King Ahaz
28
📚Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem, but he did not do what was right in the sight of the LORD, as his father David had done. 2 📚For he walked in the ways of the kings of Israel and also made cast metal idols for the Baals. 3 📚Moreover, he burned incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom 📖, and burned his children in the fire, according to the abominations of the heathen whom the LORD had driven out before the children of Israel. 4 📚He also sacrificed and burned incense on the high places and on the hills and under every green tree. 5 📚Therefore the LORD his God delivered him into the hands of the king of Syria, and they defeated him, and carried away a large number of them captive and brought them to Damascus. And he was also delivered into the hands of the king of Israel, who defeated 📖 him in a great slaughter. 6 📚For Pekah 📖, the son of Remaliah, killed a hundred and twenty thousand in Judah in one day, who were all valiant men, because they had forsaken the LORD God of their fathers. 7 📚And Zichri, a mighty man of Ephraim, killed Maaseiah, the king’s son, and Azrikam, the governor of the house, and Elkanah, who was next to the king. 8 📚And the children of Israel carried away captive two hundred thousand of their brethren, women, sons, and daughters, and also took away much plunder from them, and brought the plunder to Samaria.
9 📚But a prophet of the LORD was there whose name was Oded, and he went out before the army that came to Samaria and said to them, “Look, because the LORD God of your fathers was angry with Judah, he delivered them into your hands, and you have slaughtered them in a rage that reaches up to heaven. 10 📚And now you intend to keep the children of Judah and Jerusalem for male slaves and female slaves 📖 for yourselves. But are you not also guilty of sins 📖 against the LORD your God? 11 📚Therefore now listen to me, and send back the captives whom you have taken captive of your brethren. For the fierce wrath of the LORD is on you”.
12 📚Then some of the heads of the children of Ephraim, Azariah the son of Johanan, Berechiah the son of Meshillemoth, and Jehizkiah the son of Shallum, and Amasa the son of Hadlai, stood up against those who came from the war, 13 📚and said to them, “You shall not bring the captives in here, for we have already offended against the LORD, and you intend to add to our sins and to our guilt; for our guilt is great, and there is fierce wrath against Israel”.
14 So the armed men left the captives and the plunder before the leaders and all the congregation. 15 📚And the men who were named rose up and took the captives, and clothed all those who were naked among them with the plunder, and gave them clothes and footwear, and gave them things to eat and to drink, and anointed them, and carried all the feeble among them on donkeys, and brought them to Jericho, the city of palm trees, to their brethren. Then they returned to Samaria.
16 📚At that time King Ahaz send word to the kings of Assyria to help him, 17 📚for the Edomites had come again and defeated Judah, and carried away captives. 18 📚The Philistines also had invaded the cities of the lowlands and of the south of Judah, and had taken Beth Shemesh, and Aijalon, and Gederoth, and Shocho with its villages, and Timnah with its villages, also Gimzo and its villages; and they lived there. 19 📚For the LORD brought Judah low because of Ahaz, king of Israel 📖, for he promoted loose living in Judah, and trespassed greatly against the LORD.
28:17-19 God was teaching them part of the penalty for their sins.⚜
20 📚And Tiglath Pilneser 📖, king of Assyria, came to him and troubled him, but did not strengthen him. 21 📚For Ahaz took away a part of the treasures from the house of the LORD and from the king’s house and from the leaders, and gave it to the king of Assyria. But he did not help him.
22 📚And in the time of his trouble 📖 this same King Ahaz trespassed even more against the LORD. 23 📚For he sacrificed to the gods of Damascus, which had defeated him, and he said 📖, “Because the gods of the kings of Syria help them, I will sacrifice to them, so that they will help me”. But they were the ruin of him and of all Israel.
24 📚And Ahaz gathered together the articles of the house of God, and cut the articles of the house of God into pieces, and shut up the doors of the house of the LORD, and made altars for himself in every corner of Jerusalem. 25 📚And in every city of Judah he made high places to burn incense to other gods, and provoked the LORD God of his fathers to anger 📖.
28:25 See also 2 Kings 16:10-18.⚜
26 📚Now the rest of his acts and all his ways, first and last, look, they are written in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel. 27 📚And Ahaz slept 📖 with his ancestors, and they buried him in the city, in Jerusalem, but they did not bring him into the tombs of the kings of Israel. And his son Hezekiah reigned in his place.
28:1-27 2 Kings chapter 16 also gives an account of Ahaz’s reign. See notes there.⚜