my son tomorrow.’ ²⁹So we cooked my son and ate him. But the next day, when I said to her: ‘Take your son so that we may eat him, ' she had hidden him.”

³⁰When the king heard the woman's words, he tore his clothes. He was upon the wall, and the people saw that he was wearing sackcloth under his tunic. ³¹The king swore: “May God punish me if the head of Elisha, the son of Shaphat, remains on his shoulders today.” And the king sent a guard to Elisha’s house.

³²Elisha was seated in his house, and the elders sat with him. Before the messenger’s arrival, Elisha said to them, “Do you not know that this murderer has ordered someone to cut my head off? When the messenger comes, shut the door and do not let him in. Behind him, I hear the sound of his master’s footsteps.” ³³He was still talking to them when the king arrived. The king said, “If all this evil comes from the Lord, why should I still trust him?”

7 | ¹But Elisha answered, “Listen to the word of the Lord: Tomorrow at this same time, at the gate of Samaria, a measure of flour shall be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, too.” ²The shield bearer, on whose arm the king leaned, said to the man of God, “Even if the Lord opens the windows of heaven for it to rain wheat, how could this thing be?” Elisha answered, “You shall see it with your own eyes but not eat of it.”

³Four men were at the city gates, outside, at the other side of the wall. They were lepers. And on that day, they said to one another, “Shall we sit here until we die? ⁴If we decide to enter the city, there we shall die of hunger. But if we stay here, we die as well. So let us go over to the camp of the Arameans. If they spare our lives, then we live; and if they kill us, then let us die!”

⁵They arose as it was getting dark to go to the camp of the Arameans. But when they reached the camp, they found no one there. ⁶The Lord had let the Arameans hear the noise of chariots and horses, the sound of a great army. And they had thought: “The king of Israel has sent money to the kings of the Hittites and the kings of Egypt to come and attack us.”

⁷So they fled as it was getting dark to save themselves, abandoning their tents, their horses, and their asses, leaving the camp just as it was. ⁸When these lepers reached the camp boundary, they went into a tent. They ate and drank; they took the silver, gold, and clothes and hid them in the ground. They entered another tent, took whatever they found, and hid them similarly.

⁹Then they thought: “What we are doing is not good. Today is a day of good tidings; if we keep silent until tomorrow, we shall be guilty. So let us go and tell this to the king’s men.” ¹⁰Returning to the city, they called out to the city guards, saying, “We went to the camp of the Arameans, but no one was there, not a trace of anyone, only horses and asses tied, and the tents just as they were left.” ¹¹The guards cried out the news told within the king’s household.

¹²The king arose at night and said to his officials, “The Arameans know that we are hungry. They have left their camp and have hidden in the field, waiting for us to come out of the city so that they may take us alive and then get into the city.” ¹³One of the officials answered, “Let some men take five of the remaining horses for, at any rate, these are also bound to die of hunger, as are all the people of this city. Dispatch them and see.” ¹⁴So they took two chariots and their horses, and the king sent the horsemen after the Arameans. ¹⁵They went as far as the Jordan, littered with clothes and equipment, which the Arameans had thrown away in their flight.

The messengers returned and told the king this. ¹⁶Then, the people went out and plundered the camp of the Arameans. As Elisha had said, a measure of flour was sold for a shekel, and a double measure of barley was also sold for a shekel. ¹⁷The king had appointed his shield bearer to keep watch at the city gates. But he was crushed right there by the crowd, so that he died, ¹⁸just as Elisha had told him when the king had come down to see him.

For when Elisha had said to the king, “Tomorrow at this hour, at the gate of Samaria, two measures of barley, as well as a measure of flour, shall be sold for a shekel,” ¹⁹the shield bearer had said to the man of God, “Even if the Lord opens the windows of heaven for it to rain down wheat, what you say will not happen.” Then Elisha had told him, “You shall see it with your own eyes, but you shall not eat of it.” ²⁰So it happened. The people ran over him and crushed him at the city gates, and there he died.

8 | ¹Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he had brought back to life, “Arise, and go with your family to live in another place, wherever it seems best for you because the Lord has called for a famine and it will come upon the land for seven years.” ²The woman did what the man of God told her to do—she went with her family to the land of the Philistines and stayed there for seven years.

³At the end of the seven years, the woman returned to her land and asked the king for her house and field. ⁴The king was talking with Gehazi, the servant of the man of God, saying, “Tell me all the marvelous things Elisha has done.” ⁵As Gehazi was narrating how Elisha had restored the dead to life, the woman showed up, whose very son Elisha had raised from the dead. She was claiming back from the king her house and field. Gehazi said, “This, my lord, is the woman, and this is her son whom Elisha raised from the dead.”

⁶The king asked her what had happened, and she recounted it to him. Then, the king immediately sent a palace official with her and said to him, “See to it that all her properties are returned to her with all the produce of her field from the day she left her land until now.”

Elisha and Hazael of Damascus

⁷Elisha went to Damascus. Ben-hadad, the king of Aram, was sick. When he was told that the man of God had come, ⁸he told Hazael, “Go to the man of God and consult the Lord through him, that I may know if I shall recover from this sickness. But take with you a good gift.”

⁹So Hazael went to see Elisha, taking with him all the best he could find in Damascus, forty camel loads of gifts. When he came before Elisha, he said to him, “Your son, Ben-hadad, the king of Aram, has sent me to ask you: ‘Shall I recover from this sickness?’” ¹⁰Elisha answered, “Go and tell him that he shall recover. But the Lord has shown me that he shall certainly die.”

¹¹Then the face of the man of God became rigid, his gaze fixed, and he began to weep. ¹²Hazael asked him, “Why do you weep, my lord?” He answered, “Because I have just seen the evil you will do to the children of Israel: you shall set on fire their fortresses, kill their young men by the sword, crush their children, and rip open the womb of pregnant women.” ¹³Hazael told him, “Who am I, your servant, that I should carry out such exploits?” Elisha answered, “I have just had a vision: the Lord has made you the king of Aram.”

¹⁴Hazael left Elisha and returned to his master, who asked him, “What has Elisha said to you?” He answered, “He has told me that you shall surely live.” ¹⁵But the following day, Hazael took a mantle, dipped it in water, and pressed it down on the king’s face until he died. And so, Hazael succeeded him as king of Aram.

¹⁶In the fifth year of the reign of Joram, son of Ahab and king of Israel, Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, began to reign. ¹⁷He was thirty-two years old when he began his reign and reigned for eight years in Jerusalem. ¹⁸He followed the footsteps of the kings of Israel and acted in everything like the family of Ahab. Because he had married the daughter of Ahab, he acted very severely with the Lord. ¹⁹However, the Lord would not destroy Judah for the sake of his servant David, according to the promise he had made to keep his lamp burning forever, which referred to David’s descendants.

²⁰In his days, the Edomites rebelled against the rule of Judah and proclaimed a king of their own. ²¹Then, Joram attacked the city of Zair with all his war chariots. Rising by night, he managed to escape from the Edomites, who had surrounded him and his chariot commanders, but the troops had fled. ²²Thus, Edom rebelled against Judah to this day. At that time, the city of Libnah also rebelled.

²³The rest of the deeds of Joram and his bravery are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ²⁴When Joram died, they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and his son Ahaziah succeeded him.

Ahaziah, King of Judah

²⁵In the twelfth year of the reign of Joram, the son of Ahab, king of Israel, Ahaziah, the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, began to reign. ²⁶Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he began his reign and reigned for a year in Jerusalem. His mother was Athaliah, daughter of Omri, king of Israel. ²⁷He followed in the footsteps of Ahab and misbehaved towards the Lord like those in the family of Ahab had done since he was related to Ahab’s family. ²⁸He went with Joram, the son of Ahab, to make war against Hazael, the king of Aram, at Ramoth of Gilead. ²⁹But the Arameans wounded Joram, who returned from Ramoth to Jezreel to recover from his wounds. After a while, Ahaziah, the king of Judah, visited Jezreel as he was recuperating.

Jehu Is the Anointed King of Israel

9 | •  ¹The prophet Elisha called one of the fellow prophets and said to him, “Prepare to go to the city of Ramoth in Gilead taking this bottle of oil. ²Look there for Jehu, the son of Jehoshaphat, son of Nimshi. Make him leave his companions and lead him to a different place. ³There, you shall take the bottle and pour the oil on his head, saying: ‘The Lord has anointed you king of Israel.’ Then open the door and flee without delay.” ⁴So the young man went to Ramoth.

 ⁵When he arrived, the army commanders were seated together, and he said, “I have to talk with you, commander.” Jehu asked, “To which of us?” He answered, “To you, commander.” ⁶So Jehu arose and went into the house.

Then, the young man poured the oil on Jehu’s head and said, “The Lord, the God of Israel, has consecrated you, king of the people of Israel. Thus says the Lord: ⁷ ‘You shall overthrow the kings of the family of Ahab, that I may avenge the blood of my servants, the prophets, whom Jezebel has murdered. ⁸I shall destroy the family of Ahab, and all their men shall perish. ⁹The family of Ahab shall be like the family of Jeroboam and the family of Baasha. ¹⁰And regarding Jezebel, no one shall bury her, for the dogs shall devour her in the field of Jezreel.’” Then, the young man opened the door and fled.

¹¹Jehu came out to join the officers of the king. They said to him, “What happened? Why did that fool call you?” Jehu answered, “You know that fellow, and you also know why he came.” ¹²They said, “We do not know anything. Tell us what he said to you.” He answered, “These are his exact words: ‘The Lord has consecrated you king of Israel.’”

¹³Then, all the commanders, the companions of Jehu, took their cloaks and put them on a wooden platform in the shape of a throne. And with the blast of trumpets, they proclaimed, “Jehu is king!”

¹⁴Thus, Jehu, son of Jehoshaphat, son of Nimshi, conspired against Joram. At that time, Joram was with the Israelites defending the city of Ramoth in Gilead against Hazael, king of Aram, ¹⁵but Joram had retreated to Jezreel to recover from the wounds he had received in battle.

Jehu said, “If it seems good to you, let no one leave the city, lest they go and tell the news to the king in Jezreel.” ¹⁶Jehu then mounted his chariot and went to Jezreel, where Joram lay sick, and Ahaziah, king of Judah, had visited him.

¹⁷The watchman at the tower in Jezreel saw Jehu's retinue coming and said, “I see a company.” Joram said, “Take your horse, run to meet them, and ask them if they have any news.”

¹⁸The man went out to meet them and said, “The king sent me to ask if you have any news.” Jehu answered, “Do not worry about the news. Turn around and follow me.” And the watchman immediately reported, “The messenger reached them, but he has not returned.”

¹⁹They sent another messenger who came to them and said, “The king wants to know if you bring any news.” And Jehu again answered, “Do not worry about the news; turn around and ride behind me.” ²⁰Again, the watchman reported, “He has reached them but has not returned. The way of driving of him who comes resembles that of Jehu, son of Nimshi, for he drives like a madman.”

²¹Joram then said, “Harness the horses of my chariot.” And Joram, the king of Israel, went out with Ahaziah, the king of Judah, each in his chariot, to meet Jehu. They met him in the field of Naboth of Jezreel.

Jehu Murders Joram

²²When Joram saw Jehu, he asked, “Do you bring peace, Jehu?” Jehu answered, “Why do you ask for peace when the prostitution of your mother, Jezebel, and her many sorceries continue?” ²³So Joram turned his chariot around and fled, saying to Ahaziah, “Treachery, Ahaziah!”

²⁴Jehu then drew his bow with all his strength and shot Joram in the back so the arrow pierced his heart. And Joram fell dead in his chariot.

²⁵Jehu said to his shield bearer Bidkar, “Take the body and throw it in the field of Naboth of Jezreel; for remember, when we served together in the cavalry of his father, Ahab, the Lord pronounced this sentence against him: ²⁶‘I swear that in this field, I shall take vengeance on you, for the blood of Naboth and for the blood of his sons which I saw you shed yesterday.’ So take his body and throw it into the field according to the word of the Lord.”

²⁷As for Ahaziah, the king of Judah, he fled toward Beth-haggan. Jehu pursued him, crying out, “Kill him, too!” And they shot him in his chariot at the slope of Gur near Ibleam. He reached Megiddo, took refuge there, and died. ²⁸His servants carried his body in a chariot to Jerusalem and buried him with his fathers in the city of David. ²⁹Ahaziah had begun his reign in Judah in the eleventh year of the reign of Joram, son of Ahab.

Jezebel Is Killed

•  ³⁰Jehu entered the city of Jezreel. When Jezebel learned this, she painted her eyes, adorned her neck, and looked out the window. ³¹As Jehu entered the gates, she said to him, “Do you bring peace? Will you not have Zimri’s fate after murdering your master?”

³²Jehu looked to the window and cried, “Who is on my side?” Two or three eunuchs looked down at him. ³³He ordered them, “Throw her down.” They threw her down through the window, and her blood splashed on the walls and the horses, and Jehu, in his chariot, ran over her.

³⁴Jehu entered Jezreel. After he had eaten and drunk, he gave these orders, “Take care of that cursed woman and bury her, for she was a king’s daughter.” ³⁵They went to bury her, but they found no more than her hands and feet with the skull. ³⁶When they told Jehu about it, he said, “This is what Elijah of Tishbe said in the name of the Lord: ‘In the field of Jezreel, the dogs shall eat Jezebel. ³⁷Her body shall be as dung on the land so that no one can say: “This was Jezebel.”’”

Ahab’s Family Is Wiped Out

10 | ¹The seventy sons of Ahab lived in Samaria. So Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria, to the leaders of the city, to the judges, and to those who took care of the sons of Ahab, saying, ²“As soon as this letter comes to you who have the king’s sons, chariots of war and horses, fortified cities and weapons, ³select the best and most fit of your master’s sons and make him sit on his father’s throne; then prepare to defend the family of your lord.”

⁴They were in great fear, and they said, “If the two kings were not able to stand up to him, how then can we resist him?” ⁵The palace chamberlain, the military commissioner of the city, the judges, and the tutors sent this response to Jehu: “We are your servants, and we will do whatever you say. We will not proclaim anyone king; do whatever seems best to you.”

⁶Then he sent them a second letter, which said, “If you are on my side and among those who obey me, take the heads of the sons of the king, your lord, and come to talk to me tomorrow at this time in Jezreel.”

The king had seventy sons, who were raised in the houses of prominent city families.

⁷When they received the letter, they seized the king’s sons and, executed all seventy of them and placed their heads in large baskets, which they sent to Jezreel. ⁸The messenger came to where Jehu was and said to him, “Here, they send you the heads of the king’s sons.” He answered, “Lay them in two heaps at the entrance of the gate of Jezreel until tomorrow.”

⁹In the morning, Jehu went out and said to all the people, “Be fair, tell me: if I have conspired against my king and have killed him, who then has beheaded all these? ¹⁰Know then that none of the words the Lord has spoken against the family of Ahab shall be without effect. Everything he said through the mouth of his servant Elijah has been fulfilled.”

¹¹Jehu then killed all who remained loyal to Ahab in Jezreel—all his ministers, relatives, and priests—without sparing anyone. ¹²Then he left for Samaria; in Beth-eked of the Shepherds, ¹³he met the brothers of Ahaziah, king of Judah. He asked them, “Who are you?” They answered, “We are the brothers of Ahaziah, and we go to greet the sons of the king and the sons of the queen.” ¹⁴Jehu said, “Take them alive.” They took them alive and beheaded them all by the well of Beth-eked. They were forty-two men, and none was left alive.

¹⁵Setting out from there, he met Jehonadab, son of Rechab, who came out to meet him. Jehu greeted him and said, “Would you be faithful to me as I am to you?” Jehonadab answered, “Yes.” So Jehu said to him, “Give me your hand.” He gave him his hand, and Jehu took him up into his chariot and said, ¹⁶“Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord.” And he had him ride in his chariot.

¹⁷When Jehu came to Samaria, he killed all the survivors loyal to Ahab in that city and did not spare anyone. So the word the Lord had said through the mouth of Elijah was fulfilled.

¹⁸Jehu gathered together all the inhabitants and said, “Ahab served Baal, but I will serve him still better.” ¹⁹He added, “Summon all the prophets of Baal, all his faithful followers, and priests. ²⁰Let no one be missing at the solemn sacrifice I will offer to Baal. Whoever is absent shall die.” Jehu did this with cunning, for he was determined to kill all who were faithful to Baal. They proclaimed the sacred solemnity that Jehu had commanded. And Jehu, for his part, ²¹sent messengers throughout Israel for all the faithful of Baal to come without any exception.

When they entered the temple of Baal, there were so many that they hardly touched the ground. ²²Then Jehu ordered those in charge of the vestments to bring out the sacred vestments reserved for the faithful of Baal and to distribute these to them. ²³Jehu, who Jehonadab, the son of Rechab, accompanied, said insistently to the faithful of Baal, “Make sure that none of the faithful of the Lord has entered with you, that there is no one here except all the true servants of Baal.”

²⁴Then they entered to prepare the sacrifice. But Jehu had stationed eighty men outside and said to them, “Whoever of you lets anyone escape of those who must die shall pay with his own life.” ²⁵And when the sacrifice was finished, Jehu gave this order to the soldiers and officers, “Go in and kill all of them; let none of them escape.” So, they put everyone to the sword, going as far as the Sanctuary of the house of Baal. ²⁶They pulled out the sacred pillar of the house of Baal and burned it. ²⁷They destroyed the altar and pulled down the temple, which remains a garbage dump to this very day.

²⁸This was how Jehu wiped out the name of Baal from Israel. ²⁹But Jehu did not turn aside from the sins which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, had caused Israel to commit, for they kept the golden calves of Bethel and Dan. ³⁰Despite this, the Lord said to Jehu, “Since you have acted well, doing what seems just to me, and have dealt with the family of Ahab according to my will, your sons until the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel.” ³¹But Jehu did not completely walk according to the Law of the Lord since he did not give up the sins into which Jeroboam had led Israel.

³²In those days, the Lord began to reduce the land of Israel. Hazael conquered the Israelites, taking their territory ³³from the Jordan to the East, all the land of Gilead, of the tribes of Gad, Reuben, Manasseh, from Aroer by the brook of Arnon, all the land of Gilead and Bashan.

³⁴Now, the rest of the story of Jehu, all that he did, and his bravery are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ³⁵When Jehu died, they buried him in Samaria, and his son Jehoahaz reigned in his place. ³⁶Jehu reigned over Israel in Samaria for twenty-eight years.

Athaliah in Judah

11 | •  ¹When Athaliah, the mother of Ahaziah, saw that her son had died, she was determined to wipe out all the descendants of the king. ²But Jehosheba, the daughter of King Joram and sister of Ahaziah, took Joash, her nephew, and brought him away from among the king’s sons who were about to be killed and put him with his wet nurse in the bedroom. Thus, she hid him from Athaliah so the boy was saved. ³And Joash remained hidden in the house of the Lord for six years while Athaliah reigned over the land.

⁴In the seventh year, Jehoiada, the chief priest, summoned the officers of the royal guard and the Carians to the house of the Lord. After concluding a pact with them under oath, he showed them the king’s son.

⁵Then he gave them these orders, “One-third of your men who come on duty on the Sabbath shall guard the king’s house, ⁶another third shall be at the foundation gate, and the last third at the back gates. Keep watch continuously. ⁷Now about those who come off duty on the Sabbath, two divisions shall guard the house of the Lord and surround King Joash. ⁸You shall be at his side, each with drawn weapons, and you will kill all who would cross your line. Take care of the king wherever he goes.”

⁹The guards' commanders did what Jehoiada, the priest, had told them to do, and they showed up with all their men, those who were to go off duty on the Sabbath and those who were to come on duty on that day. ¹⁰Jehoiada entrusted to the officers the spears and shields of King David which were in the house of the Lord. ¹¹And then the guards stood from the southern corner of the house to the north, surrounding the altar and the house of the Lord.

¹²Then Jehoiada, the priest, brought out the king’s son, crowned him and put the bracelets on him, then proclaimed and consecrated him king. All clapped their hands, shouting and crying out, “Long live the king!”

¹³When Athaliah heard the noise of the people, she approached the crowd surrounding the house of the Lord. ^{14 According to the custom,} The king was standing by the pillar, and the officers and the trumpeters were with him. The people were filled with joy, and they were blowing trumpets. Upon seeing this, Athaliah tore her clothes and cried, “Treason, treason!”

¹⁵Jehoiada, the priest, commanded the officers, “Surround her and bring her out to the courtyard, and kill anyone who tries to defend her.” He gave this order because he thought, “She should not die in the house of the Lord.”

¹⁶They brought her out, and when they reached the palace of the king, by the horses’ entrance, they killed her.

¹⁷Jehoiada made a Covenant between the Lord and the king and the people so they would be the people of the Lord. ¹⁸All the citizens went to the temple of Baal and destroyed it. They broke the altars and the images into pieces and killed Mattan, the priest of Baal, before his altar.

Then Jehoiada, the priest, posted guards over the house of the Lord. ¹⁹He led the officers, the king's guards, the Carians' guards, and the citizens, and they accompanied the king to the palace, passing through the Gate of the Guards. King Joash sat on the royal throne. ²⁰ All the citizens were happy, and the city was at peace. Now, regarding Athaliah, she died by the sword in the king’s palace.

Reign of Joash in Judah

12 | •  ¹Joash was seven years old when he began his reign. ²It was then the seventh year of the reign of Jehu, and he reigned for forty years in Jerusalem. His mother was Zibiah of Beer-sheba. ³Joash did what was right in the eyes of the Lord as long as the priest Jehoiada guided him. ⁴Still, he did not demolish the Sanctuaries on the hillsides where people continued offering sacrifices and burning incense.

⁵Joash said to the priest, “All the money from the sacred contributions which the people bring to offer in the house of the Lord, the cash, that which is offered as personal assessment, and that which is freely and voluntarily given in the house of the Lord—⁶all these you can receive. Let each one receive from the hand of those to whom he attends, but you are to repair the house of the Lord when anything needs to be repaired.”

⁷By the twenty-third year of the reign of Joash, the priests had not yet carried out the repairs needed in the house of the Lord. ⁸So the king summoned Jehoiada, the priest, and the other priests and said, “Why have you not done the house repairs yet? From now on, you will no longer keep any money during your service but shall set it aside for the repair of the house.” ⁹The priests agreed that henceforth, they would not accept money from the people and would not be in charge of the repair of the house. ¹⁰So Jehoiada, the priest, had a box made with a hole in the cover. He placed this by the altar, to the right side of those entering the house of the Lord, and the priests who were at the gates put all the money offered in the house of the Lord.

¹¹Whenever they saw that the box was full, a king's secretary would come, and together with the high priest, they would take and count the money. ¹²Then they would turn the amount over into the hands of those responsible for the work of the house, who would, in turn, pay with this money the carpenters and bricklayers doing the repairs. ¹³From this amount, they also bought the stones, wood, and everything necessary for the repair of the house of the Lord. ¹⁴But of this money given for the house of the Lord, they did not make any silver cups, or cutting tools, or water jars, or trumpets, or any golden or silver objects, ¹⁵but all the money was used to pay those who were repairing the house of the Lord. ¹⁶Accounts were not asked from those responsible for paying the laborers since they acted with great honor. ¹⁷Only the money offered to expiate sins was for the priests.

¹⁸At that time, Hazael, king of Aram, went up to fight against Gath. He captured it and was heading for Jerusalem. ¹⁹So Joash, king of Judah, took all the precious things that his fathers, Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, and Ahaziah, kings of Judah, had consecrated, with all that he had consecrated, and all the gold he could find in the treasury of the house of the Lord and those of the king’s house. Then he sent them to Hazael, king of Aram, who left Jerusalem with them.

²⁰Now, the rest regarding Joash and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah.

²¹Some of his officials plotted a conspiracy against him, and they killed him in Beth-Millo as he was going to Silla. ²²Jozacar, son of Shimeath, and Jehozabad, son of Shomer, struck him down, and he died. He was buried with his fathers in the city of David, and his son Amaziah reigned in his place.

Jehoahaz, King of Israel

13 | ¹In the twenty-third year of the reign of Joash, son of Ahaziah, king of Judah, Jehoahaz, son of Jehu, began to rule over Israel from Samaria, its capital; he reigned for seventeen years. ²He misbehaved towards the Lord and persisted in the sins of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, which had become the sins of Israel, without turning away from them. ³So the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of Hazael, king of Aram, and the hands of Ben-hadad, son of Hazael, throughout that time.

⁴But Jehoahaz prayed to the Lord, and the Lord listened to him for he had seen the oppression of Israel, how the king of Aram oppressed them. ⁵And the Lord gave Israel a liberator who would free them from the oppression of Aram, so the Israelites could live peacefully in their homes as before. ⁶(But they did not turn away from the sins by which Jeroboam made Israel sin, for the sacred pillar remained standing in Samaria.) ⁷No more than fifty horsemen, ten chariots of war and ten thousand soldiers were left of the army of Jehoahaz, for the king of Aram had wiped out all the rest like dust.

⁸The rest of Jehoahaz, all that he did, and his bravery are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ⁹When Jehoahaz slept with his fathers, they buried him in Samaria, and his son Joash reigned in his place.

Joash, King of Israel

¹⁰Joash, son of Jehoahaz, began to rule over Israel in the thirty-seventh year of King Joash’s reign in Judah. He reigned in Samaria for sixteen years. ¹¹He did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not turn away from the sins which Jeroboam, son of Nebat, made Israel commit. ¹²The rest about Joash and all that he did, his bravery and how he fought against Amaziah, king of Judah, are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ¹³When Joash slept with his fathers, he was buried in Samaria, together with the kings of Israel, and Jeroboam sat upon his throne.

Death of Elisha

¹⁴When Elisha became very sick and was about to die, Joash, king of Israel, went down to him and went before him, saying, “My father! My father! Chariot and horses of Israel!” ¹⁵Elisha said to him, “Take a bow and arrows.” So he took a bow and arrows. ¹⁶Elisha then said to the king, “Draw the bow,” and the king drew the bow. Then Elisha put his hand on the king’s hand ¹⁷and said, “Open the window towards the east.” He opened it. Elisha then said, “Shoot!” And he shot. Elisha said, “The Lord’s arrow of victory, the arrow of victory over Aram! You shall defeat Aram in Aphek until you utterly destroy them!” ¹⁸And he added, “Take the arrows.” And he took them. Elisha said to the king, “Strike the ground with them.” He struck three times and stopped. ¹⁹So the man of God became angry at him and said, “You should have struck five or six times, then you would have struck down Aram completely. But now, you will strike down Aram only three times.”

²⁰Elisha died, and they buried him. A little later, a detachment of Moabites conducted a raid as they used to do at the beginning of every year. ²¹It happened that at that time, some people were burying a dead man when they saw the Moabites. So they quickly threw the body into the grave of Elisha and then fled to safety. But as soon as the man’s body touched Elisha's bones, he revived and stood.

²²Hazael, king of Aram, oppressed the Israelites throughout the reign of Jehoahaz. ²³But the Lord had pity and took compassion on them. He turned towards them because of his Covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and would not utterly destroy them or cast them far from his face. ²⁴Hazael, the king of Aram, died, and his son Ben-hadad reigned in his place. ²⁵Then Joash, son of Jehoahaz, again took from Ben-hadad the cities Hazael had taken from Jehoahaz. Joash defeated him thrice and recovered the cities of Israel.

Amaziah, King of Judah

14 | ¹Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah, began to reign in the second year of the reign of Joash, king of Israel. ²He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jehoaddin of Jerusalem. ³He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, yet not like his father David; instead, he acted like his father Joash. ⁴The Sanctuaries on the hillside still stood. There, the people continued to offer sacrifices and to burn incense.

⁵When the kingdom was firmly in his hands, Amaziah killed the officers who had murdered the king and his father, ⁶but did not kill the sons of the assassins, according to what is written in the Law of Moses where the Lord gave this command: “You shall not put the fathers to death because of their sons, nor shall you put the sons to death because of their fathers, but every one shall be punished on account of his own crimes.”

⁷Amaziah conquered ten thousand Edomites in the valley of Salt and conquered the Rock by arms, calling it Joktheel, which is its name to this day.

⁸Then Amaziah sent messengers to Joash, son of Jehoahaz, son of Jehu, king of Israel, to say to him, “Come up and let us see which of the two of us is better.” ⁹Joash, king of Israel, sent as an answer to Amaziah, king of Judah: “A thorn bush of Lebanon sent this message to a cedar of Lebanon: ‘Give me your daughter to be my son’s wife.’ But the wild beasts of Lebanon passed by and trampled down the bush. ¹⁰You now feel very proud since you conquered the Edomites. Be content with your fame and be quiet in your own house lest disgrace befall you and the people of Judah.”

¹¹But Amaziah did not listen. So Joash, king of Israel, confronted him in Beth-shemesh of Judah. ¹²Judah was defeated by Israel, and everyone fled to his home. ¹³Joash, king of Israel, took Amaziah, son of Ahaziah, as a prisoner in Beth-shemesh and brought him to Jerusalem.

He made an opening one hundred eighty meters wide in the wall of Jerusalem, from the Ephraim Gate to the Corner Gate. ¹⁴He took all the gold and silver, all that he found in the house of the Lord and the treasuries of the king’s house, and hostages as well, and then returned to Samaria.

¹⁵The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel contains the rest of Joash, his bravery, and how he fought against Amaziah, king of Judah. ¹⁶When Joash rested with his fathers, they buried him in Samaria with his ancestors, and his son Jeroboam reigned in his place.

¹⁷Now about Amaziah: he lived fifteen more years after the death of Joash, king of Israel. ¹⁸The rest of the history of Amaziah is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ¹⁹There were people who conspired against him in Jerusalem. So Amaziah took refuge in Lachish, but they pursued him and killed him in that city. ²⁰His body was brought from there in a chariot, and they buried him in Jerusalem with his fathers in the city of David. ²¹Then, all the people of Judah took Azariah, who was sixteen years old, and proclaimed him king in place of his father, Amaziah. ²²He rebuilt Elath and restored it to Judah after the king, his father, died.

Jeroboam II, King of Israel

•  ²³Jeroboam, son of Joash, king of Israel, began to reign in Samaria in the fifteenth year of the reign of Amaziah, king of Judah. He reigned for forty-one years, ²⁴and during his reign, he misbehaved towards the Lord, for he did not turn away from the sins which Jeroboam, son of Nebat, made Israel commit. ²⁵He restored the border of Israel from the entrance of Hamath up to the Dead Sea, according to the word which the Lord, the God of Israel, had said through the mouth of his servant, the prophet Jonah, the son of Amittai from Gath-Hepher. ²⁶The Lord had seen the extreme bitter misery of Israel; there was no one left, neither slave nor freeman, who would help Israel. ²⁷But the Lord did not decide to wipe out the name of Israel from under the heavens, so he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam, son of Joash.

²⁸The rest regarding Jeroboam, all that he did and his bravery, how he fought and restored Hamath and Damascus to Israel is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ²⁹When Jeroboam died, he was buried with the kings of Israel, and his son Zechariah reigned in his place.

Azariah, King of Judah

15 | ¹Azariah, son of Amaziah, king of Judah, began to reign in the twenty-seventh year of the reign of Jeroboam in Israel. ²He was sixteen years old when he started his reign. He reigned for fifty-two years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jecoliah of Jerusalem.

³He did what pleased the Lord as his father Amaziah had done. ⁴But the Sanctuaries of the hillsides were not demolished, and the people still offered sacrifices and burned incense on them.

⁵The Lord struck down the king. He became sick with leprosy and remained a leper until his death. He lived in an isolated house, while Jotham, his son, was head of the king’s household and administered justice in the kingdom.

⁶Now, the rest about Azariah and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ⁷When Azariah died, they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and his son Jotham succeeded him.

The Last Kings of Israel

⁸Zechariah, son of Jeroboam, began to reign over Israel in Samaria, its capital, in the thirty-eighth year of the reign of Azariah, king of Judah. For the six months that he stayed in power, ⁹he misbehaved towards the Lord, as his fathers had done, for he did not turn away from the sins which Jeroboam, son of Nebat, made Israel commit.

¹⁰Shallum, son of Jabesh, conspired against him and struck him down at Ibleam. He killed him and reigned in his place.

¹¹Now, the rest regarding Zechariah is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ¹²In this way, the Lord's promise to Jehu was fulfilled: “Your sons until the fourth generation shall sit upon the throne of Israel.” And so it was.

¹³Shallum, son of Jabesh, began to reign in the thirty-ninth year of the reign of Uzziah, king of Judah, and he reigned for a month in Samaria. ¹⁴Then Menahem, son of Gadi, rebelled against him in Tirzah. He came to Samaria and killed Shallum in that city. Having killed Shallum, Menahem reigned in his place.

¹⁵Now, the rest of Shallum and the conspiracy he plotted are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

¹⁶Then Menahem seized Tappuah and killed its inhabitants, devastating its territory from Tirzah onwards since they would not open the gates to him. And he ripped open all the pregnant women.

¹⁷Menahem, son of Gadi, began to reign in the thirty-ninth year of the reign of Azariah, king of Judah. He reigned for ten years in Samaria, ¹⁸and he, too, misbehaved towards the Lord, for he did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, which he made Israel commit.

¹⁹In his days, Pul, the king of Assyria, invaded the land of Israel. And Menahem had to give him a thousand talents of silver so that the king of Asshur would receive him as an ally and keep him in power. ²⁰Menahem exacted the money from all the wealthy and prominent people of Israel to give to the king of Asshur: fifty pieces of silver from each one. With this, the king of Asshur turned back and did not stay there in the land.

²¹The rest regarding Menahem and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ²²When Menahem died, his son Pekahiah succeeded him.

²³Pekahiah, son of Menahem, began to reign over Israel in Samaria in the fiftieth year of Azariah's reign, king of Judah. He reigned for two years, ²⁴during which he misbehaved towards the Lord. He did not turn away from the sins that Jeroboam, Nebat's son, made Israel commit.

²⁵His officer Pekah, son of Remaliah, conspired against him. He and fifty Gileadites assassinated Pekahiah, as well as Argob and Arieh, in Samaria in the fortress of the royal palace. With the king dead, Pekah succeeded him.

²⁶The rest about Pekahiah and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

²⁷In the fifty-second year of the reign of Azariah, king of Judah, Pekah, son of Remaliah, began to reign over Israel in Samaria, its capital. He reigned for twenty years, and he misbehaved towards the Lord, ²⁸for he did not turn away from the sins which Jeroboam made Israel commit.

²⁹In the time of Pekah, king of Israel, Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, came and seized Iyon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, the territory of Gilead and Galilee, and the whole land of Naphtali, and deported their inhabitants to Asshur. ³⁰Then Hoshea, son of Elah, conspired against Pekah, son of Remaliah, killed him and reigned in his place. ³¹The rest about Pekah and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

Jotham, King of Judah

³²Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, began to reign in the second year of the reign of Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel. ³³Jotham was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jerusha, the daughter of Zadok.

³⁴He did what pleased the Lord, as his father had done, ³⁵but he did not abolish the Sanctuaries on the high places where the people continued to offer sacrifices and burn incense.

He built the Upper Gate of the House of the Lord. ³⁶The rest about Jotham and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ³⁷In those days, the Lord began to send Rezin, king of Aram, and Pekah, son of Remaliah, against Judah. ³⁸When Jotham died, they buried him with his fathers in the city of his ancestor David, and his son Ahaz succeeded him.

Ahaz, King of Judah

16 | ¹In the seventeenth year of the reign of Pekah, son of Remaliah, Ahaz, the son of Jotham, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 Ahaz was then twenty years old, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. He did not do what pleased the Lord, his God, as his father David had done. ³He walked in the way of the kings of Israel and even sacrificed his son in the fire, according to the hateful practices of those nations, which the Lord had expelled from the land, so the children of Israel could occupy their place. ⁴He offered sacrifices in the Sanctuaries on the hills, slopes, and under every green tree.

⁵Then Rezin, king of Aram, and Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel, came up to fight Jerusalem. They surrounded it but could not conquer it. ⁶At that time, Rezin, king of Aram, recovered Elath for the Edomites, expelling the Jews from there. The Edomites then entered Elath and lived there until now.

⁷Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser, king of Asshur, to tell him, “I am your servant and your son. Come then and rescue me from the hands of the king of Aram and the king of Israel, who wage war against me.” ⁸Ahaz took the silver and gold in the house of the Lord and the treasures from the king's house and sent them as a gift to the king of Asshur. ⁹The king of Asshur paid heed to him and went to attack Damascus; he seized that city and exiled its inhabitants to Kir, and then he killed Rezin.

¹⁰So King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet with Tiglath-pileser, king of Asshur. When he saw the altar in Damascus, he sent Uriah, the priest, the measurement of that altar and the design, which he copied on all its details.

¹¹The priest Uriah built the altar according to the king's design from Damascus. He finished it before King Ahaz arrived from Damascus. ¹²When the king returned from Damascus, he saw the altar, approached it, and went up to it. ¹³He burned his holocausts and sacrifices on that altar. There, he made his libation and shed the blood of his peace offerings. ¹⁴He removed the altar of bronze that was before the Lord, from the front of the house, from between the new altar and the house of the Lord, and he placed it on the north side of his new altar.

King Ahaz ordered the priest Uriah, ¹⁵“Upon this great altar you shall burn the morning holocaust and the evening sacrifice, the king’s holocaust and his sacrifice, the holocausts of the people of the land, their sacrifices and libations. You shall shed upon it all the blood of the holocausts and sacrifices. But the bronze altar shall be mine for consultation.” ¹⁶The priest Uriah did as the king had commanded him.

¹⁷The king dismantled the paneling of the stands, removed the washbasins from the top of them, took down the big bronze basin from the top of the oxen that supported it, and placed it on the stone pavement. Now, about the throne which had been built within the house of the Lord and the outer entrance for the king, ¹⁸he removed them from the house of the Lord because of the king of Asshur.

¹⁹The rest regarding Ahaz and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ²⁰When Ahaz died, they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and his son Hezekiah succeeded him.

End of the Kingdom of Israel in the North

17 | •  ¹Hoshea, son of Elah, began to reign in Israel in the twelfth year of the reign of Ahaz, king of Judah. He reigned for nine years in the city of Samaria ²and misbehaved towards the Lord, though not as badly as the previous kings of Israel.

³Shalmaneser, king of Asshur, came with his army to attack Hoshea, who surrendered to him and began paying taxes to him. ⁴But the king of Asshur discovered that Hoshea was plotting against him, for Hoshea had sent messengers to So, king of Egypt, and did not pay him the taxes as he had done every year. Shalmaneser arrested him and then put him in prison.

⁵The army of the king of Asshur subjected the whole of Israel, coming to Samaria and laying siege to it for three years. ⁶In the ninth year of the reign of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria, exiled the Israelites to Asshur and made them settle in Halah, at the banks of Habor, the river of Gozan, as well as in the cities of the Medes.

Causes of the Fall of Israel

•  ⁷This happened because the children of Israel had sinned against the Lord, their God, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, where they were subject to Pharaoh. But they had turned back to other gods. ⁸They followed the customs of the nations which the Lord had driven out before them.

⁹The children of Israel introduced many innovations that offended the Lord, their God. They built Sanctuaries in all the cities, from the watchtowers to the fortified cities. ¹⁰They placed images and sacred pillars on all the hills and under every green tree. ¹¹They burned incense in their Sanctuaries on the hills, like the nations the Lord had dispossessed for them.

They did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger. ¹²They served their filthy idols despite what the Lord had told them: “You must not do such a thing.” ¹³The Lord warned Israel and Judah through the mouth of every prophet and seer, saying: “Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and precepts according to the laws which I commanded your fathers and which I have sent to you by my servants, the prophets.”

¹⁴But they did not listen and refused, as did their fathers, who did not believe in the Lord, their God. ¹⁵They despised his statutes, the covenant he had made with their fathers, and the warnings he had given them. They went after worthless idols and became worthless, following the nations that surrounded them, despite what the Lord had said: “Do not do as they do.”

¹⁶They abandoned all the Lord's commandments and fashioned two bronze calves. They made sacred pillars, knelt before all the stars of heaven, and worshiped Baal.

¹⁷They sacrificed their sons and daughters in the fire, practiced divination and magic, and sold themselves to evildoing in the sight of the Lord, enkindling his anger.

¹⁸So the Lord became indignant with Israel and cast them far away from his presence, leaving only the tribe of Judah.

¹⁹But neither did Judah keep the commandments of the Lord, their God; on the contrary, they followed the customs practiced in Israel. ²⁰Because of this, the Lord rejected the whole race of Israel. He humbled them and delivered them to plunderers' hands until the day came when he drove them far away from his presence.

²¹When he divided the kingdom of David, Israel chose Jeroboam, son of Nebat, as king; he made them commit a great sin by separating themselves from the Lord. ²²The Israelites followed Jeroboam in his sins and did not turn away from them ²³until the Lord had removed Israel from his presence, according to the warning given them through his servants, the prophets. So Israel was exiled from its land to the country of Asshur until this day.

The Origin of the Samaritans

•  ²⁴The king of Asshur brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and he settled them in the cities of Samaria in place of the Israelites. These people occupied the country of Samaria and resided in its cities.

²⁵When they first settled there, they did not worship the Lord, so the Lord sent lions, which killed many of them. ²⁶Then it was reported to the king of Asshur, “The people you deported and sent to Samaria to settle in its cities do not know how the Lord, the God of the land, should be honored, so he has sent lions which are killing them.”

²⁷So the king of Asshur commanded, “Let one of the priests we have banished from Samaria return there. Let him go and live with those people and teach them how to honor the God of that land.” ²⁸So, one of the priests, who had been banished from Samaria, came back and, staying in Bethel, taught these people how they should honor the Lord.

²⁹Yet each nation made its own gods and placed them in the Sanctuaries on the hills, which the Samaritans had built. Each of these nations put their god in the city where they settled: ³⁰the Babylonians set up the idol Succoth, the inhabitants of Cuth made Nergal, the inhabitants of Hamath made Ashima, ³¹those of Avva made Nibjaz and Tartak. Those of Sepharvaim burned their children in the fire in honor of King Hadad and King Anu, their gods.

³²They worshiped the Lord, but they appointed for themselves priests from among their people, who served the Lord in the Houses on the hills. ³³They honored the Lord but, at the same time, served their own gods according to the customs of the nations from where they had been banished.

³⁴Until this very day, they still observe the old customs. They do not honor the Lord since they do not follow the precepts and customs, the law, or the commandments which the Lord had given to the children of Jacob, to whom he had given the name Israel. ³⁵The Lord had made a Covenant with them, commanding them, “Do not honor other gods or bow down before them, or serve them or offer them sacrifices. ³⁶You shall honor the Lord alone, who brought you out of the land of Egypt with the strength of his arm; before him, you shall bow, and to him alone shall you offer sacrifices. ³⁷Keep the precepts, the ordinances, the Law, and the commandments he wrote for you. Fulfill them all your days, and do not adore strange gods. ³⁸Do not forsake the Covenant he made with you and do not adore strange gods, ³⁹but adore only the Lord, your God, and he shall free you from the hand of all your enemies.” ⁴⁰But they did not pay attention; instead, they followed their ancient customs.

⁴¹So these people honored the Lord, but, at the same time, also served their idols; after them, their children and their children’s children continued doing what their fathers had done.

Hezekiah, King of Judah

18 | •  ¹In the third year of the reign of Israel’s King Hoshea, son of Elah, Ahaz’s son Hezekiah became king over Judah.

²He was twenty-five years old then, and his reign in Jerusalem lasted for twenty-nine years. His mother was Abijah, daughter of Zechariah. ³He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, like David, his ancestor.

⁴He did away with the Sanctuaries on the hills, demolished the standing stones, and cut down the sacred pillars.

He also destroyed the bronze serpent that Moses had fashioned in the desert, for until that time, the Israelites had been offering sacrifices to it and called it Nehushtan.

⁵He trusted in the Lord more than any of the kings of Judah who preceded or succeeded him, and he never departed from the Lord. ⁶He kept the commandments the Lord had given through Moses. ⁷For that reason, the Lord was with him. He succeeded in all his undertakings. He rebelled against the king of Assyria and was no longer subject to him. ⁸He imposed his authority on the Philistines as far as Gaza and seized their land from the watchtowers to the fortified cities.

⁹In the fourth year of King Hezekiah’s reign (the seventh year of the reign of Israel’s King Hoshea, son of Elah), King Shalmaneser of Assyria marched up against Samaria and besieged it. ¹⁰At the end of three years, he conquered it. In the sixth year of the reign of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of the reign of Hoshea, king of Israel, Samaria was conquered. ¹¹The king of Assyria deported the Israelites to Assyria and settled them in Halah, on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.

¹²This happened to them because they did not listen to the voice of the Lord, their God, and had broken his Covenant. They did not listen to nor put into practice what Moses, the servant of the Lord, had commanded them.

Sennacherib’s Invasion

•  ¹³In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah’s reign, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, invaded Judah. He laid siege to all the fortified cities and seized all of them. ¹⁴Hezekiah, king of Judah, told Sennacherib, who was in Lachish, “I have misbehaved; stop your attack, and I will do whatever you demand of me.” The king of Assyria demanded that Hezekiah contribute three hundred talents of silver and thirty of gold.

¹⁵Hezekiah then handed over to him all the money found in the house of the Lord and the treasuries of the royal palace. ¹⁶ It was then that Hezekiah ordered that the gold sheets, with which he had adorned the doorposts, be stripped from the gates of the house of the Lord and given to the king of Assyria.

¹⁷From Lachish, the king of Assyria sent his field commander with a large army to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem. They halted at the channel of the Upper Pool on the highway to the Fuller’s Field. The field commander called for the king, and 18 Eliakim, son of Hilkiah, the palace administrator, went out to him, together with Shebnah, the secretary, and Joah, son of Asaph, the recorder.

¹⁹The field commander told them, “Give Hezekiah this message from the great king of Assyria: ‘How can you be so confident? ²⁰You thought that words are as good as wisdom and replace strength in times of war? On whom are you relying that you rebel against me? ²¹You rely on Egypt, a broken staff which pierces the palm of him who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh, king of Egypt, for all who rely on him. ²²Yes, you may say, "We rely on the Lord our God.” But isn’t he the one whose altars and high places Hezekiah removed when he commanded Judah and Jerusalem: “You shall worship before this altar?’”

²³Come now, make a bargain with my master, the king. I will give you two thousand horses if you can supply riders. ²⁴How could you ever repulse one of the least of my master’s generals? And you rely on Egypt for chariots and horsemen! ²⁵Do you think I have come to attack and destroy this land without consulting the Lord? He said to me: ‘Go up to this land and conquer it!’” ²⁶Then Eliakim, Shebnah, and Joah said to the field commander, “Speak to your servants in Aramaic. We understand it. Do not speak to us in Hebrew in the hearing of these people on the walls.”

²⁷But the field commander said, “Do you think my master sent me to speak these words only to your master and to you? Is it not also to the men on the walls who, with you, will have to eat their own dung and drink their own urine?”

²⁸Then the field commander stood and cried out loudly in Hebrew: “Hear the words of the great king of Assyria: ²⁹‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you! No, he will not be able to help you! ³⁰Do not listen to him when he tells you to trust the Lord, saying, “The Lord will save us. This city will not be given over to the king of Assyria.’” Do not listen to Hezekiah but ³¹to what the king of Assyria says, ‘Make your peace with me and surrender. Then I will let each of you eat of your vine and fig tree and drink the water of your cistern until I come again. ³²Then I will take you to a land like your own, a land of grain and new wine, of bread and vineyards, of oil and honey that you may live and not die.

Hezekiah is misleading you when he says that the Lord will save you. ³³Have the gods of the nations rescued their land from the hands of the king of Assyria? ³⁴Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah? And have the gods delivered Samaria from my hand? ³⁵Who among these nations' gods has been able to save his country from me? Do you think that the Lord will deliver Jerusalem from my hand?”

³⁶The people were silent and did not respond, for the king had ordered, “Don’t respond to him.”

³⁷Then Eliakim, with Shebnah and Joah, came to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and told him what the field commander had said.

19 | ¹When King Hezekiah heard this, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went to the house of the Lord. ²He sent Eliakim, the overseer of the palace, Shebnah, the secretary, and the elders among the priests, all wearing sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah, son of Amoz.

³And they said to Isaiah, “This is what Hezekiah says: ‘Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace, as when children are at the point of birth, and there is no strength to deliver them. ⁴Would that your God might hear the words of the field commander, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent. May the Lord your God rebuke him for his words, insulting the living God. Therefore, offer a prayer for the few of us that are left.’”

⁵When King Hezekiah’s officials came to Isaiah, ⁶he said to them: “Tell your master this word of the Lord: ‘Do not fear because of the words you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have insulted me. ⁷Listen! I will let him be frightened. Then he will return to his country, and there I will have him slain by the sword.’”

⁸The field commander returned and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah, for he had heard that the king had left Lachish. ⁹This was because King Sennacherib had heard that Tirhakah, the Cushite king of Egypt, was going out to fight him.

Sennacherib’s Letter to Hezekiah

Again, Sennacherib sent messengers to Hezekiah with these words, ¹⁰“Say to Hezekiah, king of Judah that his God in whom he trusts may be deceiving him in saying that Jerusalem will not be given into the hands of the king of Assyria. ¹¹Surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the lands they have destroyed! And will you be spared? ¹²Have their gods saved the nations that my fathers destroyed? Gozan and Haran, Rezeph and the sons of Eden who were in Telassar? ¹³Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the kings of the city of Sepharvaim, of Hena and Ivvah?”

¹⁴Hezekiah took the letter from the messengers, and when he had read it, he went to the house of the Lord, where he unrolled the letter ¹⁵ and prayed, saying, “O Lord, God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim! You alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made the heavens and the earth. ¹⁶Give ear, the Lord, and hear! Open your eyes and see! Listen to all the words of Sennacherib, who has sent men to insult the living God! ¹⁷It is true, the Lord, that the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the countries of the earth. ¹⁸They have thrown their gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not true gods but gods made of wood and stone by human hands. ¹⁹Now, O Lord our God, save us from his hand and let all the kingdoms of the earth know that you alone, the Lord, are God.”

Isaiah Intervenes

²⁰Then Isaiah, son of Amoz, sent word to Hezekiah: “You have called upon the Lord, and he has heard your prayer regarding Sennacherib, king of Assyria. ²¹This is what the Lord has spoken against him:

‘The Virgin Daughter of Zion

despises and scorns you;

the Daughter of Jerusalem

shakes her head behind you.

²²Whom have you insulted and blasphemed?

Against whom have you raised your voice

and lifted up your eyes in arrogance?

Against the Holy One of Israel!

²³Through your servants,

you have insulted the Lord.

For you have said:

“With the enormous number of my chariots,

I have ascended the heights of the mountains,

the topmost recesses of Lebanon.

I have cut down its tallest cedars

and its choicest fir trees.

I have climbed its remotest heights to the densest of its forests.

²⁴I have dug wells and drunk waters;

I have dried up with the soles of my feet all the streams of Egypt.”

²⁵Have you not heard

how I decreed it long ago,

how I planned from days of old

what now I have brought to pass?

Your ordained role was

to lay waste fortified cities,

to turn them into ruinous heaps.

²⁶Shorn of power, their inhabitants

have been dismayed and confounded;

they have been as the grass

and green plants in the field, as the grass on the housetops,

scorched before it has grown.

²⁷I know whenever you rise or sit, go out or come in, and I know your rage against me.

²⁸Because you raged against me

and your arrogance that I have heard of,

I will put my hook in your nose

and my bridle in your mouth,

and I will turn you back

on the way by which you came.’

²⁹This will be a sign for you, O Hezekiah: This year you will eat the after-growth grain, and next year what grows from that, but in the third year, sow and reap, plant vines and eat the fruit.

³⁰A remnant of the house of Judah shall take root below and produce fruit above. ³¹For a remnant will come from Jerusalem and survivors from Mount Zion. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this. ³²That is why the Lord has said this concerning the king of Assyria: ‘He shall not enter this city nor shoot his arrows. He shall not raise a shield to oppose it nor build a siege ramp against it. ³³He shall leave by the way he came and shall not enter the city, word of the Lord. ³⁴I will protect this city and so save it for my own sake and the sake of David, my servant.’” ³⁵It happened that the angel of the Lord went out that night and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. When the people rose early the next morning, there were all the corpses.

³⁶So Sennacherib, king of Assyria, departed, returned home, and lived in Nineveh. ³⁷While he was worshiping in the temple of his god, Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer slew him with the sword and escaped to Ararat’s land. And Esarhaddon, his son, succeeded him as king.

Hezekiah’s Illness

20 | ¹In those days, Hezekiah fell mortally ill, and the prophet Isaiah, son of Amoz, went to him with a message from the Lord, “Put your house for you shall die; you shall not live.”

²Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, ³“Ah, Lord! Remember how I have walked before you in truth and wholeheartedly and have done what is good in your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

⁴Isaiah had still not reached the central courtyard when the word of the Lord came to him, ⁵“Go back and tell Hezekiah, the ruler of my people, what the Lord, the God of his father David, says: ‘I have heard your prayer, and I have seen your tears. And now I will cure you. On the third day, you will go up to the house of the Lord. ⁶See! I am adding fifteen years to your life, and I will save you and this city from the power of the king of Assyria. I will defend it for my sake and the sake of David, my servant.’”

 ⁸Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “What shall be the sign that the Lord will heal me and that I shall go up to the house of the Lord within three days?” ⁹Isaiah answered, “This shall be the sign for you in the Lord’s name, that the Lord shall do what he has said: Do you wish the shadow of the second story to go forward ten steps or to go back?” ¹⁰Hezekiah said, “It is easy for the shadow to lengthen ten steps, but it shall be wonderful if the shadow goes back ten steps.” ¹¹The prophet Isaiah called on the Lord, and the Lord made the shadow go back ten steps, line by line, on the ten steps it had covered on the stairway.

⁷Isaiah ordered, “Get a fig cake.” So they did as he had ordered, placing it on the ulcerated sore, and he recovered.

¹²At that time, Merodach-baladan, son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah after hearing that he was recovering from an illness. ¹³Hezekiah rejoiced, so he showed the envoys his treasure house —the silver, the gold, the spices, the fragrant oils, his weapons and all that was in the storerooms; there was nothing in this palace, or in all his realms that Hezekiah did not show them.

¹⁴Then, the prophet Isaiah asked the king, “What did these men say? Where did they come from?” The king answered, “They have come from a far country, from Babylon.” ¹⁵Isaiah said, “And what have they seen in your house?” The king answered, “They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing in my treasuries that I did not show them.”

¹⁶So Isaiah said to the king, “Listen to this word of the Lord: ¹⁷‘The days are coming when all that is in your house and all that your fathers have stored up to this day shall be taken to Babylon; nothing shall be left, says the Lord. ¹⁸Some of your sons who are born of your blood shall be taken away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’” ¹⁹Hezekiah answered Isaiah, “What you say is a good word from the Lord,” for he thought, “What does it matter so that I have peace and security in my lifetime?”

²⁰Now, the rest regarding Hezekiah and all about his bravery, how he built the great reservoir, and how it supplied water to the city is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ²¹When Hezekiah slept with his fathers, his son Manasseh reigned in his place.

Manasseh, King of Judah

21 | •  ¹Manasseh was twelve years old when he began his reign and reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah.

²He mistreated the Lord, imitating the wretched practices of the people the Lord had driven out from the land to give it to the Israelites. ³He rebuilt the Sanctuaries on the hills, which Hezekiah, his father, had destroyed. He built altars to the god Baal and made a sacred pillar similar to the one Ahab, the king of Israel, had made. He knelt before all the stars of heaven and worshiped them. ⁴He built altars in the courtyard of the house of the Lord, about which the Lord had said, “Jerusalem shall be the dwelling place of my Name.”

⁵He built altars for all the stars of heaven in the two courtyards of the house of the Lord. ⁶He sacrificed his son by fire. He practiced soothsaying and magic; he brought in seers and wizards without ceasing what the Lord condemned, thus provoking his anger. ⁷He even put up the sacred pillar of the goddess Asherah in the house of the Lord despite what the Lord had said to David and his son, Solomon: “I shall let my Name rest forever in this house, for I have chosen Jerusalem from among all the tribes of Israel. ⁸I shall no longer let Israel wander out of the land I gave to their fathers, provided that you try to live according to all the Law I gave you through my servant Moses.”

⁹But they did not listen, and Manasseh led them into doing things worse than those nations had done whom the Lord had expelled before the Israelites. ¹⁰So the Lord spoke through the mouth of his servants, the prophets, saying,

¹¹“Manasseh, king of Judah, has multiplied the wretched practices and has acted worse than the Amorites. He has made the people of Judah sin with his repugnant images.

¹²Therefore, I shall bring upon Jerusalem and upon Judah an evil so great that the ears of those who hear of it shall buzz. ¹³Jerusalem and its kings shall suffer the fate of Samaria and the family of Ahab. I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a plate to clean it and then turn it upside down. ¹⁴I shall drive away the rest of my people and give them over into the hands of their enemies so that they shall become their prey and booty. ¹⁵For they did what displeased me and made me angry from the day when their ancestors came out of Egypt to this day.”

¹⁶Manasseh also shed innocent blood in such quantity that it filled up Jerusalem from one end to the other, besides the sins he made Judah commit, doing what is wrong in the sight of the Lord. ¹⁷The rest regarding Manasseh, all that he did and the sins he committed, is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah.

¹⁸When Manasseh died, they buried him in his house's garden, and Uzza and his son Amon reigned in his place.

¹⁹Amon was twenty-two years old when he began his reign, and he reigned for two years in Jerusalem; his mother’s name was Meshullemeth, daughter of Haruz, of the city of Jotbah. ²⁰He mistreated the Lord, as his father Manasseh had done. ²¹He completely followed in his father's footsteps—he served the idols his father had served and bowed down before them. ²²He abandoned the Lord, the God of his ancestors, and did not walk in the way of the Lord.

²³The officials of Amon conspired against him and murdered him in his house. ²⁴But the citizens killed all who had plotted against the king, and they proclaimed his son Josiah king in his place.

²⁵The rest regarding Amon and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ²⁶They buried him in his tomb, in the garden of Uzza, and his son Josiah reigned in his place.

The Book of the Law Is Discovered

22 | •  ¹Josiah was eight when he began to govern and reigned for thirty-one years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jedidah, daughter of Adaiah of Bozkath. ²He did everything right in the eyes of the Lord and followed in the footsteps of David, his father, without turning aside either to the right or the left.

³In the eighteenth year of his reign, King Josiah sent his secretary Shaphan, son of Azaliah, son of Meshullam, to the house of the Lord, saying, ⁴“Go up to the high priest Hilkiah and give him the amount of money which the people offer for the house of the Lord, and that which the gatekeepers have collected, and when these have been smelted down, ⁵let them turn it over to those in charge of the house of the Lord. ⁶It shall be given to those carpenters and construction workers who do the repairs of the house. In the same way, they shall buy the wood and stones needed to repair the house. ⁷But do not ask them any account of the money, for they are honorable men.”

⁸At that moment, Hilkiah, the high priest, said to Shaphan, the secretary, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the Lord.” And he entrusted the Book to Shaphan, who read it. ⁹Then Shaphan went to the king and said, “We have gathered the money in the house, and this has been turned over to the caretakers of the house to make the repairs.”

¹⁰And Shaphan added, “The priest Hilkiah has turned over a book to me.” And Shaphan read the book to the king. ¹¹When the king heard the contents of the book, he tore his clothes and ¹²commanded Hilkiah, Ahikam, Achbor, the secretary Shaphan, and Asaiah, his minister, to do the following, ¹³“Go and consult the Lord about the threats in this book which you have found. Consult him for me, the people, and the whole of Judah since our fathers did not listen to what this book says or its ordinances. This is why the anger of the Lord is ready to burn against us.”

¹⁴The priest Hilkiah, Ahikam, Achbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to consult the prophetess Huldah, wife of Shallum, son of Tikvah, son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe. She lived in Jerusalem, in the new city.

¹⁵She answered them, ¹⁶“You will say to the one who sent you to me: This is what the Lord says: ‘I shall bring evil upon this place and its inhabitants according to all the words of the book which the king of Judah has read, ¹⁷for this people have abandoned me and they have burned incense in honor of other gods. Because of all they have done, I am angry about this place, and the fire of my anger will not be quenched.’

¹⁸You shall deliver this answer to the king of Judah, who has sent you to consult the Lord: the Lord, the God of Israel, says this—‘The warnings in this book shall not reach you, ¹⁹for your heart has been touched, and you have done penance in the presence of the Lord when you heard what I have said against this place and its inhabitants, that this place shall be desolate and cursed. You have torn your garments and wept before me, and I have heard you, says the Lord. ²⁰Therefore, you shall join your fathers; you shall die and be buried in peace, without seeing any of the evils I shall send against this place.’”

Josiah’s Religious Reform

23 | ¹The king summoned to his side all the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem. ²Then he went up to the house of the Lord, followed by all the people of Judah and Jerusalem. The priests, prophets, and all the people went with him, from the youngest to the oldest. When all were gathered, he read to them the Book of the Law found in the house of the Lord.

³The king stood by the pillar; he made a Covenant in the presence of the Lord, promising to follow him, keep his commandments and laws, and respect his ordinances. He vowed to keep this Covenant according to what was written in the book with all his heart, soul, and people promised to him.

⁴Then the king commanded the high priest Hilkiah, the priests of lesser rank, and all the gatekeepers to bring out all the objects made for Baal, Asherah, and all the stars of heaven. He had them burned outside Jerusalem, in Kidron's idle land and brought their ashes to Bethel.

⁵The kings of Judah had appointed pagan priests who offered sacrifices in the Sanctuaries on the hills, in the different cities of Judah, and the suburbs of Jerusalem. Josiah did away with them and those who offered incense to Baal, the sun, the moon, the stars, and all the heavenly hosts. ⁶The Sacred Pillar in the Lord's house was brought out of Jerusalem and taken to the brook Kidron, where it was burned, and its ashes were thrown on the public grave.

⁷The king demolished the house of the effeminate men who dedicated themselves to prostitution (as was done in the cult of Asherah). This was within the courtyards of the house of the Lord, and in this house, too, the women wove veils for Asherah.

⁸Right after this, he made all the priests from the cities of Judah come to Jerusalem, and he destroyed all the sanctuaries on the hills where they had offered sacrifice, from Beersheba in the south to Geba in the north. He destroyed the Sanctuary of the Gates, which was on the left side of the entrance gate to the city and at the entrance of the gate of Joshua, the city governor.

⁹The priests who had served in the Sanctuaries on the hills could not offer sacrifices in the house of the Lord; they only ate the unleavened bread with the priests of Jerusalem.

¹⁰The king had the place for burning human sacrifices in the valley of Ben-Hinnom destroyed so that no one could sacrifice his sons or daughters in the fire according to the ritual of Molech. ¹¹The horses, which the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun, were removed from the entrance of the house of the Lord; these were in the atrium, near the house of the palace official, Nathan-Melech. And the chariots of the sun were burned. ¹²There were altars that the kings of Judah had built on the roof of the palace of Ahaz. Manasseh also built altars in the two courtyards of the house of the Lord. Josiah had them all destroyed and reduced to dust, thrown into the brook Kidron.

¹³The king destroyed the Sanctuaries on the hills facing Jerusalem, south of the Mount of Olives. Solomon, king of Israel, had built them for Ashtoreth, the Sidonians' idol, Chemosh, the idol of Moab, and Milcom, the idol of the Ammonites. ¹⁴The king broke in pieces the images of the false gods, cut down the sacred pillars, and filled the places where these had been with human bones to make them unclean.

•  ¹⁵There was also the Sanctuary of Bethel, with the altar which Jeroboam, king of Israel, had made. This cult had been the sin of Israel. The king destroyed it. He set the Sanctuary on fire and burned the sacred pillar. ¹⁶Looking around on all sides, Josiah saw the tombs on the mountain; he had the bones taken out of the tomb and burned on the altar. So the word of the Lord was fulfilled, which the man of God had proclaimed when Jeroboam stood by the altar during a feast. Josiah noticed the tomb of this man of God, ¹⁷and said, “What is that monument that I see?” The city's people said to him, “That is the tomb of the man of God who came from Judah to announce what you have just done with the altar of Bethel.” ¹⁸The king commanded, “Leave the tomb in peace, and let no one touch his bones.” And his bones, together with the bones of the prophet of Samaria, were not touched.

¹⁹Josiah also removed all the Sanctuaries on the hills in the cities of Samaria. These Sanctuaries had been made by the kings of Israel, which provoked the Lord's anger. The king destroyed them and did to them as he had done to the temple of Bethel.

²⁰He slaughtered upon the altars all the priests of the Sanctuaries on the hills who were found there, and he burned human bones on the altars. Then he returned to Jerusalem.

²¹The king ordered everyone to “Celebrate the Passover in honor of the Lord, our God, as it is written in this Book of the Covenant.”

²²A Passover like this had not been celebrated since the days of the Judges who had governed Israel or during the time when the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah reigned. ²³This Passover was celebrated in Jerusalem in the eighteenth year of the reign of King Josiah.

²⁴Josiah obeyed all the words of the Law written in the book which the priest Hilkiah had found in the house of the Lord. He immediately did away with the mediums and seers, the small household gods and the idols, and all those loathsome things seen in the lands of Judah and Jerusalem.

²⁵There had never before been a king like him who returned to the Lord with all his heart, soul, and strength, observing all the law of Moses, nor was another like him seen again.

²⁶Despite this, the Lord did not turn from the fire of his anger. He was angry with Judah because of all the evils Manasseh had done. ²⁷So the Lord declared, “I shall also cast Judah away from my presence as I have cast Israel; I shall no longer take Jerusalem into consideration, though it is the city I have chosen and there is the house of which I have said: My Name dwells here.”

•  ²⁸The rest regarding Josiah and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ²⁹In those days, the Pharaoh Neco crossed the river Euphrates and went to join the king of Asshur. King Josiah set out to confront him, but Neco killed him in Megiddo when he saw him. ³⁰Josiah’s servants brought his body in a chariot from Megiddo to Jerusalem and buried him in his tomb. Then, the people took Jehoahaz, son of Josiah, to anoint him and make him king in place of his father.

Josiah’s Sons

³¹Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for three months in Jerusalem. His mother was Hamutal, daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. ³²He did what displeases the Lord, imitating his ancestors. ³³The Pharaoh Neco bound Jehoahaz in chains in Riblah, in the land of Hamath, since he did not want him to reign in Jerusalem. Then he imposed on the land a contribution of one hundred talents of silver and ten of gold. ³⁴And he installed as king another son of Josiah, Eliakim, as the successor to his father and changed his name to Jehoiakim. But he took Jehoahaz away and brought him to Egypt, where Jehoahaz died.

³⁵Jehoiakim gave the silver and gold to the Pharaoh to pay the contribution, which the Pharaoh himself exacted from him through a tax imposed on all the land. Everyone had to pay his quota according to what he possessed. So Jehoiakim collected from all the people the gold and silver demanded by the Pharaoh.

³⁶Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother was Zebidah, the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah. ³⁷He did what displeased the Lord, imitating his fathers.

Nebuchadnezzar’s Invasion

24 | ¹In those days, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, invaded the land, and Jehoiakim became subject to him for three years, after which he rebelled.

²The Lord then sent bands of Chaldeans, Arameans, Moabites, and Ammonites against Jehoiakim. They raided the land of Judah and destroyed it according to the word the Lord had spoken through his servants, the prophets.

³All this happened only because the Lord had ordered it so. He willed to cast the people far away from his presence because of the sins of Manasseh and all the evils he had done. ⁴And also because of the innocent blood he had shed that filled Jerusalem. Because of all this, the Lord would not pardon them.

⁵The rest of the story regarding Jehoiakim and all he did is written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah. ⁶When Jehoiakim died, his son Jehoiachin succeeded him.

⁷The king of Egypt did not leave his land again because the king of Babylon had conquered all that belonged to the king of Egypt, from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates River.

The First Exile

•  ⁸Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he succeeded his father and reigned for three months in Jerusalem. His mother was Nehushta, daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem. ⁹Jehoiachin mistreated the Lord, as his father had done.

¹⁰At that time, the officials of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came to attack Jerusalem, surrounding the city. ¹¹Nebuchadnezzar came while his men were besieging the city.

¹²Jehoiachin, king of Judah, surrendered with his mother, servants, leaders, and palace officials. It was the eighth year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. ¹³ Nebuchadnezzar captured them and took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the king’s house. He also destroyed all the objects of gold that Solomon, king of Israel, had made for the Sanctuary of the Lord. So, the word the Lord had spoken was fulfilled.

¹⁴Nebuchadnezzar carried off into exile all the leaders and prominent men, the blacksmiths and locksmiths, all the men of valor fit for war. A total of ten thousand were exiled to Babylon. Only the poorest sector of the population was left. ¹⁵Nebuchadnezzar also carried Jehoiachin away with his mother, his wives, the palace ministers, and the prominent men of the land.

¹⁶So the king of Babylon deported to Babylon all the prominent people, numbering seven thousand, the blacksmiths, numbering a thousand, and all the men fit for war.

¹⁷He made Mattaniah, Jehoiachin’s uncle, king of Jerusalem, in place of Jehoiachin and changed his name to Zedekiah.

¹⁸Zedekiah was twenty-one years old and reigned in Jerusalem for eleven years. His mother was Hamutal, Jeremiah's daughter. ¹⁹He did what displeased the Lord, as Jehoiakim had done, ²⁰so the Lord punished Jerusalem and Judah until he cast them far away from his presence. And Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

The Chaldeans Conquer and Destroy Jerusalem

25 | ¹In the ninth year of Zedekiah’s reign, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, marched with his entire army and laid siege to Jerusalem on the tenth day of the tenth month. They camped outside the city and built siege works all around it. ²The city was under siege up to the eleventh year of the reign of Zedekiah.

³On the ninth day of the fourth month, famine became a severe problem in the city, and throughout the land, there was no bread for the people. ⁴When a breach in the wall opened the city, the Judean army fled through the gate between the two walls near the king’s garden while the Chaldeans were still around the city. They fled towards the Arabah. ⁵The Chaldeans followed in hot pursuit of King Zedekiah and caught up with him in the plains of Jericho. All his army deserted him and scattered.

⁶The Chaldeans seized the king and led him away to Riblah in the territory of Hamath, where the king of Babylon passed a sentence on him. ⁷There at Riblah, the king of Babylon slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah in his presence. He then put out the eyes of Zedekiah, bound him with a double bronze chain, and took him to Babylon.

⁸On the seventh day of the fifth month in the nineteenth year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan, commander of the captain of the royal guard and servant of the king of Babylon, entered Jerusalem and ⁹set fire to the house of the Lord and the royal palace, as well as to all the houses in Jerusalem. ¹⁰The Chaldean army, under the commander of the bodyguard, completely demolished all the walls around Jerusalem.

¹¹Nebuzaradan, commander of the bodyguard, carried off into exile the last of the Jews left in the city, those who had deserted to the king of Babylon and the remainder of the artisans. ¹²But he left those among the very poor who could work in vineyards and cultivate the soil.

¹³The Chaldeans broke into pieces the bronze pillars and the big bronze basin called the “Sea” in the house of the Lord and carried all this bronze to Babylon.

¹⁴They also took the pots, shovels, wick trimmers, spoons, and all the bronze articles used in the temple service. ¹⁵The guard captain took the basins, censers, sprinkling bowls, pots, lampstands, spoons, and solid gold or silver bowls.

¹⁶The two pillars, the Sea, the movable stands, which King Solomon had made for the house of the Lord—all this bronze was of immeasurable weight. ¹⁷The height of the one pillar was eighteen cubits, and on it was a bronze capital; the height was three cubits; latticework and pomegranates, all of bronze, were on the capital all around. The second pillar had the same, with the latticework.

¹⁸The commander of the bodyguard took captive Seraiah, the chief priest, and Zephaniah, the next priest in rank, as well as three doorkeepers.

¹⁹He also took from those in the city a eunuch in command of the fighting men, five personal advisers to the king discovered in the city, the commander’s secretary, responsible for military conscription, and sixty of his men found in the city. ²⁰Nebuzaradan took all these away to the king of Babylon at Riblah. ²¹There at Riblah, in the territory of Hamath, the king of Babylon had them put to death. So Judah was taken away captive from its own land.

²²As for the remnant of the people Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had left behind, he appointed Gedaliah, son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, as their governor. ²³When the commanders of the troops and their men heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah as governor, they went to him at Mizpah. These were Ishmael, son of Nethaniah, Johanan, son of Kareah, Seraiah, son of Tanhumeth, from Natophah, Jaazaniah, the Maakithite, with their men. ²⁴Gedaliah told them and their men most solemnly, “Do not be afraid of submitting yourselves to the Chaldeans. Live in the country obeying the king of Babylon, and all will be well with you.”

²⁵In the seventh month, however, Ishmael, son of Nethaniah, son of Elishama, who belonged to the king’s family, came with ten of his men and killed Gedaliah, as well as the Judeans and the Chaldeans who were with him at Mizpah. ²⁶Then all the people, from the greatest to the least, set out with the commanders of the troops and took refuge in Egypt, fearing the Chaldeans.

²⁷On the twenty-seventh day of the twelfth month in the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin, king of Judah, Evil-Merodach, king of Babylon, in the year he came to the throne pardoned Jehoiachin, king of Judah, and released him from prison. ²⁸He spoke kindly to him and treated him more honorably than the other kings who were with him in Babylon. ²⁹Jehoiachin put aside his prison garment and ate at the king's table for the rest of his life.

³⁰Day by day, for as long as he lived, he was maintained by the king of Babylon.