And one of his servants said in answer, Send men and let them take five of the horses which we still have in the town; if they keep their lives they will be the same as those of Israel who are still living here; if they come to their death they will be the same as all those of Israel who have gone to destruction: let us send and see.
And Hazael said, Why is my lord weeping? Then he said in answer, Because I see the evil which you will do to the children of Israel: burning down their strong towns, putting their young men to death with the sword, smashing their little ones against the stones, and cutting open the women who are with child.
In the fifth year of Joram, the son of Ahab, king of Israel, Jehoram, the son of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, became king.
He went in the ways of the kings of Israel, as the family of Ahab did: for the daughter of Ahab was his wife; and he did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
In the twelfth year that Joram, the son of Ahab, was king of Israel, Ahaziah, the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, became king;
Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he was ruling in Jerusalem for one year. His mother's name was Athaliah, the daughter of Omri, king of Israel.
Then take the bottle and put the oil on his head, and say, The Lord says, I have put the holy oil on you to make you king over Israel. Then, opening the door, go in flight, without waiting.
And he got up and went into the house; then he put the holy oil on his head and said to him, The Lord, the God of Israel, says, I have made you king over the people of the Lord, over Israel.
For the family of Ahab will come to an end; every male of Ahab's family will be cut off, he who is shut up and he who goes free in Israel.
And they said, That is not true; now give us his story. Then he said, This is what he said to me: The Lord says, I have made you king over Israel.
So Jehu, the son of Jehoshaphat, the son of Nimshi, made designs against Joram. (Now Joram and all the army of Israel were keeping watch on Ramoth-gilead because of Hazael, king of Aram:
Then Joram said, Make ready. So they made his carriage ready; and Joram, king of Israel, with Ahaziah, king of Judah, went out in their carriages for the purpose of meeting Jehu; and they came face to face with him at the field of Naboth the Jezreelite.
And Jehu sent out through all Israel; and all the servants of Baal came, not one kept away. And they came into the house of Baal, so that it was full from end to end.
So Jehu put an end to the worship of Baal in Israel.
But Jehu did not keep himself from all the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and the evil he made Israel do; the gold oxen were still in Beth-el and in Dan.
And the Lord said to Jehu, Because you have done well in doing what is right in my eyes and effecting all my purpose for the family of Ahab, your sons will be kings of Israel to the fourth generation.
But Jehu did not take care to keep the law of the Lord with all his heart: he did not keep himself from the sin which Jeroboam did and made Israel do.
In those days the Lord was angry first with Israel; and Hazael made attacks on all the land of Israel,
Now the rest of the acts of Jehu, and all he did, and his great power, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
And the time of Jehu's rule over Israel in Samaria was twenty-eight years.
Now the rest of the acts of Joash, and all he did, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
In the twenty-third year of Joash, the son of Ahaziah, king of Judah, Jehoahaz, the son of Jehu, became king over Israel in Samaria, ruling for seventeen years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, copying the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, which he did and made Israel do; he did not keep himself from them.
So the wrath of the Lord was burning against Israel, and he gave them up into the power of Hazael, king of Aram, and into the power of Ben-hadad, the son of Hazael, again and again.
Then Jehoahaz made prayer to the Lord, and the Lord gave ear to him, for he saw how cruelly Israel was crushed by the king of Aram.
(And the Lord gave Israel a saviour, so that they became free from the hands of the Aramaeans; and the children of Israel were living in their tents as in the past.
But still they did not give up the sin of Jeroboam, which he made Israel do, but went on with it; and there was an image of Asherah in Samaria.)
Now the rest of the acts of Jehoahaz, and all he did, and his great power, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
In the thirty-seventh year of the rule of Joash, king of Judah, Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, became king over Israel in Samaria, ruling for sixteen years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, not turning away from the sin of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, which he did and made Israel do, but he went on with it.
Now the rest of the acts of Joash, and all he did, and the force with which he went to war against Amaziah, king of Judah, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
And Joash went to rest with his fathers and Jeroboam took his place as king; and Joash was put into the earth in Samaria with the kings of Israel.
Now elisha became ill with the disease which was the cause of his death: and Joash, king of Israel, came down to him, and weeping over him said, My father, my father, the war-carriages of Israel and its horsemen!
And he said to the king of Israel, Put your hand on the bow: and he put his hand on it; and Elisha put his hands on the king's hands.
And he said, Take the arrows: and he took them. And he said to the king of Israel, Send them down into the earth; and he did so three times and no more.
And Israel was crushed under the power of Hazael, king of Aram, all the days of Jehoahaz.
And Jehoash, the son of Jehoahaz, took again from Ben-hadad, the son of Hazael, the towns which he had taken from Jehoahaz his father in war. Three times Jehoash overcame him and got back the towns of Israel.
In the second year of Joash, son of Joahaz, king of Israel, Amaziah, the son of Joash, became king of Judah.
Then Amaziah sent representatives to Jehoash, the son of Jehoahaz, son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying, Come, let us have a meeting face to face.
And Jehoash, king of Israel, sent to Amaziah, king of Judah, saying, The thorn-tree in lebanon sent to the cedar in Lebanon, saying, Give your daughter to my son for a wife: and a beast from the woodland in Lebanon went by, crushing the thorn under his feet.
But Amaziah gave no attention. So Jehoash, king of Israel, went up, and he and Amaziah, king of Judah, came face to face at Beth-shemesh, which is in Judah.
And Judah was overcome before Israel, so that they went in flight, every man to his tent.
And Jehoash, king of Israel, made Amaziah, king of Judah, the son of Jehoash, son of Ahaziah, prisoner at Beth-shemesh, and came to Jerusalem, and had the wall of Jerusalem pulled down from the doorway of Ephraim to the door in the angle, four hundred cubits.
Now the rest of the acts of Jehoash, and his power, and how he went to war with Amaziah, king of Judah, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
And Jehoash went to rest with his fathers, and was put into the earth in Samaria with the kings of Israel; and Jeroboam his son became king in his place.
Amaziah, the son of Joash, king of Judah, went on living for fifteen years after the death of Jehoash, son of Jehoahaz, king of Israel.
In the fifteenth year of the rule of Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah, Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel, became king in Samaria, ruling for forty-one years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, not turning away from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
He got back the old limits of Israel from the way into Hamath to the sea of the Arabah, as the Lord had said by his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet of Gath-hepher.
For the Lord saw how bitter was the trouble of Israel, and that everyone was cut off, he who was shut up and he who went free, and that Israel had no helper.
And the Lord had not said that the name of Israel was to be taken away from the earth; but he gave them a saviour in Jeroboam, the son of Joash.
Now the rest of the acts of Jeroboam, and all he did, and his power, and how he went to war with Damascus, causing the wrath of the Lord to be turned away from Israel, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
And Jeroboam went to rest with his fathers, and was put into the earth with the kings of Israel; and Zechariah his son became king in his place.
In the twenty-seventh year of the rule of Jeroboam, king of Israel, Azariah, son of Amaziah, became king of Judah.
In the thirty-eighth year of Azaliah, king of Judah, Zechariah, son of Jeroboam, was king over Israel for six months.
And he did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as his father had done, not turning away from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
Now the rest of the acts of Zechariah are recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel.
This was what the Lord had said to Jehu, Your sons to the fourth generation will be kings of Israel. And so it came about.
Now the rest of the acts of Shallum, and the secret design which he made, are recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel.
In the thirty-ninth year of Azariah, king of Judah, Menahem, the son of Gadi, became king over Israel, and was ruling in Samaria for ten years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not keep himself from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
And Menahem got the money from Israel, from all the men of wealth, fifty silver shekels from every man, to give to the king of Assyria. So the king of Assyria went back without stopping in the land.
Now the rest of the acts of Menahem, and all he did, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
In the fiftieth year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekahiah, the son of Menahem, became king over Israel in Samaria, ruling for two years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, not turning from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
Now the rest of the acts of Pekahiah, and all he did, are recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel.
In the fifty-second year of Azariah, king of Judah, Pekah, the son of Remaliah, became king over Israel in Samaria, ruling for twenty years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, not turning from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
In the days of Pekah, king of Israel, Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, came and took Ijon and Abel-beth-maacah and Janoah and Kedesh and hazor and Gilead and Galilee and all the land of Naphtali; and he took the people away to Assyria.
Now the rest of the acts of Pekah, and all he did, are recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel.
In the second year of Pekah, the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, Jotham, the son of Uzziah, became king of Judah.
But he went in the ways of the kings of Israel, and even made his son go through the fire, copying the disgusting ways of the nations whom the Lord had sent out of the land before the children of Israel.
Then Rezin, king of Aram, and Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem to make war; and they made an attack on Ahaz, shutting him in, but were not able to overcome him.
So Ahaz sent representatives to Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, saying, I am your servant and your son; come to my help against the kings of Aram and Israel who have taken up arms against me.
In the twelfth year of Ahaz, king of Judah, Hoshea, the son of Elah, became king over Israel in Samaria, ruling for nine years.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, though not like the kings of Israel before him.
In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria took Samaria, and took Israel away to Assyria, placing them in Halah and in Habor on the river Gozan, and in the towns of the Medes.
And the wrath of the Lord came on Israel because they had done evil against the Lord their God, who took them out of the land of Egypt from under the yoke of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and had become worshippers of other gods,
Living by the rules of the nations whom the Lord had sent out from before the children of Israel.
And the children of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things which were not right, building high places for themselves in all their towns, from the tower of the watchmen to the walled town.
And he gave witness to Israel and Judah, by every prophet and seer, saying, Come back from your evil ways, and do my orders and keep my rules, and be guided by the law which I gave to your fathers and sent to you by my servants the prophets.
So the Lord was very angry with Israel, and his face was turned away from them: only the tribe of Judah kept its place.
(But even Judah did not keep the orders of the Lord their God, but were guided by the rules which Israel had made.
So the Lord would have nothing to do with all the offspring of Israel, and sent trouble on them, and gave them up into the hands of their attackers, till he had sent them away from before his face.)
For Israel was broken off from the family of David, and they made Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, king, who, driving them away from the laws of the Lord, made them do a great sin.
And the children of Israel went on with all the sins which Jeroboam did; they did not keep themselves from them;
Till the Lord put Israel away from before his face, as he had said by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was taken away from their land to Assyria, to this day.
Then the king of Assyria took men from babylon and from Cuthah and Avva and Hamath and Sepharvaim, and put them in the towns of Samaria in place of the children of Israel; so they got Samaria for their heritage, living in its towns.
So to this day they go on in their old ways, not worshipping the Lord or keeping his orders or his ways or the law and the rule which the Lord gave to the children of Jacob, to whom he gave the name Israel;
Now in the third year of Hoshea, son of Elah, king of Israel, Hezekiah, the son of Ahaz, became king of Judah.
He had the high places taken away, and the stone pillars broken to bits, and the Asherah cut down; and the brass snake which Moses had made was crushed to powder at his order, because in those days the children of Israel had offerings burned before it, and he gave it the name Nehushtan.
He had faith in the Lord, the God of Israel; so that there was no one like him among all the kings of Judah who were before him.
Now in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea, son of Elah, king of Israel, Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, came up against Samaria, shutting it in with his armies.
And at the end of three years they took it; in the sixth year of Hezekiah's rule, which was the ninth year of Hoshea, king of Israel, Samaria was taken.
And the king of Assyria took Israel away as prisoners into Assyria, placing them in Halah and in Habor on the river Gozan, and in the towns of the Medes;
And Hezekiah made his prayer to the Lord, saying, O Lord, the God of Israel, seated between the winged ones, you only are the God of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth.
Then Isaiah, the son of Amoz, sent to Hezekiah, saying, The Lord, the God of Israel, says, The prayer which you have made to me against Sennacherib, king of Assyria, has come to my ears.
Against whom have you said evil and bitter things? against whom has your voice been loud and your eyes lifted up? even against the holy One of Israel.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, copying the disgusting ways of those nations whom the Lord had sent out before the children of Israel.
He put up again the high places which had been pulled down by Hezekiah his father; he made altars for Baal, and an Asherah, as Ahab, king of Israel, had done; he was a worshipper and servant of all the stars of heaven.
He put the image of Asherah which he had made in the house of which the Lord had said to David and to Solomon his son, In this house, and in Jerusalem, the town which I have made mine out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name for ever.
And never again will I send the feet of Israel wandering from the land which I gave to their fathers; if only they will take care to do all my orders, and keep all the law which my servant Moses gave them.
But they did not give ear; and Manasseh made them do more evil than those nations did, whom the Lord gave up to destruction before the children of Israel.
For this cause, says the Lord, the God of Israel, I will send such evil on Jerusalem and Judah that the ears of all to whom the news comes will be burning.
And she said to them, The Lord, the God of Israel, says, Say to the man who sent you to me,
But to the king of Judah who sent you to get directions from the Lord, say, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said: As to the words which have come to your ears,
And the high places before Jerusalem, on the south side of the mountain of destruction, which Solomon, king of Israel, had made for Ashtoreth, the disgusting god of the Zidonians, and for Chemosh, the disgusting god of Moab, and for Milcom, the disgusting god of the children of Ammon, the king made unclean.
And the altar at Beth-el, and the high place put up by Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel do evil, that altar and that high place were pulled down; and the high place was burned and crushed to dust and the Asherah was burned.
Then Josiah took away all the houses of the high places in the towns of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had put up, moving the Lord to wrath, and he did with them as he had done in Beth-el.
Truly, such a Passover had not been kept in all the days of the judges of Israel or of the kings of Israel or the kings of Judah;
And the Lord said, I will send Judah away from before my face, as I have sent Israel; I will have nothing more to do with this town, which I had made mine, even Jerusalem, and the holy house of which I said, My name will be there.
And he took away all the stored wealth of the Lord's house, and the goods from the king's store-house, cutting up all the gold vessels which Solomon, king of Israel, had made in the house of the Lord, as the Lord had said.
And Abraham was the father of Isaac. The sons of Isaac: esau and Israel.
Now these are the kings who were ruling in the land of Edom, before there was any king over Israel: Bela, the son of Beor; his town was named Dinhabah.
These are the sons of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, levi and Judah, Issachar and Zebulun;
And the sons of Carmi: Achan, the troubler of Israel, who did wrong about the cursed thing.
And Jabez made a prayer to the God of Israel, saying, If only you would truly give me a blessing, and make wider the limits of my land, and let your hand be with me, and keep me from evil, so that I may not be troubled by it! And God gave him his desire.
And the sons of Reuben, the oldest son of Israel, (for he was the oldest son, but, because he made his father's bride-bed unclean, his birthright was given to the sons of Joseph, the son of Israel; but he is not to be given the place of the oldest.
The sons of Reuben, the oldest son of Israel: Hanoch and Pallu, Hezron and Carmi.
All these were listed under the names of their families, in the time of Jotham, king of Judah, and in the time of Jeroboam, king of Israel.
And the God of Israel put an impulse into the heart of Pul, king of Assyria, and of Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, who took them away as prisoners, all the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, to Halah and Habor and Hara and to the river of Gozan, to this day.
The son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, the son of Israel.
But Aaron and his sons made offerings on the altar of burned offering, and on the altar of perfume, for all the work of the most holy place, and to take away the sin of Israel, doing everything ordered by Moses, the servant of God.
And the children of Israel gave to the Levites the towns with their outskirts.
And by the limits of the children of Manasseh, Beth-shean and its daughter-towns, Taanach, Megiddo, and Dor, with their daughter-towns. In these the children of Joseph, the son of Israel, were living.
So all Israel was listed by their families; and, truly, they are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel. And Judah was taken away as prisoners to Babylon because of their sin.
Now the first to take up their heritage in their towns were: Israel, the priests, the Levites, and the Nethinim.
Now the philistines were fighting against Israel; and the men of Israel went in flight before the Philistines, falling down wounded in Mount Gilboa.
And when all the men of Israel who were in the valley saw that the men of Israel had gone in flight and that Saul and his sons were dead, they went in flight away from their towns; and the Philistines came and took them for themselves.
Then all Israel came together to David at Hebron, and said, Truly, we are your bone and your flesh.
In the past, when Saul was king, it was you who went at the head of Israel when they went out or came in; and the Lord your God said to you, You are to be the keeper of my people Israel, and their ruler.
So all the responsible men of Israel came to the king at Hebron; and David made an agreement with them in hebron before the Lord; and they put the holy oil on David and made him king over Israel, as the Lord had said by Samuel.
Then David and all Israel went to Jerusalem (which is Jebus); and the Jebusites, the people of the land, were there.
Now these are the chief of David's men of war who were his strong supporters in the kingdom, and, with all Israel, made him king, as the Lord had said about Israel.
And of the children of Issachar, there were two hundred chiefs, men who had expert knowledge of the times and what it was best for Israel to do, and all their brothers were under their orders.
All these men of war, expert in ordering the fight, came to hebron with the full purpose of making David king over all Israel; and all the rest of Israel were united in their desire to make David king.
And those who were near, as far as Issachar and Zebulun and Naphtali, came with food on asses and camels and mules and oxen, with meal for food and cakes of figs and masses of grapes, and wine and oil and oxen and sheep in great numbers, for there was joy in Israel.
And David said to all the men of Israel who had come together there, If it seems good to you and if it is the purpose of the Lord our God, let us send to all the rest of our brothers, everywhere in the land of Israel, and to the priests and the Levites in their towns and the country round them, and get them to come together here to us;
So David sent for all Israel to come together, from Shihor, the river of Egypt, as far as the way into Hamath, to get the ark of God from Kiriath-jearim.
And David went up, with all Israel, to Baalah, that is, to Kiriath-jearim in Judah, to get up from there the ark of God, over which the holy Name is named, the name of the Lord whose place is between the winged ones.
Then David and all Israel made melody before God with all their strength, with songs and corded instruments of music, and with brass instruments and horns.
And David saw that the Lord had made his position safe as king over Israel, lifting up his kingdom on high because of his people Israel.
And when the philistines had news that David had been made king over all Israel, they went up in search of David, and David, hearing of it, went out against them.
And David made all Israel come together at Jerusalem, to take the ark of the Lord to its place, which he had got ready for it.
And said to them, You are the heads of the families of the Levites: make yourselves holy, you and your brothers, so that you may take the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel, to the place which I have made ready for it.
So the priests and the Levites made themselves holy to take up the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel.
So David, and the responsible men of Israel, and the captains over thousands, went with joy to get the ark of the agreement of the Lord out of the house of Obed-edom.
So all Israel took up the ark of the agreement of the Lord, with loud cries and with horns and brass and corded instruments sounding loudly.
And he gave to everyone, every man and woman of Israel, a cake of bread, some meat, and a cake of dry grapes.
And he put some of the Levites before the ark of the Lord as servants, to keep the acts of the Lord in memory, and to give worship and praise to the Lord, the God of Israel:
O you seed of Israel his servant, you children of Jacob, his loved ones.
And he gave it to Jacob for a law, and to Israel for an eternal agreement;
Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, for ever and for ever. And all the people said, So be it; and gave praise to the Lord.
To give burned offerings to the Lord on the altar of burned offerings morning and evening, every day, as it is ordered in the law of the Lord which he gave to Israel;
For from the day when I took Israel up, till this day, I have had no house, but have gone from tent to tent, and from living-place to living-place.
In all the places where I have gone with all Israel, did I ever say to any of the judges of Israel, whom I made the keepers of my people, Why have you not made for me a house of cedar?
So now, say to my servant David, The Lord of armies says, I took you from the fields, from keeping sheep, so that you might be a ruler over my people Israel;
And I will make a resting-place for my people Israel, planting them there, so that they may be in the place which is theirs and never again be moved; and never again will they be made waste by evil men, as they were at first,
From the time when I put judges over my people Israel; and I will overcome all those who are against you; and I will make you great and the head of a line of kings.
And what other nation in the earth, like your people Israel, did a god go out to take for himself, to be his people, making his name great and to be feared, driving out the nations from before your people whom you made free and took out of Egypt?
For your people Israel you made yours for ever; and you, Lord, became their God.
So let your words be made certain and your name be made great, when men say, The Lord of armies is the God of Israel; and when the family of David your servant is made strong before you.
So David was king over all Israel, judging and giving right decisions for all his people.
Now when Joab saw that their forces were in position against him in front and at his back, he took all the best men of Israel, and put them in line against the Aramaeans;
And when the Aramaeans saw that Israel had overcome them, they sent men to get the Aramaeans who were on the other side of the River, with Shophach, the captain of Hadadezer's army, at their head.
And word of this was given to David; and he got all Israel together and went over Jordan and came to Helam and put his forces in position against them. And when David's forces were in position against the Aramaeans, the fight was started.
And the Aramaeans went in flight before Israel; and David put to the sword the men of seven thousand Aramaean war-carriages and forty thousand footmen, and put to death Shophach, the captain of the army.
And when the servants of Hadadezer saw that they were overcome by Israel, they made peace with David and became his servants: and the Aramaeans would give no more help to the children of Ammon.
And when he put shame on Israel, Jonathan, the son of Shimea, David's brother, put him to death.
Now Satan, designing evil against Israel, put into David's mind the impulse to take the number of Israel.
And David said to Joab and the captains of the people, Now let all Israel, from Beer-sheba to Dan, be numbered; and give me word so that I may be certain of their number.
And Joab said, May the Lord make his people a hundred times more in number than they are; but, my lord king, are they not all my lord's servants? why would my lord have this done? why will he become a cause of sin to Israel?
But the king's word was stronger than Joab's. So Joab went out and went through all Israel and came to Jerusalem.
And Joab gave David the number of all the people; all the men of Israel, able to take up arms, were one million, one hundred thousand men; and those of Judah were four hundred and seventy thousand men, able to take up arms.
And God was not pleased with this thing; so he sent punishment on Israel.
Three years when there will not be enough food; or three months of war, when you will go in flight before your haters, being in great danger of the sword; or three days of the sword of the Lord, disease in the land, and the angel of the Lord taking destruction through all the land of Israel. Now give thought to the answer I am to take back to him who sent me.
So the Lord sent disease on Israel, causing the death of seventy thousand men.
Then David said, This is the house of the Lord God, and this is the altar for Israel's burned offerings.
And David gave orders to get together all the men from strange lands who were in the land of Israel; and he put stone-cutters to work, cutting stones for building the house of God.
Then he sent for his son Solomon, and gave him orders for the building of a house for the Lord, the God of Israel.
But you will have a son who will be a man of rest; and I will give him rest from wars on every side. His name will be Solomon, and in his time I will give Israel peace and quiet;
He will be the builder of a house for my name; he will be to me a son, and I will be to him a father; and I will make the seat of his rule over Israel certain for ever.
Only may the Lord give you wisdom, and knowledge of his orders for Israel, so that you may keep the law of the Lord your God.
And all will go well for you, if you take care to keep the laws and the rules which the Lord gave to Moses for Israel: be strong and take heart; have no fear and do not be troubled.
Then David gave orders to all the chiefs of Israel to give their help to Solomon his son, saying,
Now David was old and full of days; and he made his son Solomon king over Israel.
And he got together all the chiefs of Israel, with the priests and the Levites.
For David said, The Lord, the God of Israel, has given his people rest, and he has made his resting-place in Jerusalem for ever;
So they were put into their different groups, to take their places in the house of the Lord, in agreement with the rules made by Aaron their father, as the Lord, the God of Israel, had given him orders.
Of the Izharites, Chenaniah and his sons had to do all the public business of Israel, in relation to judges and men in authority.
Of the Hebronites, Hashabiah and his brothers, seventeen hundred able men, were overseers of Israel on the other side of the Jordan, to the west, being responsible for all the work of the Lord's house and for the work done by the king's servants.
Now the number of the children of Israel, that is, the heads of families, and the captains of thousands and of hundreds, and the men in authority who were servants of the king in anything to do with the divisions which came in and went out month by month through all the months of the year, in every division were twenty-four thousand.
And over the tribes of Israel: the ruler of the Reubenites was Eliezer, the son of Zichri; of the Simeonites, Shephatiah, the son of Maacah;
Of Dan, Azarel, the son of Jeroham. These were the captains of the tribes of Israel.
But David did not take the number of those who were under twenty years old, for the Lord had said that he would make Israel like the stars of heaven in number.
The numbering was started by Joab, the son of Zeruiah, but he did not go on to the end; and because of it, wrath came on Israel and the number was not recorded in the history of King David.
And David got together at Jerusalem all the rulers of Israel, the chiefs of the tribes and the captains of the divisions waiting on the king in turn, and the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds and the controllers of all the goods and property of the king and his sons, with the unsexed servants and the great men of war.
Though the Lord, the God of Israel, took me out of all my father's family, to be king over Israel for ever, marking out Judah to be chief, and, of the people of Judah, my father's family; and among the sons of my father he was pleased to make me king over all Israel;
And of all my sons (for the Lord has given me a great number of sons) he has made selection of Solomon to take his place on the seat of the kingdom of the Lord over Israel.
So now, before the eyes of all Israel, the people of the Lord, and in the hearing of our God, keep and be true to the orders of the Lord your God; so that you may have this good land for yourselves and give it for a heritage to your children after you for ever.
Then the heads of families and the chiefs of the tribes of Israel, and the captains of thousands and of hundreds, with the controllers of the king's business, freely gave themselves;
So David gave praise to the Lord before all the people; and David said, Praise be to you, O Lord the God of Israel, our father for ever and ever.
O Lord, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, our fathers, keep this for ever in the deepest thoughts of your people, and let their hearts be fixed and true to you;
And they made offerings to the Lord, and gave burned offerings to the Lord, on the day after, a thousand oxen, a thousand sheep, and a thousand lambs, with their drink offerings, and a great wealth of offerings for all Israel.
So Solomon was put on the seat of the Lord as king in place of his father David, and everything went well for him; and all Israel was under his authority.
And the Lord made Solomon great in the eyes of all Israel, clothing him with glory and honour such as no other king in Israel had had before him.
Now David, the son of Jesse, was king over all Israel.
For forty years he was ruling as king over Israel, seven years in Hebron and thirty-three years in Jerusalem.
Together with all his rule and his power, and the events which took place in his time, in Israel and in all the kingdoms of other lands.
And Solomon sent word to all Israel, to the captains of thousands and of hundreds and to the judges and to every chief in all Israel, heads of their families.
Then Solomon, and all the men of Israel with him, went to the high place at Gibeon, because the tent of meeting of God, which Moses, the servant of the Lord, had made in the waste land, was there.
So Solomon went back from the high place at Gibeon, from before the Tent of meeting, to Jerusalem; and he was king over Israel.
See! I am building a house for the name of the Lord my God, to be made holy to him, where perfumes of sweet spices will be burned before him, and the holy bread will be placed at all times, and burned offerings will be offered morning and evening, on the sabbaths and at the new moons, and on the regular feasts of the Lord our God. This is a law for ever to Israel.
And Huram said, praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, maker of heaven and earth, who has given to David the king a wise son, full of wisdom and good sense, to be the builder of a house for the Lord and a house for himself as king.
Then Solomon took the number of all the men from strange lands who were living in Israel, as his father David had done; there were a hundred and fifty-three thousand, six hundred.
Then Solomon sent for all the responsible men of Israel, all the chiefs of the tribes and the heads of families of the children of Israel, to come to Jerusalem and take the ark of the Lord's agreement up out of the town of David, which is Zion.
And all the men of Israel came together to the king at the feast in the seventh month.
All the responsible men of Israel came, and the Levites took up the ark.
And King Solomon and all the men of Israel who had come together there with him, were before the ark, making offerings of sheep and oxen more than might be numbered.
Nothing was in the ark but the two flat stones which Moses put there at Horeb, where the Lord made an agreement with the children of Israel when they came out of Egypt.
Then, turning his face about, the king gave a blessing to all the men of Israel; and they were all on their feet together.
And he said, praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, who himself gave his word to my father David, and with his strong hand has made his word come true, saying,
From the day when I took my people out of the land of Egypt, no town in all the tribes of Israel has been marked out by me for the building of a house for the resting-place of my name; and I took no man to be a ruler over my people Israel;
But now I have made selection of Jerusalem, that my name might be there, and of David, to be over my people Israel.
Now it was in the heart of my father David to put up a house for the name of the Lord, the God of Israel.
And the Lord has kept his word; for I have taken my father David's place on the seat of the kingdom of Israel, as the Lord gave his word; and I have made the house for the name of the Lord the God of Israel.
And there I have put the ark, in which is the agreement of the Lord, which he made with the people of Israel.
Then he took his place in front of the altar of the Lord, all the men of Israel being present,
(For Solomon had made a brass stage, five cubits long, five cubits wide and three cubits high, and had put it in the middle of the open space; on this he took his place and went down on his knees before all the meeting of Israel, stretching out his hands to heaven.)
And he said, O Lord, the God of Israel, there is no God like you in heaven or on earth; keeping faith and mercy unchanging for your servants, while they go in your ways with all their hearts;
So now, O Lord, the God of Israel, let your word to your servant David, my father, come true, when you said, You will never be without a man to take his place before me on the seat of the kingdom of Israel; if only your children give attention to their ways, walking in my law, as you have done before me.
So now, O Lord, the God of Israel, make your word come true which you said to your servant David.
And give ear to the prayers of your servant and of your people Israel, when they make their prayers, turning to this place; give ear from heaven your living-place; and hearing have mercy.
And if your people Israel are overcome in war, because of their sin against you; if they are turned to you again, honouring your name, making prayers and requesting your grace in this house:
Then give ear from heaven, and let the sin of your people Israel have forgiveness, and take them back again to the land which you gave to them and to their fathers.
Then give ear from heaven, so that the sin of your servants and the sin of your people Israel may have forgiveness, when you make clear to them the good way in which they are to go; and send rain on your land which you have given to your people for their heritage.
Whatever prayer or request for your grace is made by any man, or by all your people Israel, whatever his trouble may be, whose hands are stretched out to this house:
And as for the man from a strange land, who is not of your people Israel but comes from a far country because of the glory of your name and your strong hand and your outstretched arm; when he comes to make his prayer, turning to this house:
Then give ear from heaven your living-place, and give him his desire, whatever it may be; so that all the peoples of the earth may have knowledge of your name, worshipping you as do your people Israel, and may see that this house which I have made is truly named by your name.
And all the children of Israel were looking on when the fire came down, and the glory of the Lord was on the house; and they went down on their knees, with their faces to the earth, worshipping and praising the Lord, and saying, He is good; for his mercy is unchanging for ever.
And the priests were in their places, and the Levites with their instruments of music for the Lord's song, which David the king had made for the praise of the Lord whose mercy is unchanging for ever, when David gave praise by their hand; and the priests were sounding horns before them; and all Israel were on their feet.
So Solomon kept the feast at that time for seven days, and all Israel with him, a very great meeting, for the people had come together from the way into Hamath and from as far as the river of Egypt.
And on the twenty-third day of the seventh month, he sent the people away to their tents, full of joy and glad in their hearts, because of all the good which the Lord had done to David and to Solomon and to Israel his people.
Then I will make strong the seat of your kingdom, as I gave my word to David your father, saying, You will never be without a man to be ruler in Israel.
He took in hand the building up of the towns which Huram had given him, causing the children of Israel to make living-places for themselves there.
As for all the rest of the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, who were not of Israel:
Their men who were still living in the land, and whom the children of Israel had not put an end to, these Solomon put to forced work, as is done to this day;
But Solomon did not make use of the children of Israel as servants for his work; they were men of war, his chiefs and his captains, and captains of his war-carriages and his horsemen.
Then Solomon made Pharaoh's daughter come up from the town of David to the house which he had made for her; for he said, I will not have my wife living in the house of David, king of Israel, because those places where the ark of the Lord has come are holy.
Praise be to the Lord your God whose pleasure it was to put you on the seat of his kingdom to be king for the Lord your God: because, in his love for Israel, it was the purpose of your God to make them strong for ever, he made you king over them, to be their judge in righteousness.
Solomon was king over Israel in Jerusalem for forty years.
And rehoboam went to Shechem, where all Israel had come together to make him king.
And they sent for him; and Jeroboam and all Israel came to Rehoboam and said,
And when all Israel saw that the king would give no attention to them, the people in answer said to the king, What part have we in David? what is our heritage in the son of Jesse? every man to your tents, O Israel; now see to your house, David. So all Israel went to their tents.
But Rehoboam was still king over those of the children of Israel who were living in the towns of Judah.
Then Rehoboam sent Adoniram, the overseer of the forced work; and he was stoned to death by all Israel. And King Rehoboam went quickly and got into his carriage to go in flight to Jerusalem.
So Israel was turned away from the family of David to this day.
And rehoboam came to Jerusalem, and got together the men of Judah and Benjamin, a hundred and eighty thousand of his best fighting-men, to make war against Israel and get the kingdom back for Rehoboam.
Say to Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, king of Judah, and to all Israel in Judah and Benjamin,
And the priests and Levites who were in all Israel came together to him from every part of their country.
And after them, from all the tribes of Israel, all those whose hearts were fixed and true to the Lord, the God of Israel, came to Jerusalem to make offerings to the Lord, the God of their fathers.
Now when Rehoboam's position as king had been made certain, and he was strong, he gave up the law of the Lord, and all Israel with him.
Then the chiefs of Israel and the king made themselves low and said, The Lord is upright.
So King Rehoboam made himself strong in Jerusalem and was ruling there. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he became king, and he was ruling for seventeen years in Jerusalem, the town which the Lord had made his out of all the tribes of Israel, to put his name there; and his mother's name was Naamah, an Ammonite woman.
And Abijah took up his position on Mount Zemaraim, in the hill-country of Ephraim, and said, Give ear to me, O Jeroboam and all Israel:
Is it not clear to you that the Lord, the God of Israel, gave the rule over Israel to David and to his sons for ever, by an agreement made with salt?
And now God is with us at our head, and his priests with their loud horns sounding against you. O children of Israel, do not make war on the Lord, the God of your fathers, for it will not go well for you.
And the men of Judah gave a loud cry; and at their cry, God put fear into Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.
And the children of Israel went in flight before Judah, and God gave them up into their hands.
And Abijah and his people put them to death with great destruction: five hundred thousand of the best of Israel were put to the sword.
So at that time the children of Israel were overcome, and the children of Judah got the better of them, because they put their faith in the Lord, the God of their fathers.
Now for a long time Israel has been without the true God, and without a teaching priest and without the law;
But when in their trouble they were turned to the Lord, the God of Israel, searching after him, he let their search be rewarded.
And he got together all Judah and Benjamin and those of Ephraim and Manasseh and Simeon who were living with them; for numbers of them came to him out of Israel when they saw that the Lord his God was with him.
And that anyone, small or great, man or woman, who was not true to the Lord, the God of Israel, would be put to death.
But the high places were not taken away out of Israel; but still the heart of Asa was true to the Lord all his life.
In the thirty-sixth year of the rule of Asa, Baasha, king of Israel, went up against Judah, building Ramah so that no one was able to go out or in to Asa, king of Judah.
Let there be an agreement between me and you as there was between my father and your father: see, I have sent you silver and gold; go and put an end to your agreement with Baasha, king of Israel, so that he may give up attacking me.
And Ben-hadad did as King Asa said, and sent the captains of his armies against the towns of Israel, attacking Ijon and Dan and Abel-maim, and all the store-towns of Naphtali.
Now the acts of Asa, first and last, are recorded in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel.
And Jehoshaphat his son became king in his place, and made himself strong against Israel.
But turning to the God of his father and keeping his laws, and not doing as Israel did.
For Ahab, king of Israel, said to Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, Will you go with me to Ramoth-gilead? And he said, I am as you are, and my people as your people; we will be with you in the war.
Then Jehoshaphat said to the king of Israel, Let us now get directions from the Lord.
So the king of Israel got together all the prophets, four hundred men, and said to them, Am I to go to Ramoth-gilead to make war or not? And they said, Go up: for God will give it into the hands of the king.
And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, There is still one man by whom we may get directions from the Lord, but I have no love for him, because he has never been a prophet of good to me, but only of evil: he is Micaiah, the son of Imla. And Jehoshaphat said, Let not the king say so.
Then the king of Israel sent for one of his unsexed servants and said, Go quickly and come back with Micaiah, the son of Imla.
Now the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, were seated on their seats of authority, dressed in their robes, by the doorway into Samaria; and all the prophets were acting as prophets before them.
Then he said, I saw all Israel wandering on the mountains like sheep without a keeper; and the Lord said, These have no master: let them go back, every man to his house in peace.
And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, Did I not say that he would not be a prophet of good to me, but of evil?
And the Lord said, How may Ahab, king of Israel, be tricked into going up to Ramoth-gilead to his death? And one said one thing and one another.
And the king of Israel said, Take Micaiah and send him back to Amon, the ruler of the town, and to Joash, the king's son;
So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, went up to Ramoth-gilead.
And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, I will make a change in my clothing, so that I do not seem to be the king, and will go into the fight; but do you put on your robes. So the king of Israel made a change in his dress, and they went to the fight.
Now the king of Aram had given orders to the captains of his war-carriages, saying, Make no attack on small or great, but only on the king of Israel.
So when the captains of the war-carriages saw Jehoshaphat, they said, It is the king of Israel. And turning about, they came round him, but Jehoshaphat gave a cry, and the Lord came to his help, and God sent them away from him.
Now when the captains of the war-carriages saw that he was not the king of Israel, they went back from going after him.
And a certain man sent an arrow from his bow without thought of its direction, and gave the king of Israel a wound where his breastplate was joined to his clothing; so he said to the driver of his war-carriage, Go to one side and take me away out of the army, for I am badly wounded.
But the fight became more violent while the day went on; and the king of Israel was supported in his war-carriage facing the Aramaeans till the evening; and by sundown he was dead.
Then in Jerusalem he gave authority to certain of the Levites and the priests and the heads of families of Israel to give decisions for the Lord, and in the causes of those living in Jerusalem.
Did you not, O Lord our God, after driving out the people of this land before your people Israel, give it to the seed of Abraham, your friend, for ever?
And now, see, the children of Ammon and Moab and the people of Mount Seir, whom you kept Israel from attacking when they came out of Egypt, so that turning to one side they did not send destruction on them:
And the Levites, the children of the Kohathites and the Korahites, got to their feet and gave praise to the Lord, the God of Israel, with a loud voice.
And the fear of God came on all the kingdoms of the lands, when they had news of how the Lord made war on those who came against Israel.
Now as for the rest of the acts of Jehoshaphat, first and last, they are recorded in the words of Jehu, the son of Hanani, which were put in the book of the kings of Israel.
After this Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, became friends with Ahaziah, king of Israel, who did much evil:
And he had brothers, sons of Jehoshaphat, Azariah, Jehiel, Zechariah, Azariah, Michael, and Shephatiah; all these were sons of Jehoshaphat, king of Israel.
Now when Jehoram had taken his place over his father's kingdom, and had made his position safe, he put all his brothers to death with the sword, as well as some of the princes of Israel.
He went in the ways of the kings of Israel, and did as the family of Ahab did, for the daughter of Ahab was his wife; and he did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
But have gone in the way of the kings of Israel, and have made Judah and the people of Jerusalem go after false gods, as the family of Ahab did: and because you have put to death your father's sons, your brothers, who were better than yourself:
Acting on their suggestion, he went with Jehoram, son of Ahab, king of Israel, to make war on Hazael, king of Aram, at Ramoth-gilead: and Joram was wounded by the bowmen.
And they went through Judah, getting together the Levites and the heads of families in Israel from all the towns of Judah, and they came to Jerusalem.
And getting together the priests and Levites, he said to them, Go out into the towns of Judah year by year, and get from all Israel money to keep the house of your God in good condition; and see that this is done without loss of time. The Levites, however, were slow in doing so.
Then the king sent for Jehoiada, the chief priest, and said to him, Why have you not given the Levites orders that the tax fixed by Moses, the servant of the Lord, and by the meeting of Israel, for the tent of witness, is to be got in from Judah and Jerusalem and handed over?
And an order was sent out through all Judah and Jerusalem that payment was to be made to the Lord of the tax which Moses, the servant of God, had put on Israel in the waste land.
And they put him into his last resting-place in the town of David, among the kings, because he had done good in Israel for God and for his house.
And for a hundred talents of silver, he got a hundred thousand fighting-men from Israel.
But a man of God came to him, saying, O king, let not the army of Israel go with you; for the Lord is not with Israel, that is, the children of Ephraim.
Then Amaziah said to the man of God, But what is to be done about the hundred talents which I have given for the armed band of Israel? And the man of God in answer said, God is able to give you much more than this.
And ten thousand more the children of Israel took living, and made them go up to the top of the rock, pushing them down from the top of the rock so that their bodies were broken by the fall.
Then Amaziah, king of Judah, acting on the suggestion of his servants, sent to Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, the son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying, Come, let us have a meeting face to face.
And Joash, king of Israel, sent to Amaziah, king of Judah, saying, The thorn-tree in lebanon sent to the cedar in Lebanon, saying, Give your daughter to my son for a wife: and a beast from the woodland in Lebanon went by, crushing the thorn under his feet.
And so Joash, king of Israel, went up; and he and Amaziah, king of Judah, came face to face at Beth-shemesh in Judah.
And Judah was overcome before Israel, and they went in flight, every man to his tent.
And Joash, king of Israel, made Amaziah, king of Judah, the son of Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, prisoner at Beth-shemesh, and took him to Jerusalem; and he had the wall of Jerusalem pulled down from the doorway of Ephraim to the doorway in the angle, four hundred cubits.
Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah, went on living for fifteen years after the death of Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, king of Israel.
Now the rest of the acts of Amaziah, first and last, are they not recorded in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel?
Now the rest of the acts of Jotham, and all his wars and his ways, are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah.
But he went in the ways of the kings of Israel and made images of metal for the Baals.
More than this, he had offerings burned in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and made his children go through fire, copying the disgusting ways of the nations whom the Lord had sent out of the land before the children of Israel.
So the Lord his God gave him up into the hands of the king of Aram; and they overcame him, and took away a great number of his people as prisoners to Damascus. Then he was given into the hands of the king of Israel, who sent great destruction on him.
And the children of Israel took away as prisoners from their brothers, two hundred thousand, women and sons and daughters, and a great store of their goods, and took them to Samaria.
And said to them, You are not to let these prisoners come here; for what you are designing to do will be a cause of sin against the Lord to us, making even greater our sin and our wrongdoing, which now are great enough, and his wrath is burning against Israel.
For the Lord made Judah low, because of Ahaz, king of Israel; for he had given up all self-control in Judah, sinning greatly against the Lord.
For he made offerings to the gods of Damascus, who were attacking him, and said, Because the gods of the kings of Aram are giving them help, I will make offerings to them so that they may give me help. But they were the cause of his downfall, and of that of all Israel.
Now the rest of his acts and all his ways, first and last, are recorded in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel.
And Ahaz went to rest with his fathers, and they put his body into the earth in Jerusalem; but they did not put him in the resting-place of the kings of Israel: and Hezekiah his son became king in his place.
The doors of his house have been shut and the lights put out; no perfumes have been burned or offerings made to the God of Israel in his holy place.
Now it is my purpose to make an agreement with the Lord, the God of Israel, so that the heat of his wrath may be turned away from us.
And the priests put them to death, and made a sin-offering with their blood on the altar, to take away the sin of all Israel: for the king gave orders that the burned offering and the sin-offering were for all Israel.
And Hezekiah gave the word for the burned offering to be offered on the altar. And when the burned offering was started, then the song of the Lord was started, with the blowing of horns and with all the instruments of David, king of Israel.
Then Hezekiah sent word to all Israel and Judah, and sent letters to Ephraim and Manasseh, requesting them to come to the house of the Lord at Jerusalem, to keep the passover to the Lord, the God of Israel.
So it was ordered that word was to be sent out through all Israel, from Beer-sheba to Dan, that they were to come to keep the Passover to the Lord, the God of Israel, at Jerusalem: because they had not kept it in great numbers in agreement with the law.
So runners went with letters from the king and his chiefs through all Israel and Judah, by the order of the king, saying, O children of Israel, come back again to the Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, so that he may come again to that small band of you which has been kept safe out of the hands of the kings of Assyria.
So the children of Israel who were present in Jerusalem kept the feast of unleavened bread for seven days with great joy: and the Levites and the priests gave praise to the Lord day by day, making melody to the Lord with loud instruments.
And all the people of Judah, with the priests and the Levites, and those who had come from Israel, and men from other lands who had come from Israel or who were living in Judah, were glad with great joy.
So there was great joy in Jerusalem: for nothing like this had been seen in Jerusalem from the time of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel.
Now when all this was over, all the men of Israel who were present went out into the towns of Judah, causing the stone pillars to be broken up and the wood pillars to be cut down, pulling down the high places and the altars in all Judah and Benjamin, as well as in Ephraim and Manasseh, till all were gone. Then all the children of Israel went back to their towns, every man to his property.
And when the order was made public, straight away the children of Israel gave, in great amounts, the first-fruits of their grain and wine and oil and honey, and of the produce of their fields; and they took in a tenth part of everything, a great store.
And the children of Israel and Judah, who were living in the towns of Judah came with the tenth part of their oxen and sheep, and a tenth of all the holy things which were to be given to the Lord their God, and put them in great masses.
And when Hezekiah and the rulers came and saw all the store of goods, they gave praise to the Lord and to his people Israel.
And he sent letters, in addition, to put shame on the Lord, the God of Israel, and to say evil against him, saying, As the gods of the nations of other lands have not been able to keep their people safe from my hands, no more will the God of Hezekiah keep his people safe from my hands.
Now the rest of the acts of Hezekiah, and the good he did, are recorded in the vision of Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, and in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel.
He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, copying the disgusting ways of the nations whom the Lord had sent out of the land before the children of Israel.
And he put the image he had made in the house of God, the house of which God had said to David and to Solomon his son, In this house, and in Jerusalem, the town which I have made mine out of all the tribes of Israel, will I put my name for ever:
And never again will I let the feet of Israel be moved out of the land which I have given to their fathers; if only they will take care to do all my orders, even all the law and the orders and the rules given to them by Moses.
And Manasseh made Judah and the people of Jerusalem go out of the true way, so that they did more evil than those nations whom the Lord gave up to destruction before the children of Israel.
And he put the altar of the Lord in order, offering peace-offerings and praise-offerings on it, and said that all Judah were to be servants of the Lord, the God of Israel.
Now the rest of the acts of Manasseh, and his prayer to his God, and the words which the seers said to him in the name of the Lord, the God of Israel, are recorded among the acts of the kings of Israel.
He had the altars and the pillars of wood pulled down and the images crushed to dust, and all the sun-images cut down, through all the land of Israel, and then he went back to Jerusalem.
And they came to Hilkiah, the chief priest, and gave him all the money which had been taken into the house of God, which the Levites, the keepers of the door, had got from Manasseh and Ephraim and those of Israel who had not been taken away as prisoners, and from all Judah and Benjamin and the people of Jerusalem.
Go and get directions from the Lord for me and for those who are still in Israel and for Judah, about the words of this book which has come to light; for great is the wrath of the Lord which has been let loose on us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the Lord or done what is recorded in this book.
And she said to them, The Lord, the God of Israel, has said, Say to the man who sent you to me,
But to the king of Judah who sent you to get directions from the Lord, say, This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, has said: Because you have given ear to my words,
Josiah took away all the disgusting things out of all the lands of the children of Israel, and made all who were in Israel servants of the Lord their God. And as long as he was living they were true to the Lord, the God of their fathers.
And he said to the Levites, the teachers of all Israel, who were holy to the Lord, See, the holy ark is in the house which Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel, made; it will no longer have to be transported on your backs: now be the servants of the Lord your God and his people Israel,
And make yourselves ready in your divisions, by your families, as it is ordered in the writings of David, king of Israel, and of Solomon his son;
And all the children of Israel who were present kept the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread at that time for seven days.
No Passover like it had been kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet; and not one of the kings of Israel had ever kept a Passover like the one kept by Josiah and the priests and the Levites and all those of Judah and Israel who were present, and the people of Jerusalem.
And Jeremiah made a song of grief for Josiah; and to this day Josiah is named by all the makers of melody, men and women, in their songs of grief; they made it a rule in Israel; and the songs are recorded among the songs of grief.
And all his acts, first and last, are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah.
Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim and the disgusting things he did, and all there is to be said against him, are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah; and Jehoiachin his son became king in his place.
And he took up arms against King Nebuchadnezzar, though he had made him take an oath by God; but he made his neck stiff and his heart hard, turning away from the Lord, the God of Israel.
Whoever there is among you of his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and take in hand the building of the house of the Lord, the God of Israel; he is the God who is in Jerusalem.
And whoever there may be of the rest of Israel, living in any place, let the men of that place give him help with offerings of silver and gold and goods and beasts, in addition to the offering freely given for the house of God in Jerusalem.
Who went with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, Baanah, The number of the men of the people of Israel:
And these were the people who went up from Tel-melah, Tel-harsha, Cherub, Addan, and Immer. But having no knowledge of their fathers' families or offspring, it was not certain that they were Israelites;
So the priests and the Levites and the people and the music-makers and the door-keepers and the Nethinim, took up their places in their towns; even all Israel in their towns.
And when the seventh month came, and the children of Israel were in the towns, the people came together like one man to Jerusalem.
Most of the teaching of Jesus are recorded in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Complete Sayings of Jesus presents every word spoken by Jesus in one place and provides an index to assist in finding specific ocassions, places and/or events. It is a must read aid for serious Bible study.
He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, saith the Lord. These are the words of Christ; and they direct us to imitate his life and character. The Imitation of Christ is guide to following the example of Jesus Christ. Let it be our most earnest study to dwell upon the life and example of Jesus.
The Apocrypha books are 14 books that were included between the old and new testaments in the original King James Version of the bible and many others. Church leaders agreed that these books were valuable for instruction in life and manners, but did not all agree that they should be considered cannon.
The Childrens Bible provides bible lessons from the Old and New testaments. There are 216 stories written in plain english. The stories are easy to read and understand but they are not just for childern. It is a pleasure to read and enjoy these important stories.
Let us love one another, for love comes from God and every one who loves is a child of God and knows God. He who loves not man does not know God, for God is love. God showed his love for us, for he sent his only Son into the world that through him we might have life. Love the stranger.
In Mark 12:30 Jesus said;
And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this [is] the first commandment.
And the second Mark 12:31 [is] like, [namely] this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.
The Gospel of The Birth of Mary was attributed to St. Matthew and was received as genuine and authentic by early Christians. It is to be found in the works of Jerome, a Father of the Church in the 4th century and is translated from his collection.
The Book of Enoch is ascribed to the great-grandfather of Noah and is included in the cannon of some churches. It describes the fall of the angels (watchers), visions of heaven and hell and the birth of Noah. Quotes from the book of Enoch are found in the New Testament.
The First Book of Adam and Eve. Books 1 begins immediately after the expulsion from the Garden of Eden. We learn about the fall but also of the promise to save Adam and his decendents. The story depicts mans struggle against evil, the devil and sin.
The Second Book of Adam and Eve. Discusses Adam's sorrow and death. The history of the patriarchs who lived before the Flood until the birth of Noah; the children of Seth on Mount Hermon and Cain's death. It ends with the testament and translation of Enoch.
The Infancy of Jesus Christ (Infancy Gospel of Thomas) relates the life of Jesus from the ages of five to twelve. It is believed that the document was transcribed from oral traditions some time prior to the second century. The ancient writing is possibly Gnostic and many early church leaders considered it heretical.
Daily Bible study is essential. The Bible Verse of the Day provides a collection of enlightening and inspiration bible verses. Improve your knowledge and understanding of the Bible and your life by studying the words of the holy scripture. Explore the King James Bible (kjv) and discover new insights.
The World English Bible was produced to provide speakers of modern English with a version of the Bible that is easily understood. The Bible is in the public domain and available world-wide. It is an accurate modern translation of the original King James Bible, including the Apocryphal books.
Looking for something in the Bible? Want to find a specifc verse or list of words? The Bible search feature makes it easy find verses or words. Enter the verses or words in the search bar or visit the search page to access additional search options. Finding information in the Bible will never be easier.
The favorite verses page is a list of popular bible verses. Each verse includes a link to the chapter and verse of the book where it is found in the bible. Click on any link for a bible verse and it will take you to that location in the bible.
The bible contains great stories. Visit the bible stories page for links to some of the best known and most significant stories and passages in the bible.