Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 19-21.

I usually write about Sennacherib and Hezekiah when I read this passage, but today I want to write about Hezekiah’s son and heir, Manasseh.   The writer tells us that he did detestable things and gives us a summary of those things.  He erected altars to Baal.  He constructed and Asherah pole and placed it in the temple of God.  Further, he built altars to the “starry host” in the temple of God. He worshiped at all of these shrines and even sacrificed his own son in the fire.  Manasseh did all of these things, but even worse, he led the people astray, so that they did more evil than the people whom God had driven out of the land ahead of them.  The writer finally tells us that Manasseh filled Jerusalem with the blood of the innocent.  I have always read that as Manasseh had many innocent people killed for his own pleasure.  While that may be true, I have come to wonder if perhaps it mean that Manasseh allowed crime to run rampant.  Manasseh’s son, Amon, followed in his father’s footsteps.  He committed the same sins that Manasseh had, until things became so bad that some of his officials assassinated him and put his son, Josiah on the throne.  Despite having seen Hezekiah, who held fast to the Lord his entire life, the people of Judah chose to follow Manasseh into doing evil.  They could have chosen to refuse to worship at the altars he built and to join him in sacrificing their children, but they chose otherwise.  They chose to follow their king, rather than their God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.