2 Chronicles 28:1-27
28 * Ahaz was twenty years old at his accession to the throne, and reigned sixteen years at Jerusalem.
2 And he did not do what Jehovah approved as his father David had, but followed the paths of the kings of Israel, and even made bronze images for the Baals.
3 And he made burnings in Ben-Hinnom’s Valley, and burned his sons up in the fire, in accordance with the detestable ways of the nations Jehovah dispossessed before the sons of Israel,
4 and sacrificed and made burnings at the heights and on the hills and under every verdant tree.
5 * And his God Jehovah gave him into the hands of the king of Syria, and they killed in his country and took a great number of prisoners out of it and brought them to Damascus; and he was also given into the hands of the king of Israel, who killed great numbers in his country.
6 And Pekah the son of Remaliah killed in Judah a hundred and twenty thousand in one day, all stalwart men, for their having abandoned their fathers’ God Jehovah;
7 and the Ephraimite champion Zicri killed the king’s son Maʽasejah and ʽAzrikam the warden of the palace, and Elkanah the prime minister;
8 and the sons of Israel took prisoners from their brothers two hundred thousand, wives and sons and daughters, and also plundered much booty from them, and brought the booty to Samaria.
9 But there was there a prophet of Jehovah named ʽOded, and he went out to confront the army that was coming to Samaria and said to them “Here it has been by the ire of your fathers’ God Jehovah against Judah that he has given them into your hands and you have been killing among them in an irritation that reached to the sky.
10 And now you are thinking of reducing the sons of Judah and Jerusalem to be slaves to you; do not you yourselves decidedly have your own guilts against your God Jehovah?
11 Now listen to me and send back the prisoners you have brought that are brothers of yours; for there is anger of Jehovah’s against you.”
12 And some of the heads of the sons of Ephraim, ʽAzariah the son of Jehohanan and Berekiah the son of Meshillemoth and Jehizkiah the son of Shallum and ʽAmasa the son of Hadlai, stood up against those who were coming from the expedition
13 and said to them “You shall not bring the prisoners in here; for it is by way of laying upon us guilt against Jehovah that you are thinking of adding to our sins and our guilts; for we have too much guilt, and there is anger against Israel.”
14 And the armed force left the prisoners and the plunder before the generals and all the assembly;
15 and the men named above stood up and took the prisoners in hand, and clothed out of the booty all nakedness of theirs, and furnished them clothing and sandals and food and drink and oil to rub on, and brought them along, with donkeys for everybody who was breaking down, and brought them to Jericho the City of Palms alongside their brothers, and went back to Samaria.
16 * At that time King Ahaz sent to the king of Assyria to help him,
17 the Edomites having made another invasion and killed in Judah and carried off prisoners for slaves,
18 and the Philistines having raided among Judah’s lowland and southern cities and captured Beth-Shemesh and Aijalon and Gederoth and Soco and its dependencies and Timnah and its dependencies and Gimzo and its dependencies and settled in them;
19 for Jehovah had humbled Judah on account of King Ahaz of Israel because he had been a demoralizing influence in Judah and had been unfaithful to Jehovah.
20 But King Tiglath-Pilneser of Assyria came against him and harassed him, and did not strengthen him;
21 for Ahaz despoiled Jehovah’s house and the royal palace and the generals, and gave to the king of Assyria, but it was no help to him.
22 * And at the time he was harassed he was additionally unfaithful to Jehovah—that was King Ahaz—
23 and sacrificed to the gods of Damascus that had inflicted blows on him, thinking “Because the gods of the kings of Syria give them help, I will sacrifice to them and they shall help me”; and they served to bring him to his fall, him and all Israel.
24 * And Ahaz got together the vessels of the house of God, and mutilated the vessels of the house of God, and shut the doors of Jehovah’s house and made himself altars at every corner in Jerusalem,
25 and in each and every city of Judah he made heights to make burnings to other gods, and provoked his fathers’ God Jehovah.
26 And as to the rest of his history, and all his courses first and last, they are recorded in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel.
27 And Ahaz went to rest with his fathers, and they buried him in the city, in Jerusalem, for they did not put him into the tombs of the kings of Israel; and his son Hezekiah succeeded him.
Footnotes
^ 28:1 Var. twenty-five
^ 28:5 Lit. killed in him . . . prisoners out of him . . . numbers in him
^ 28:16 Var. to the kings of
^ 28:22 Var. no help to him, but a distress to him; and he was
^ 28:24 Or mutilated the furniture of
