4
Then in his presence the altars of the Baals were torn down, and the incense altars that were above them he chopped down. The Asherah poles, the carved images, and the cast images he shattered, crushed to dust, and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.
5
He burned the bones of the priests on their altars. So he cleansed Judah and Jerusalem.
6
[He did the same] in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, and as far as Naphtali [and] on their surrounding mountain shrines.
7
He tore down the altars, and he smashed the Asherah poles and the carved images to powder. He chopped down all the incense altars throughout the land of Israel and returned to Jerusalem.
Josiah's Repair of the Temple
8 In the eighteenth year of his reign, in order to cleanse the land and the temple, Josiah sent Shaphan son of Azaliah, along with Maaseiah the governor of the city and the recorder Joah son of Joahaz, to repair the temple of the Lord his God.
9
So they went to Hilkiah the high priest, and gave him the money brought into God's temple. The Levites and the doorkeepers had collected [money] from Manasseh, Ephraim, and from the entire remnant of Israel, and from all Judah, Benjamin, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
10
They put it into the hands of those doing the work-those who oversaw the Lord's temple. They [in turn] gave it to the workmen who were working in the Lord's temple, to repair and restore the temple;
11
they gave it to the carpenters and builders and [also used it] to buy quarried stone and timbers-for joining and to make beams-for the buildings that Judah's kings had destroyed.
12
The men were doing the work with integrity. Their overseers were Jahath and Obadiah the Levites from the Merarites, and Zechariah and Meshullam from the Kohathites as supervisors. The Levites were all skilled on musical instruments.
13
[They were] also over the porters and were supervising all those doing the work task by task. Some of the Levites were secretaries, officers, and gatekeepers.
The Recovery of the Book of the Law
14 When they brought out the money that had been deposited in the Lord's temple, Hilkiah the priest found the book of the law of the Lord [written] by the hand of Moses.