Manasseh

(forgetting ).

1. The thirteenth king of Judah, son of Hezekiah, ( 2 Kings 21:1 ) ascended the throne at the age of twelve, and reigned 55 years, from B.C. 608 to 642. His accession was the signal for an entire change in the religious administration of the kingdom. Idolatry was again established to such an extent that every faith was tolerated but the old faith of Israel. The Babylonian alliance which the king formed against Assyria resulted in his being made prisoner and carried off to Babylon in the twenty-second year of his reign, according to a Jewish tradition. There his eyes were opened and he repented, and his prayer was heard and the Lord delivered him, ( 2 Chronicles 33:12 2 Chronicles 33:13 ) and he returned after some uncertain interval of time to Jerusalem. The altar of the Lord was again restored, and peace offerings and thank offerings were sacrificed to Jehovah. ( 2 Chronicles 38:15 2 Chronicles 38:16 ) But beyond this the reformation did not go. On his death, B.C. 642, he was buried as Ahaz had been, not with the burial of a king, in the sepulchres of the house of David, but in the garden of Uzza, ( 2 Kings 21:26 ) and long afterward, in suite of his repentance, the Jews held his name in abhorrence.
2. One of the descendants of Pahathmoab, who in the days of Ezra had married a foreign wife. ( Ezra 10:30 )
3. One of the laymen, of the family of Hashum who put away his foreign wife at Ezra command. ( Ezra 10:33 )