Upon hearing from his servants on their errand to the prophetess Huldah that the Book of the Law was genuine, and the promises God made, Josiah immediately set about conforming his kingdom to the written word.
He called a meeting to the Temple, insisting that everyone possible attend. There he had to Book of Law read for their hearing. Then, according to the custom, he stood by the main pillar designated for kings and renewed his royal oath to the Covenant. Following his cue, the crowd echoed his commitment in a renewal of the Covenant.
Then he ordered the High Priest to cleanse the Temple of idols and all the furnishings dedicated to them. This stuff was burned outside the city, in a flat area of the Kidron Valley, most likely somewhere to the south. The ashes were carried off to Bethel. Keep in mind that the imported pagans Esarhaddon had brought in to replace the northern kingdom had restored the services Jeroboam had established there. These imported folks were in no position to resist much of anything Josiah wanted to do, as the Assyrian imperial government was pretty busy defending itself from insurrections back in Mesopotamia.
Josiah then deposed all the priests that had been dedicated to idolatrous services. He took down the Asherah (wooden posts carved as images of female fertility deities) and burned them in the Kidron Valley; it would have made a significant bonfire. Throwing the ashes on the graves of the common folk was a symbolic act of contempt for the idols. It didn’t defile the graves, but it defiled the reputation and worship of the goddesses.
Does it make you shiver to realize that during the long reign of Manasseh, homosexual male prostitutes were serving in idolatrous sacred shrines next door to the Temple? All the various incense shrines and high places were destroyed across the whole kingdom. Any members of the priestly clan that got entangled in that were retired on their priestly rations, no longer permitted to enter the Temple grounds.
The ancient shrine to Moloch was in the bottom of the Hinnom Valley, just off the southern tip of the ridge on which Zion stood. It had been resurrected and put back into service, and Josiah made it a point to defile the site in accordance with the mythology of the idol. We aren’t sure what it was, but it was different from the other shrines. That this eventually turned into the garbage pit for Jerusalem should indicate something.
The text mentions the two horses dedicated to the solar deity. They had been tethered at the entrance to the Temple, fed a special privileged diet, and on ceremonial occasions would pull symbolic chariots dedicated to the sun. People would bring them treats as offerings to the pagan god. The caretaker for them was a eunuch who had a booth in the Temple itself; under Moses eunuchs weren’t allowed in the Temple area except in the Court of Gentiles.
King Ahaz had built himself a shrine in the upper breeze room of the palace. There had been similar shrines in the Temple courts. Josiah had all that stuff brought down and the stone or clay altars were shattered until they were sand, then dumped in the Kidron Valley. The reference to the Mount of Corruption hails back to 1 Kings 11:7, where Solomon had built for some of his wives shrines on the Mount of Olives to the despicable worship of Chemosh, Milcom and Asherahs. Throwing bones in the sites of the shrines meant it would take some serious labor to have them cleansed and restored to the service of the idols. Keep in mind that the sites were chosen based on a number of factors, and once chosen, no alternates could be selected in the same area.
He did the same thing for the shrine at Bethel. Making liberal use of the bones from graves in the area, when they spotted the graves of faithful prophets, they honored them by leaving them alone. Josiah carried this reform to Samaria and cleaned that place out, as well. Then he carried this out as far into the old northern kingdom as he dared, hunting down every pagan shrine he could identify.
We assume he returned home from this long campaign in time for the Passover, because he ordered the observation of the feast. For the first time in decades, they celebrated the Passover with such fervor and propriety that it stood out in judgment of the prophets writing the narrative. And Josiah kept up his purge of idolatry into the very homes of the citizens. It would be hard to compare any previous or later King of Judah with Josiah’s ardor for Jehovah and the Covenant.
Still, it was too late for Judah. The punishment ordained in the Covenant itself was going to fall sooner or later. Josiah met an early end in something orchestrated by God, as a matter of timing.
The Assyrian capital was under attack. Babylon had finally risen up and laid siege to Nineveh. Pharaoh Necco was marching up the coast of Palestine to support the Assyrians. Josiah led his army out in battle against this march, being a sort of ally with Babylon (due to their feigned friendship with King Hezekiah). While Josiah did some serious damage to the Egyptian forces, he lost and was killed in battle.
This did two things. First, it put Judah under Pharaoh’s authority for a while. It also kept the Egyptian army from being much help to Assyria. Thus, Babylon won the war and established their own empire. Second, they then they came looking for what was left of Judah to assert their authority, on the way to reprisal on Egypt.
