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Josiah was eight years old when he became king of Judah, and he ruled in Jerusalem for thirty-one years. His mother was Jedidah, the daughter of Adaiah from the town of Bozkath.
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Josiah did what was pleasing to the LORD; he followed the example of his ancestor King David, strictly obeying all the laws of God.
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In the eighteenth year of his reign, King Josiah sent the court secretary Shaphan, the son of Azaliah and grandson of Meshullam, to the Temple with the order:
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"Go to the High Priest Hilkiah and get a report on the amount of money that the priests on duty at the entrance to the Temple have collected from the people.
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Tell him to give the money to the men who are in charge of the repairs in the Temple. They are to pay
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the carpenters, the builders, and the masons, and buy the timber and the stones used in the repairs.
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The men in charge of the work are thoroughly honest, so there is no need to require them to account for the funds."
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Shaphan delivered the king's order to Hilkiah, and Hilkiah told him that he had found the book of the Law in the Temple. Hilkiah gave him the book, and Shaphan read it.
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Then he went back to the king and reported: "Your servants have taken the money that was in the Temple and have handed it over to the men in charge of the repairs."
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And then he said, "I have here a book that Hilkiah gave me." And he read it aloud to the king.
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When the king heard the book being read, he tore his clothes in dismay,
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and gave the following order to Hilkiah the priest, to Ahikam son of Shaphan, to Achbor son of Micaiah, to Shaphan, the court secretary, and to Asaiah, the king's attendant:
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"Go and consult the LORD for me and for all the people of Judah about the teachings of this book. The LORD is angry with us because our ancestors have not done what this book says must be done."
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Hilkiah, Ahikam, Achbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to consult a woman named Huldah, a prophet who lived in the newer part of Jerusalem. (Her husband Shallum, the son of Tikvah and grandson of Harhas, was in charge of the Temple robes.) They described to her what had happened,
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and she told them to go back to the king and give him
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the following message from the LORD: "I am going to punish Jerusalem and all its people, as written in the book that the king has read.
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They have rejected me and have offered sacrifices to other gods, and so have stirred up my anger by all they have done. My anger is aroused against Jerusalem, and it will not die down.
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As for the king himself, this is what I, the LORD God of Israel, say: You listened to what is written in the book,
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and you repented and humbled yourself before me, tearing your clothes and weeping, when you heard how I threatened to punish Jerusalem and its people. I will make it a terrifying sight, a place whose name people will use as a curse. But I have heard your prayer,
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and the punishment which I am going to bring on Jerusalem will not come until after your death. I will let you die in peace." The men returned to King Josiah with this message.
1
Josiah was eight years old when he became king of Judah, and he ruled in Jerusalem for thirty-one years.
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He did what was pleasing to the LORD; he followed the example of his ancestor King David, strictly obeying all the laws of God.
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In the eighth year that Josiah was king, while he was still very young, he began to worship the God of his ancestor King David. Four years later he began to destroy the pagan places of worship, the symbols of the goddess Asherah, and all the other idols.
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Under his direction the altars where Baal was worshiped were smashed, and the incense altars near them were torn down. They ground to dust the images of Asherah and all the other idols and then scattered the dust on the graves of the people who had sacrificed to them.
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He burned the bones of the pagan priests on the altars where they had worshiped. By doing all this, he made Judah and Jerusalem ritually clean again.
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He did the same thing in the cities and the devastated areas of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, and as far north as Naphtali.
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Throughout the territory of the Northern Kingdom he smashed the altars and the symbols of Asherah, ground the idols to dust, and broke into bits all the incense altars. Then he returned to Jerusalem.
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In the eighteenth year of his reign, after he had purified the land and the Temple by ending pagan worship, King Josiah sent three men to repair the Temple of the LORD God: Shaphan son of Azaliah, Maaseiah, the governor of Jerusalem, and Joah son of Joahaz, a high official.
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The money that the Levite guards had collected in the Temple was turned over to Hilkiah the High Priest. (It had been collected from the people of Ephraim and Manasseh and the rest of the Northern Kingdom, and from the people of Judah, Benjamin, and Jerusalem.)
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This money was then handed over to the three men in charge of the Temple repairs, and they gave it to
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the carpenters and the builders to buy the stones and the timber used to repair the buildings that the kings of Judah had allowed to decay.
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The men who did the work were thoroughly honest. They were supervised by four Levites: Jahath and Obadiah of the clan of Merari, and Zechariah and Meshullam of the clan of Kohath. (The Levites were all skillful musicians.)
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Other Levites were in charge of transporting materials and supervising the workers on various jobs, and others kept records or served as guards.
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While the money was being taken out of the storeroom, Hilkiah found the book of the Law of the LORD, the Law that God had given to Moses.
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He said to Shaphan, "I have found the book of the Law here in the Temple." He gave Shaphan the book,
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and Shaphan took it to the king. He reported, "We have done everything that you commanded.
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We have taken the money that was kept in the Temple and handed it over to the workers and their supervisors."
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Then he added, "I have here a book that Hilkiah gave me." And he read it aloud to the king.
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When the king heard the book being read, he tore his clothes in dismay
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and gave the following order to Hilkiah, to Ahikam son of Shaphan, to Abdon son of Micaiah, to Shaphan, the court secretary, and to Asaiah, the king's attendant:
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"Go and consult the LORD for me and for the people who still remain in Israel and Judah. Find out about the teachings of this book. The LORD is angry with us because our ancestors have not obeyed the word of the LORD and have not done what this book says must be done."
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At the king's command, Hilkiah and the others went to consult a woman named Huldah, a prophet who lived in the newer part of Jerusalem. (Her husband Shallum, the son of Tikvah and grandson of Harhas, was in charge of the Temple robes.) They described to her what had happened,
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and she told them to go back to the king and give him
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the following message from the LORD: "I am going to punish Jerusalem and all its people with the curses written in the book that was read to the king.
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They have rejected me and have offered sacrifices to other gods, and so have stirred up my anger by all they have done. My anger is aroused against Jerusalem, and it will not die down.
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As for the king himself, this is what I, the LORD God of Israel, say: You listened to what is written in the book,
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and you repented and humbled yourself before me, tearing your clothes and weeping, when you heard how I threatened to punish Jerusalem and its people. I have heard your prayer,
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and the punishment which I am going to bring on Jerusalem will not come until after your death. I will let you die in peace." The men returned to King Josiah with this message.
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King Josiah summoned all the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem,
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and together they went to the Temple, accompanied by the priests and the Levites and all the rest of the people, rich and poor alike. Before them all the king read aloud the whole book of the covenant, which had been found in the Temple.
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He stood by the royal column and made a covenant with the LORD to obey him, to keep his laws and commands with all his heart and soul, and to put into practice the demands attached to the covenant, as written in the book.
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He made the people of Benjamin and everyone else present in Jerusalem promise to keep the covenant. And so the people of Jerusalem obeyed the requirements of the covenant they had made with the God of their ancestors.
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King Josiah destroyed all the disgusting idols that were in the territory belonging to the people of Israel, and as long as he lived, he required the people to serve the LORD, the God of their ancestors.
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After this, Jesus went across Lake Galilee (or, Lake Tiberias, as it is also called).
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A large crowd followed him, because they had seen his miracles of healing the sick.
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Jesus went up a hill and sat down with his disciples.
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The time for the Passover Festival was near.
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Jesus looked around and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, so he asked Philip, "Where can we buy enough food to feed all these people?"
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(He said this to test Philip; actually he already knew what he would do.)
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Philip answered, "For everyone to have even a little, it would take more than two hundred silver coins to buy enough bread."
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Another one of his disciples, Andrew, who was Simon Peter's brother, said,
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"There is a boy here who has five loaves of barley bread and two fish. But they will certainly not be enough for all these people."
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"Make the people sit down," Jesus told them. (There was a lot of grass there.) So all the people sat down; there were about five thousand men.
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Jesus took the bread, gave thanks to God, and distributed it to the people who were sitting there. He did the same with the fish, and they all had as much as they wanted.
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When they were all full, he said to his disciples, "Gather the pieces left over; let us not waste a bit."
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So they gathered them all and filled twelve baskets with the pieces left over from the five barley loaves which the people had eaten.
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Seeing this miracle that Jesus had performed, the people there said, "Surely this is the Prophet who was to come into the world!"
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Jesus knew that they were about to come and seize him in order to make him king by force; so he went off again to the hills by himself.
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When evening came, Jesus' disciples went down to the lake,
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got into a boat, and went back across the lake toward Capernaum. Night came on, and Jesus still had not come to them.
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By then a strong wind was blowing and stirring up the water.
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The disciples had rowed about three or four miles when they saw Jesus walking on the water, coming near the boat, and they were terrified.
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"Don't be afraid," Jesus told them, "it is I!"
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Then they willingly took him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached land at the place they were heading for.
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Next day the crowd which had stayed on the other side of the lake realized that there had been only one boat there. They knew that Jesus had not gone in it with his disciples, but that they had left without him.
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Other boats, which were from Tiberias, came to shore near the place where the crowd had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks.
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When the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they got into those boats and went to Capernaum, looking for him.
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When the people found Jesus on the other side of the lake, they said to him, "Teacher, when did you get here?"
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Jesus answered, "I am telling you the truth: you are looking for me because you ate the bread and had all you wanted, not because you understood my miracles.
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Do not work for food that spoils; instead, work for the food that lasts for eternal life. This is the food which the Son of Man will give you, because God, the Father, has put his mark of approval on him."
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So they asked him, "What can we do in order to do what God wants us to do?"
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Jesus answered, "What God wants you to do is to believe in the one he sent."
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They replied, "What miracle will you perform so that we may see it and believe you? What will you do?
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Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, just as the scripture says, 'He gave them bread from heaven to eat.' "
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"I am telling you the truth," Jesus said. "What Moses gave you was not the bread from heaven; it is my Father who gives you the real bread from heaven.
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For the bread that God gives is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."
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"Sir," they asked him, "give us this bread always."
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"I am the bread of life," Jesus told them. "Those who come to me will never be hungry; those who believe in me will never be thirsty.
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Now, I told you that you have seen me but will not believe.
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Everyone whom my Father gives me will come to me. I will never turn away anyone who comes to me,
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because I have come down from heaven to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
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And it is the will of him who sent me that I should not lose any of all those he has given me, but that I should raise them all to life on the last day.
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For what my Father wants is that all who see the Son and believe in him should have eternal life. And I will raise them to life on the last day."
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The people started grumbling about him, because he said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven."
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So they said, "This man is Jesus son of Joseph, isn't he? We know his father and mother. How, then, does he now say he came down from heaven?"
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Jesus answered, "Stop grumbling among yourselves.
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People cannot come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me; and I will raise them to life on the last day.
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The prophets wrote, 'Everyone will be taught by God.' Anyone who hears the Father and learns from him comes to me.
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This does not mean that anyone has seen the Father; he who is from God is the only one who has seen the Father.
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I am telling you the truth: he who believes has eternal life.
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I am the bread of life.
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Your ancestors ate manna in the desert, but they died.
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But the bread that comes down from heaven is of such a kind that whoever eats it will not die.
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I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If you eat this bread, you will live forever. The bread that I will give you is my flesh, which I give so that the world may live."
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This started an angry argument among them. "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" they asked.
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Jesus said to them, "I am telling you the truth: if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in yourselves.
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Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them to life on the last day.
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For my flesh is the real food; my blood is the real drink.
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Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood live in me, and I live in them.
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The living Father sent me, and because of him I live also. In the same way whoever eats me will live because of me.
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This, then, is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the bread that your ancestors ate, but then later died. Those who eat this bread will live forever."
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Jesus said this as he taught in the synagogue in Capernaum.
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Many of his followers heard this and said, "This teaching is too hard. Who can listen to it?"
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Without being told, Jesus knew that they were grumbling about this, so he said to them, "Does this make you want to give up?
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Suppose, then, that you should see the Son of Man go back up to the place where he was before?
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What gives life is God's Spirit; human power is of no use at all. The words I have spoken to you bring God's life-giving Spirit.
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Yet some of you do not believe." (Jesus knew from the very beginning who were the ones that would not believe and which one would betray him.)
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And he added, "This is the very reason I told you that no people can come to me unless the Father makes it possible for them to do so."
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Because of this, many of Jesus' followers turned back and would not go with him any more.
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So he asked the twelve disciples, "And you---would you also like to leave?"
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Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life.
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And now we believe and know that you are the Holy One who has come from God."
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Jesus replied, "I chose the twelve of you, didn't I? Yet one of you is a devil!"
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He was talking about Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. For Judas, even though he was one of the twelve disciples, was going to betray him.
