1
Josiah was eight years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for thirty-one years.
2
And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, walking in the ways of his father David, without turning to the right hand or to the left.
3
In the eighth year of his rule, while he was still young, his heart was first turned to the God of his father David; and in the twelfth year he undertook the clearing away of all the high places and the pillars and the images of wood and metal from Judah and Jerusalem.
4
He had the altars of the Baals broken down, while he himself was present; and the sun-images which were placed on high over them he had cut down; and the pillars of wood and the metal images he had broken up and crushed to dust, dropping the dust over the resting-places of the dead who had made offerings to them.
5
And he had the bones of the priests burned on their altars, and so he made Judah and Jerusalem clean.
6
And in all the towns of Manasseh and Ephraim and Simeon as far as Naphtali, he made waste their houses round about.
7
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.
8
Now in the eighteenth year of his rule, when the land and the house had been made clean, he sent Shaphan, the son of Azaliah, and Maaseiah, the ruler of the town, and Joah, the son of Joahaz, the recorder, to make good what was damaged in the house of the Lord his God.
9
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.
10
And they gave it to the overseers of the work of the Lord's house, and the overseers gave it to the workmen working in the house, for building it up and making good what was damaged;
11
Even to the woodworkers and builders to get cut stone and wood for joining the structure together and for making boards for the houses which the kings of Judah had given up to destruction.