Azariah Reigns in Judah

15 ⁿIn the twenty-seventh year of ^oJeroboam king of Israel, ^pAzariah the son of Amaziah, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 He was sixteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned fifty-two years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jecoliah of Jerusalem. 3 And he ^qdid what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that his father Amaziah had done. 4 Nevertheless, ^rthe high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places. 5 ^sAnd the Lord touched the king, so that he was a leper¹ to the day of his death, and he lived ^tin a separate house.² And ^uJotham the king’s son was over the household, governing the people of the land. 6 ^vNow the rest of the acts of Azariah, and all that he did, are they not written in the ^wBook of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? 7 ^xAnd Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and Jotham his son reigned in his place.

Zechariah Reigns in Israel

8 In the thirty-eighth year of Azariah king of Judah, Zechariah the son of Jeroboam reigned over Israel in Samaria six months. 9 And he ^ydid what was evil in the sight of the Lord, as his fathers had done. He did not depart from the ^zsins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin. 10 Shallum the son of Jabesh conspired against him and struck him down at Ibleam and put him to death and reigned in his place. 11 Now the rest of the deeds of Zechariah, behold, they are written in the ^aBook of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. 12 (This was the promise of the Lord that he gave to Jehu, ^b“Your sons shall sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation.” And so it came to pass.)

Shallum Reigns in Israel

13 Shallum the son of Jabesh began to reign in the thirty-ninth year of Uzziah³ king of Judah, and he reigned one month in Samaria. 14 Then Menahem the son of Gadi came up from ^cTirzah and came to Samaria, and he struck down Shallum the son of Jabesh in Samaria and put him to death and reigned in his place. 15 Now the rest of the deeds of Shallum, and the conspiracy that he made, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. 16 At that time Menahem sacked Tiphsah and all who were in it and its territory from Tirzah on, because they did not open it to him. Therefore he sacked it, and he ^dripped open all the women in it who were pregnant.

Menahem Reigns in Israel

17 In the thirty-ninth year of Azariah king of Judah, Menahem the son of Gadi began to reign over Israel, and he reigned ten years in Samaria. 18 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not depart all his days from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin. 19 ^ePul⁴ the king of Assyria came against the land, and Menahem ^fgave Pul a thousand talents⁵ of silver, that he might help him to confirm his hold on the royal power. 20 Menahem exacted the money from Israel, that is, from all the wealthy men, fifty shekels⁶ of silver from every man, to give to the king of Assyria. So the king of Assyria turned back and did not stay there in the land. 21 Now the rest of the deeds of Menahem and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? 22 And Menahem slept with his fathers, and Pekahiah his son reigned in his place.

Pekahiah Reigns in Israel

23 In the fiftieth year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekahiah the son of Menahem began to reign over Israel in Samaria, and he reigned two years. 24 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin. 25 And ^gPekah the son of Remaliah, his captain, conspired against him with fifty men of the people of Gilead, and struck him down in Samaria, in the citadel of the king’s house with Argob and Arieh; he put him to death and reigned in his place. 26 Now the rest of the deeds of Pekahiah and all that he did, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

Pekah Reigns in Israel

27 In the fifty-second year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekah the son of Remaliah began to reign over Israel in Samaria, and he reigned twenty years. 28 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. He did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin.

29 In the days of Pekah king of Israel, ^hTiglath-pileser king of Assyria came and captured Ijon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and he ⁱcarried the people captive to Assyria. 30 Then ^jHoshea the son of Elah made a conspiracy against Pekah the son of Remaliah and struck him down and put him to death and reigned in his place, in the twentieth year of Jotham the son of Uzziah. 31 Now the rest of the acts of Pekah and all that he did, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.

Jotham Reigns in Judah

32 ^kIn the second year of Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, ^lJotham the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, began to reign. 33 He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jerusha the daughter of Zadok. 34 And he ^mdid what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that his father Uzziah had done. 35 Nevertheless, the high places were not removed. The people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places. He built the ⁿupper gate of the house of the Lord. 36 Now the rest of the acts of Jotham and all that he did, are they not written in the ^oBook of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? 37 In those days the Lord began to send ^pRezin the king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah against Judah. 38 Jotham slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his father, and Ahaz his son reigned in his place.

Ahaz Reigns in Judah

16 ^qIn the seventeenth year of Pekah the son of Remaliah, ^rAhaz the son of Jotham, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. And he did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord his God, as his father David had done, 3 but he ^swalked in the way of the kings of Israel. He even ^tburned his son as an offering,^{1 u}according to the despicable practices of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel. 4 And he sacrificed and made offerings on the high places and ^von the hills and under every green tree.

5 ^wThen Rezin king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, came up to wage war on Jerusalem, and they besieged Ahaz but could not conquer him. 6 At that time Rezin the king of Syria recovered ^xElath for Syria and drove the men of Judah from Elath, and the Edomites came to Elath, where they dwell ^yto this day. 7 So Ahaz ^zsent messengers to ^aTiglath-pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria and from the hand of the king of Israel, who are attacking me.” 8 Ahaz also took the silver and gold that was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasures of the king’s house and ^bsent a present to the king of Assyria. 9 And the king of Assyria listened to him. ^cThe king of Assyria marched up against Damascus and took it, carrying its people captive to Kir, and he killed Rezin.

10 ^dWhen King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, he saw the altar that was at Damascus. And King Ahaz sent to ^eUriah the priest a model of the altar, and its pattern, exact in all its details. 11 And Uriah the priest built the altar; in accordance with all that King Ahaz had sent from Damascus, so Uriah the priest made it, before King Ahaz arrived from Damascus. 12 And when the king came from Damascus, the king viewed the altar. Then the king drew near to the altar and went up on it 13 and burned his burnt offering and his grain offering and poured his drink offering and threw the blood of his peace offerings on the altar. 14 And the ^fbronze altar that was before the Lord he removed from the front of the house, from the place between his altar and the house of the Lord, and put it on the north side of his altar. 15 And King Ahaz commanded Uriah the priest, saying, “On the great altar burn the ^gmorning burnt offering and the evening grain offering and the king’s burnt offering and his grain offering, with the burnt offering of all the people of the land, and their grain offering and their drink offering. And ^hthrow on it all the blood of the burnt offering and all the blood of the sacrifice, but the bronze altar shall be for me to inquire by.” 16 Uriah the priest did all this, as King Ahaz commanded.

17 And King Ahaz cut off the frames of the ⁱstands and removed the ^jbasin from them, and he took down the ^ksea² from off the bronze ^loxen that were under it and put it on a stone pedestal. 18 And the covered way for the Sabbath that had been built inside the house and the outer entrance for the king he caused to go around the house of the Lord, because of the king of Assyria. 19 Now the rest of the acts of Ahaz that he did, are they not written in the ^mBook of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? 20 And Ahaz ⁿslept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David, and ^oHezekiah his son reigned in his place.

Hoshea Reigns in Israel

17 In the twelfth year of ^pAhaz king of Judah, ^qHoshea the son of Elah began to reign in Samaria over Israel, and he reigned nine years. 2 And he ^rdid what was evil in the sight of the Lord, yet not as the kings of Israel who were before him. 3 Against him came up ^sShalmaneser king of Assyria. ^tAnd Hoshea became his vassal and paid him tribute. 4 But the king of Assyria found treachery in Hoshea, for he had sent messengers to So, king of ^uEgypt, and offered no tribute to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year. Therefore the king of Assyria shut him up and bound him in prison. 5 Then the king of Assyria invaded all the land and came to Samaria, and for three years he ^vbesieged it.

The Fall of Israel

6 In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria, and he ^wcarried the Israelites away to Assyria and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.

Exile Because of Idolatry

7 And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, ^xwho had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods 8 and ^ywalked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, ^zand in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced. 9 And the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. They built for themselves high places in all their towns, ^afrom watchtower to fortified city. 10 ^bThey set up for themselves ^cpillars and ^dAsherim ^eon every high hill and under every green tree, 11 and there they ^fmade offerings on all the high places, ^gas the nations did whom the Lord carried away before them. And they did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger, 12 and they served idols, ^hof which the Lord had said to them, “You shall not do this.” 13 Yet the Lord warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and every ⁱseer, saying, ^j“Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes, in accordance with all the Law that I commanded your fathers, and that I sent to you by my servants the prophets.”

14 But they would not listen, but were ^kstubborn, as their fathers had been, ^lwho did not believe in the Lord their God. 15 They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They ^mwent after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, ⁿconcerning whom the Lord had commanded them that they should not do like them. 16 And they abandoned all the commandments of the Lord their God, and ^omade for themselves metal images of two calves; and they ^pmade an Asherah and ^qworshiped all the host of heaven and ^rserved Baal. 17 And they ^sburned their sons and their daughters as offerings¹ and used ^tdivination and ^uomens and ^vsold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger. 18 Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel and ^wremoved them out of his sight. None was left ^xbut the tribe of Judah only.

19 Judah also did not keep the commandments of the Lord their God, but ^ywalked in the customs that Israel had introduced. 20 And the Lord rejected all the descendants of Israel and afflicted them and gave them into the hand of ^zplunderers, until he had ^acast them out of his sight.

21 When he had ^btorn Israel from the house of David, ^cthey made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. And Jeroboam drove Israel from following the Lord and ^dmade them commit great sin. 22 The people of Israel walked in all the sins that Jeroboam did. ^eThey did not depart from them, 23 until the Lord removed Israel out of his sight, as he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria ^funtil this day.

Assyria Resettles Samaria

24 And the king of Assyria ^gbrought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and lived in its cities. 25 And at the beginning of their dwelling there, they did not fear the Lord. Therefore the Lord sent lions among them, which killed some of them. 26 So the king of Assyria was told, “The nations that you have carried away and placed in the cities of Samaria do not know the law of the god of the land. Therefore he has sent lions among them, and behold, they are killing them, because they do not know the law of the god of the land.” 27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, “Send there one of the priests whom you carried away from there, and let him² go and dwell there and ^hteach them the law of the god of the land.” 28 So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and lived in Bethel and taught them how they should fear the Lord.

29 But every nation still made gods of its own and put them in the ⁱshrines of the high places that the Samaritans had made, every nation in the cities in which they lived. 30 The men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the men of Cuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, 31 and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites ^jburned their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim. 32 They also feared the Lord and ^kappointed from among themselves all sorts of people as priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places. 33 So they feared the Lord but ^lalso served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away.

34 ^mTo this day they do according to the former manner. They do not fear the Lord, and they do not follow the statutes or the rules or the law or the commandment that the Lord commanded the children of Jacob, ⁿwhom he named Israel. 35 The Lord made a covenant with them and commanded them, “You shall not fear other gods or ^obow yourselves to them or serve them or sacrifice to them, 36 but you shall fear the Lord, who ^pbrought you out of the land of Egypt with ^qgreat power and with an outstretched arm. You shall bow yourselves to him, and to him you shall sacrifice. 37 And the ^rstatutes and the rules and the law and the commandment that he wrote for you, you shall always be careful to do. You shall not fear other gods, 38 and you shall not ^sforget the covenant that I have made with you. You shall not fear other gods, 39 but you shall fear the Lord your God, and he will deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.” 40 However, they would not listen, but they did according to their former manner.

41 So these nations feared the Lord and also served their carved images. Their children did likewise, and their children’s children—as their fathers did, so they do to this day.

Hezekiah Reigns in Judah

18 ^tIn the third year of ^uHoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, ^vHezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah. 3 And he ^wdid what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. 4 He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces ^xthe bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).¹ 5 He ^ytrusted in the Lord, the God of Israel, so that ^zthere was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him. 6 For he ^aheld fast to the Lord. He did not depart from following him, but kept the commandments that the Lord commanded Moses. 7 ^bAnd the Lord was with him; ^cwherever he went out, he prospered. ^dHe rebelled against the king of Assyria and would not serve him. 8 He struck down the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territory, ^efrom watchtower to fortified city.

9 In the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, ^fShalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and ^gbesieged it, 10 and at the end of three years he took it. In the sixth year of Hezekiah, which was the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken. 11 The king of Assyria ^hcarried the Israelites away to Assyria and put them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes, 12 because they did ⁱnot obey the voice of the Lord their God but transgressed his covenant, even all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded. They neither listened nor obeyed.

Sennacherib Attacks Judah

13 ^jIn the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of Assyria came up against all the fortified cities of Judah and took them. 14 And Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, “I have done wrong; withdraw from me. Whatever you impose on me I will bear.” And the king of Assyria required of Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents² of silver and thirty talents of gold. 15 And Hezekiah ^kgave him all the silver that was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasuries of the king’s house. 16 At that time Hezekiah stripped the gold from the doors of the temple of the Lord and from the doorposts that Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid and gave it to the king of Assyria. 17 And the king of Assyria sent the Tartan, the Rab-saris, and the Rabshakeh with a great army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. And they went up and came to Jerusalem. When they arrived, they came and stood by the conduit of the upper pool, which is on the highway to the ^lWasher’s Field. 18 And when they called for the king, there came out to them ^mEliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and ⁿShebnah the secretary, and Joah the son of Asaph, the recorder.