by all the showers, saying, Turn ye from your wicked ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent unto you by my servants the prophets:

So they hearkened not, but hardened their necks, as the necks of their fathers, which believed not on the LORD their God;

And they despised his commandments, and his covenant which he had made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he had done among them; but walked after their own vanity, and became vain after the heathen that dwelt about them, of whom the LORD
commanded them that they should not do like them;

But they forsook all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them two cast calves, and groves; and worshipped all the hosts of heaven, and served Baal; 17. And they made their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and went about with divination and sorcery, and committed themselves to do evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger;

And the LORD was very wroth with Israel, and removed them out of his sight; and there remained none but the tribe of Judah only.

Neither did Judah keep the commandments of the LORD their God, and walk after the manner of Israel, which they had done.

Therefore the LORD rejected all the seed of Israel, and pressed them, and delivered them into the hand of the spoilers, until he had cast them out of his sight.

For Israel was cut off from the house of David, and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. And he turned Israel backward from the LORD, and made them to sin grievously.

So the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam, which he had committed, and departed not from them,

Till the LORD had removed Israel out of his sight, as he spake by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away out of his land into Assyria unto this day.

And the king of Assyria sent from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hemath, and from Sepharvaim, and possessed the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel. And they took Samaria, and dwelt in the same. Cities.

And when they began to dwell there, and feared not the LORD, the LORD sent lions among them, and slew them.

And they said unto the king of Assyria, The heathen whom thou hast brought, and filled the cities of Samaria with them, know not the way of God in the land: therefore he hath sent lions among them, and, behold, they slay them, because they know not the way of God in the land.

And the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Bring thither one of the priests that are carried away from thence, and go and dwell there; and he shall teach them the manner of God in the land.

And there came one of the priests which were carried away from Samaria, and sat in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear the LORD.

But every people made his god, and put them in the houses which the Samaritans made in the high places, every people in their cities where they dwelt.

They of Babylon made Sukhoth-benoth. Those of Chuth made Nergel. Those of Hemath made Asima.

Those of Ava made Nibehas and Tharthak. Those of Sepharvaim burned their sons to the.
Adramelech and Anamelech, the gods of those of Sepharvaim.

And because they also feared the LORD, they made them priests in the high places out of the lowest of them, and put them in the houses in the high places.

So they feared the LORD, and served the gods after the manner of every people whence they were brought.

And unto this day they do after the manner of old, not fearing the LORD, nor doing their statutes and their judgments, according to the law and the commandment, which the LORD
commanded the children of Jacob, whom he called Israel,

And he made a covenant with them, and commanded them, saying, Fear no other gods, neither worship them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice unto them,

But the LORD, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and an outstretched arm, him fear, and him worship, and sacrifice unto him; 37. And the statutes, and the judgments, and the judgments, and the statutes, and the commandments, which he hath commanded you to observe, that ye do them always, and fear not other gods;

and of the covenant which he hath made with you, forget not that ye fear not other gods, 39. But fear the LORD your God, which shall deliver you from all your enemies.

But these obeyed not, but did after their former manner.

So these nations feared the LORD, and served their idols also. So did their children, and their children’s children, as their fathers did, unto this day.
(2 Kings)
Chapter 18
In the reign of Hezekiah, Jerusalem is besieged by Sanherib.

In the third year of Hoshea the son of Elah king of Israel was king Hezekiah the son of Ahaz king of Judah.

And he was twenty and five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty and nine years in Jerusalem. And his mother’s name was Abi, the daughter of Zechariah.

And that which was well pleasing in the sight of the LORD, as his father David.

And he cut down the high places, and brake down the pillars, and cut down the groves, and brake down the brazen serpent that Moses had made: for until that time the children of Israel had burned incense unto it, and it was called Nehusthan.

He trusted in the LORD God of Israel, that after him there was none like him among all the kings of Judah, neither was there any before him.

He cleaved unto the LORD, and departed not backward from him, and kept his commandments which the LORD commanded Moses.

And the LORD was with him; and whithersoever he went forth, he dealt wisely. For this cause he turned aside from the king of Assyria, and was not subject unto him.

And he smote the Philistines unto Gaza, and unto the border thereof, from the castles even unto the strong cities.

In the fourth year of Hezekiah king of Judah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea the son of Elah king of Israel, Salmanesser king of Assyria came up against Samaria, and besieged it; 10. And he took it after three years, in the sixth year of Hezekiah; that is, in the ninth year. Hosea king of Israel, when Samaria was won.

And the king of Assyria led Israel away to Assyria, and put them in Halah, and in Habor, by the river Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes,

Because they had not hearkened unto the voice of the LORD their God, and had transgressed his covenant, and all that Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded, whom they had neither hearkened unto, nor done.

Now in the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah went up Sanherib king of Assyria against all the strong cities of Judah, and took them.

And Hezekiah king of Judah sent unto the king of Assyria to Lachish, saying, I have sinned, turn from me; and I will bear that which thou layest upon me. So the king of Assyria laid on Hezekiah king of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold.

So Hezekiah gave all the silver that was found in the house of the LORD, and in the treasures of the king’s house.

At that time Hezekiah king of Judah brake the doors of the temple of the LORD, and the plates which he had overlaid, and gave them to the king of Assyria.

And the king of Assyria sent Tartan, and the arch-trustee, and Rabshakeh of Lachish, unto king Hezekiah, with great power, unto Jerusalem: and they went up. And when they were come, they stopped at the water-pit by the upper pool, which is by the way of the fuller’s field.

And he called unto the king. And there came out unto them Eliakim the son of Hilkiah the chamberlain, and Sebena the scribe, and Joah the son of Asaph the chancellor.

And the archbishop said unto them: Beloved, say unto king Hezekiah, Thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria: What defiance is this, in which thou trustest?

Thinkest thou that there is yet counsel and power to fight? Whereunto then dost thou trust, that thou hast turned aside from me?

Behold, thou trustest in this broken reed, in Egypt? which, if any man lean upon it, it shall go into his hand, and pierce it. So Pharaoh king of Egypt is unto all them that trust in him.

But if ye will say unto me, We trust in the LORD our God: is not this he, whose high places and altars Hezekiah hath abolished, and hath said unto Judah and Jerusalem, Before this altar which is in Jerusalem shall ye worship?

Now therefore vow unto my lord the king of Assyria, that I will give thee two thousand horses, and that thou shalt add horsemen unto them.

How wilt thou then abide before the least of my lords, one of my lord’s subjects, and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

But thinkest thou that I have gone up without the LORD, to destroy this place? The LORD
hath said unto me, Go up into this land, and destroy it.

And Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and Sebena, and Joah, said unto the prince of the arch, Speak unto thy servants in Syrian, for we understand it: speak not unto us in the Jews’ tongue in the ears of the people that