2 Kings 16

1 In the seventeenth year of Pekah son of Remaliah, Ahaz son of Jotham, king of Judah, has reigned.

2 Ahaz [is] a son of twenty years in his reigning, and he has reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem, and he has not done that which [is] right in the eyes of his God YHWH, like his father David,

3 and he walks in the way of the kings of Israel, and he has also caused his son to pass over into fire, according to the abominations of the nations that YHWH dispossessed from the presence of the sons of Israel,

4 and he sacrifices and makes incense in high places, and on the heights, and under every green tree.

5 Then Rezin king of Aram, and Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, go up to Jerusalem, to battle, and they lay siege to Ahaz, and they have not been able to fight.

6 At that time Rezin king of Aram has brought back Elath to Aram, and casts out the Jews from Elath, and the Arameans have come to Elath, and dwell there to this day.

7 And Ahaz sends messengers to Tiglath-Pileser king of Asshur, saying, “I [am] your servant and your son; come up and save me out of the hand of the king of Aram, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, who are rising up against me.”

8 And Ahaz takes the silver and the gold that is found in the house of YHWH, and in the treasures of the house of the king, and sends to the king of Asshur [as] a bribe.

9 And the king of Asshur listens to him, and the king of Asshur goes up to Damascus, and seizes it, and removes [the people of] it to Kir, and he has put Rezin to death.

10 And King Ahaz goes to meet Tiglath-Pileser king of Asshur [at] Damascus, and sees the altar that [is] in Damascus, and King Ahaz sends to Urijah the priest the likeness of the altar, and its pattern, according to all its work,

11 and Urijah the priest builds the altar according to all that King Ahaz has sent from Damascus; so Urijah the priest did until the coming in of King Ahaz from Damascus.

12 And the king comes in from Damascus, and the king sees the altar, and the king draws near on the altar, and offers on it,

13 and burns his burnt-offering and his present as incense, and pours out his drink-offering, and sprinkles the blood of the peace-offerings that he has, on the altar.

14 As for the altar of bronze that [is] before YHWH—he brings [it] near from the front of the house, from between the altar and the house of YHWH, and puts it on the side of the altar, northward.

15 And King Ahaz commands him—Urijah the priest—saying, “On the great altar burn as incense the burnt-offering of the morning, and the present of the evening, and the burnt-offering of the king, and his present, and the burnt-offering of all the people of the land, and their present, and their drink-offerings; and all the blood of the burnt-offering, and all the blood of the sacrifice, you sprinkle on it, and the altar of bronze is for me to inquire [by].”

16 And Urijah the priest does according to all that King Ahaz commanded.

17 And King Ahaz cuts off the borders of the bases, and turns aside the laver from off them, and he has taken down the sea from off the bronze oxen that [are] under it, and puts it on a pavement of stones.

18 And the covered place for the Sabbath that they built in the house, and the entrance of the king outside, he turned [from] the house of YHWH, because of the king of Asshur.

19 And the rest of the matters of Ahaz that he did, are they not written on the scroll of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

20 And Ahaz lies with his fathers, and is buried with his fathers in the City of David, and his son Hezekiah reigns in his stead.