seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
2 Chronicles 34:3 In the eighth year of his reign, while he was still young, he began to seek the God of his father David. In his twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem of high places, Asherah poles and idols. 4 Under his direction the altars of the Baals were torn down; he cut to pieces the incense altars that were above them, and smashed the Asherah poles and the idols. These he broke to pieces and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them. 5 He burned the bones of the priests on their altars, and so he purged Judah and Jerusalem. 6 In the towns of Manasseh, Ephraim and Simeon, as far as Naphtali, and in the ruins around them, 7 he tore down the altars and the Asherah poles and crushed the idols to powder and cut to pieces all the incense altars throughout Israel. Then he went back to Jerusalem.
8 In the eighteenth year of Josiah’s reign, to purify the land and the temple, he sent Shaphan son of Azaliah and Maaseiah the ruler of the city, with Joah son of Joahaz, the recorder, to repair the temple of the Lord his God.
9 They went to Hilkiah the high priest and gave him the money that had been brought into the temple of God, which the Levites who were the gatekeepers had collected from the people of Manasseh, Ephraim and the entire remnant of Israel and from all the people of Judah and Benjamin and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.10 Then they entrusted it to the men appointed to supervise the work on the Lord’s temple. These men paid the workers who repaired and restored the temple. 11 They also gave money to the carpenters and builders to purchase dressed stone, and timber for joists and beams for the buildings that the kings of Judah had allowed to fall into ruin.
12 The workers labored faithfully. Over them to direct them were Jahath and Obadiah, Levites descended from Merari, and Zechariah and Meshullam, descended from Kohath. The Levites—all who were skilled in playing musical instruments— 13 had charge of the laborers and supervised all the workers from job to job. Some of the Levites were secretaries, scribes and gatekeepers.
I met a man once who told me that the goodness of humanity swings back and forth like a pendulum. He also described humanity like a timeline.... the good more to the right side of zero and evil on the far left side. He said most people reside or swing near the zero... or center. It seems to me the majority of humanity is swinging out of wack. I have a pendulum clock that use to swing back and forth really well.... but the pendulum clock doesn't swing at all anymore.... it just hangs at zero.... that pendulum no longer helps that clock stay away from dead zero.... Luckily... the clock itself doesn't depend on the pendulum for power.... it has a battery.... it's not a particularly showy clock so it has to work to maintain its place on the wall.
This is from studylight.org.
And he burnt the bones of the priests upon their altars, i.e., he caused the bones of the idolatrous priests to be taken from their graves and burnt on the spot where the destroyed altars had stood, that he might defile the place with the ashes of the dead. In these words is summarized what is stated in 2 Kings 23:13 and 2 Kings 23:14 as to the defilement of the places of sacrifice built upon the Mount of Olives by the bones of the dead, and in 2 Kings 23:16-20 as to the burning of the bones of the high priests of Bethel, after they had been taken from their graves, upon their own altars. מזבחותים is an orthographical error for מזבּחותם .
This commentary is from the bible.org site.
When you read 2 Chronicles 34:3-7 and the parallel passage (2 Kings 23:4-15, 19-20) you begin to see what Josiah was up against. Although the people in his kingdom would claim to be followers of the one true God, they had incorporated all sorts of worldly practices into their worship: idolatry, sexual immorality, and even child sacrifice, all under the guise of religion! It’s amazing how people can delve into anything and everything other than God’s Word in the name of religion! These people claimed to be God’s covenant people, but they were totally corrupt in their lifestyle.
In Josiah’s day, as in ours, there was a widespread lack of understanding of God’s Word. When we read of a copy of the Law being discovered in the Temple and read to the King, we get the distinct impression that even the godly Josiah had never heard it read before! We don’t know whether Manasseh and Amon had destroyed the copies used by the priests and Levites during Hezekiah’s reign. But apparently God’s Word was scarce. Whenever people do not read and understand the Bible, they have no basis for evaluating or confronting their behavior. And so they drift into the worst of sins without even knowing that they are thoroughly pagan.
This is from the blueletterbible.org site.
He also burned the bones of the priests on their altars: Josiah did this both to carry out the prescribed punishment of idolatrous priests in Israel and to defile these pagan altars.
Josiah's reforms did not only remove sinful things, but also the sinful people that promoted and permitted these sinful things. The idols that filled the temple did not get there or stay there on their own - there were priests who were responsible for these sinful practices.
Any thorough reformation can not only deal with sinful things; it must also deal with sinful people. If sinful people are not dealt with, they will quickly bring back the sinful things that were righteously removed.
This is a very violent action that Josiah has undertaken at such a young age. The priests who were preaching and teaching a distorted truth were burnt on their own fake alters. It was a real slaughter on a fake alter.
These guys were God's Chosen People... and they didn't have a clue. They had been doing it this way for decades and no one ever told them otherwise. I'm pretty sure the shiny little objects were inserted in the services one at a time... slowly... maybe someone placed one just inside the door and as people got use to seeing it... it became part of the service. Like a new hymn is incorporated in the worship service... so were these pagan problem pieces.
People don't like the Bible because it's violent. Look around... the flippin' world is violent..... People don't like Christians because of the murder and mayhem of the Crusades. Look around.... the people are being murdered in church for crying out loud.... really the people were murdered during a prayer service. The world is violent. People think abortion is good and capital punishment is not.
People think the reason they can't read their Bible is they aren't supposed to understand it. I'm sure there are preachers who use Revelation 22:7-11 to keep their "flock" in line.
Revelation 22:7 “Look, I am coming soon! Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy written in this scroll.”
8 I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I had heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had been showing them to me. 9 But he said to me, “Don’t do that! I am a fellow servant with you and with your fellow prophets and with all who keep the words of this scroll.Worship God!”
10 Then he told me, “Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this scroll,because the time is near. 11 Let the one who does wrong continue to do wrong; let the vile person continue to be vile; let the one who does right continue to do right; and let the holy person continue to be holy.”
See how that could be distorted?
