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1 ESDRAS

Josiah Celebrates the Passover

1Josiah kept the passover to his Lord in Jerusalem; he killed the passover lamb on the fourteenth day of the first month, ²having placed the priests according to their divisions, arrayed in their vestments, in the temple of the Lord. ³He told the Levites, the temple servants of Israel, that they should sanctify themselves to the Lord and put the holy ark of the Lord in the house that King Solomon, son of David, had built; ⁴and he said, ‘You need no longer carry it on your shoulders. Now worship the Lord your God and serve his people Israel; prepare yourselves by your families and kindred, ⁵in accordance with the directions of King David of Israel and the magnificence of his son Solomon. Stand in order in the temple according to the groupings of the ancestral houses of you Levites, who minister before your kindred the people of Israel, ⁶and kill the passover lamb and prepare the sacrifices for your kindred, and keep the passover according to the commandment of the Lord that was given to Moses.’

7 To the people who were present Josiah gave thirty thousand lambs and kids, and three thousand calves; these were given from the king’s possessions, as he promised, to the people and the priests and Levites. ⁸Hilkiah, Zechariah, and Jehiel,^* the chief officers of the temple, gave to the priests for the passover two thousand six hundred sheep and three hundred calves. ⁹And Jeconiah and Shemaiah and his brother Nethanel, and Hashabiah and Ochiel and Joram, captains over thousands, gave the Levites for the passover five thousand sheep and seven hundred calves.

10 This is what took place. The priests and the Levites, having the unleavened bread, stood in proper order, according to kindred ¹¹and the grouping of the ancestral houses, before the people to make the offering to the Lord as it is written in the book of Moses; this they did in the morning. ¹²They roasted the passover lamb with fire, as required; and they boiled the sacrifices in bronze pots and cauldrons, with a pleasing odour, ¹³and carried them to all the people. Afterwards they prepared the passover for themselves and for their kindred the priests, the sons of Aaron, ¹⁴because the priests were offering the fat until nightfall; so the Levites prepared it for themselves and for their kindred the priests, the sons of Aaron. ¹⁵The temple singers, the sons of Asaph, were in their place according to the arrangement made by David, and also Asaph, Zechariah, and Eddinus, who represented the king. ¹⁶The gatekeepers were at each gate; no one needed to interrupt his daily duties, for their kindred the Levites prepared the passover for them.

17 So the things that had to do with the sacrifices to the Lord were accomplished that day: the passover was kept ¹⁸and the sacrifices were offered on the altar of the Lord, according to the command of King Josiah. ¹⁹And the people of Israel who were present at that time kept the passover and the festival of unleavened bread for seven days. ²⁰No passover like it had been kept in Israel since the times of the prophet Samuel; ²¹none of the kings of Israel had kept such a passover as was kept by Josiah and the priests and Levites and the people of Judah and all of Israel who were living in Jerusalem. ²²In the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah this passover was kept.

The End of Josiah’s Reign

23 And the deeds of Josiah were upright in the sight of the Lord, for his heart was full of godliness. ²⁴In ancient times the events of his reign have been recorded—concerning those who sinned and acted wickedly towards the Lord beyond any other people or kingdom, and how they grieved the Lord^* deeply, so that the words of the Lord fell upon Israel.

25 After all these acts of Josiah, it happened that Pharaoh, king of Egypt, went to make war at Carchemish on the Euphrates, and Josiah went out against him. ²⁶And the king of Egypt sent word to him saying, ‘What have we to do with each other, O king of Judea? ²⁷I was not sent against you by the Lord God, for my war is at the Euphrates. And now the Lord is with me! The Lord is with me, urging me on! Stand aside, and do not oppose the Lord.’

28 Josiah, however, did not turn back to his chariot, but tried to fight with him, and did not heed the words of the prophet Jeremiah from the mouth of the Lord. ²⁹He joined battle with him in the plain of Megiddo, and the commanders came down against King Josiah. ³⁰The king said to his servants, ‘Take me away from the battle, for I am very weak.’ And immediately his servants took him out of the line of battle. ³¹He got into his second chariot; and after he was brought back to Jerusalem he died, and was buried in the tomb of his ancestors.

32 In all Judea they mourned for Josiah. The prophet Jeremiah lamented for Josiah, and the principal men, with the women,^* have made lamentation for him to this day; it was ordained that this should always be done throughout the whole nation of Israel. ³³These things are written in the book of the histories of the kings of Judea; and every one of the acts of Josiah, and his splendour, and his understanding of the law of the Lord, and the things that he had done before, and these that are now told, are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah.

The Last Kings of Judah

34 The men of the nation took Jeconiah^* son of Josiah, who was twenty-three years old, and made him king in succession to his father Josiah. ³⁵He reigned for three months in Judah and Jerusalem. Then the king of Egypt deposed him from reigning in Jerusalem, ³⁶and fined the nation one hundred talents of silver and one talent of gold. ³⁷The king of Egypt made his brother Jehoiakim king of Judea and Jerusalem. ³⁸Jehoiakim put the nobles in prison, and seized his brother Zarius and brought him back from Egypt.

39 Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign in Judea and Jerusalem; he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. ⁴⁰King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came up against him; he bound him with a chain of bronze and took him away to Babylon. ⁴¹Nebuchadnezzar also took some holy vessels of the Lord, and carried them away, and stored them in his temple in Babylon. ⁴²But the things that are reported about Jehoiakim,^* and his uncleanness and impiety, are written in the annals of the kings.

43 His son Jehoiachin^* became king in his place; when he was made king he was eighteen years old, ⁴⁴and he reigned for three months and ten days in Jerusalem. He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. ⁴⁵A year later Nebuchadnezzar sent and removed him to Babylon, with the holy vessels of the Lord, ⁴⁶and made Zedekiah king of Judea and Jerusalem.

The Fall of Jerusalem

Zedekiah was twenty-one years old, and he reigned for eleven years. ⁴⁷He also did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and did not heed the words that were spoken by the prophet Jeremiah from the mouth of the Lord. ⁴⁸Although King Nebuchadnezzar had made him swear by the name of the Lord, he broke his oath and rebelled; he stiffened his neck and hardened his heart and transgressed the laws of the Lord, the God of Israel. ⁴⁹Even the leaders of the people and of the priests committed many acts of sacrilege and lawlessness beyond all the unclean deeds of all the nations, and polluted the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem—the temple that God had made holy. ⁵⁰The God of their ancestors sent his messenger to call them back, because he wished to spare them and his dwelling-place. ⁵¹But they mocked his messengers, and whenever the Lord spoke, they scoffed at his prophets, ⁵²until in his anger against his people because of their ungodly acts he gave command to bring against them the kings of the Chaldeans. ⁵³These killed their young men with the sword around their holy temple, and did not spare young man or young woman,^* old man or child, for he gave them all into their hands. ⁵⁴They took all the holy vessels of the Lord, great and small, the treasure-chests of the Lord, and the royal stores, and carried them away to Babylon. ⁵⁵They burned the house of the Lord, broke down the walls of Jerusalem, burned their towers with fire, ⁵⁶and utterly destroyed all its glorious things. The survivors he led away to Babylon with the sword, ⁵⁷and they were servants to him and to his sons until the Persians began to reign, in fulfilment of the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, ⁵⁸saying, ‘Until the land has enjoyed its sabbaths, it shall keep sabbath all the time of its desolation until the completion of seventy years.’