2 Kings 16
1 In the seventeenth year of Pekah son of Remaliah, Ahaz son of Jotham, king of Judah, began to reign.
2 Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. He did not do what was right in the eyes of the LORD his God, as David his father had done.
3 He followed the way of the kings of Israel and even made his son pass through the fire, following the detestable practices of the nations that the LORD had driven out before the Israelites.
4 He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the high places, on the hills, and under every leafy tree.
5 Then Rezin king of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, marched up to Jerusalem to wage war. They besieged Ahaz, but they could not defeat him.
6 At that time Rezin king of Aram recovered Elath for Aram and drove the people of Judah out of Elath. The Edomites came to Elath and have lived there to this day.
7 Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Aram and from the hand of the king of Israel, who are attacking me.”
8 Ahaz took the silver and gold found in the house of the LORD and in the treasuries of the royal palace, and sent them to the king of Assyria as a gift.
9 The king of Assyria heeded him. He marched against Damascus, captured it, deported its inhabitants to Kir, and put Rezin to death.
10 King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria. He saw the altar in Damascus, and King Ahaz sent the priest Uriah a drawing of the altar and a model showing all its details.
11 The priest Uriah built the altar according to everything King Ahaz had sent from Damascus. The priest Uriah did just that before King Ahaz returned from Damascus.
12 When the king arrived from Damascus, he saw the altar. The king approached it and offered sacrifices on it.
13 He burned his burnt offering and grain offering, poured out his drink offering, and sprinkled on the altar the blood of his peace offerings.
14 As for the bronze altar that stood before the LORD, he moved it from the front of the temple, from between the altar and the house of the LORD, and placed it on the north side of the altar.
15 King Ahaz commanded the priest Uriah, “On the large altar, burn the morning burnt offering and the evening grain offering, the king’s burnt offering and his grain offering, and the burnt offering of all the people of the land, with their grain offerings and drink offerings. Sprinkle on it all the blood of the burnt offerings and all the blood of the sacrifices. The bronze altar will be for me to consult.”
16 The priest Uriah did everything King Ahaz had commanded.
17 King Ahaz cut off the frames of the stands and removed the basins from them. He took the sea down from the bronze oxen beneath it and set it on a stone pavement.
18 Because of the king of Assyria, he removed from the house of the LORD the covered Sabbath walkway that had been built there and the king’s outer entrance.
19 The rest of the acts of Ahaz, what he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
20 Ahaz rested with his ancestors and was buried with them in the City of David. His son Hezekiah succeeded him as king.
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