| ToC | Reading the Old Testament | . . . Chapter 9. Kings | ToC |
After David, Josiah (640-609) was the best king Judah ever had. In 622 B.C.E., the eighteenth year of his reign, Josiah authorized and underwrote the restoration of the temple back to Yahwistic purposes after its disgraceful neglect under Manasseh and Amon. During the process of renovation Hilkiah the high priest, came in possession of "the book of the Torah." Hilkiah gave it to Josiah's secretary, Shaphan, who in turn read it to the king.
The king was extremely distraught when he heard words that seemed to spell doom for the nation because of their apparent departure from the covenant. Huldah, a female prophet, interpreted the book to Josiah and the court, and comforted him with the prophecy that he himself would not see the demise of the nation because of his own faithful acts of repentance.
Josiah was inspired to make further reforms throughout Judah and the territory to the north that Judah controlled. The various religious shrines to Baal, Asherah, astral deities, and numerous other abominations to Yahweh, were all torn down. From then on, worship could take place only in Jerusalem, and the Passover was celebrated for the first time in a long time.
The description of the reforms of Josiah inspired by the "book of the Torah," especially the elimination of all worship centers except Jerusalem, and the reference to the document as "the book of the covenant," make its identification as Deuteronomy quite sure. Deuteronomy is so closely associated with the reforms of Josiah that most authorities today grant that at least the core of the book received its final shape out of that historical context (see Chapter 5).
It must have come as a terrible shock, then, given his piety and devotion to Yahweh, that Josiah was killed in a battle attempting to stop the advance of the Egyptian army. Killed near Megiddo by Pharaoh Neco in 609 B.C.E., the supremely pious Davidic king seems to have fed an accumulating mythology about that place Megiddo. Mount Megiddo is har megiddo in Hebrew, from which the term Armageddon is derived. In apocalyptic thought Armageddon will be the site of the last great battle between the forces of good and the forces of evil. But in the last days good would triumph.
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| ToC | Reading the Old Testament | . . . Chapter 9. Kings | ToC |
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