Final Kings and the Genesis of the Tanakh

II Kings 21-25

       According to the book of Kings after Hezekiah died his son, Manasseh age 15 at his coronation, and grandson, Amon 22 at the age of coronation, backslid into the idolatrous patterns of the previous kings. According to Assyrian records Manasseh was actually a respected ruler of Judah because he was such a loyal vassal of Assyria in the eyes of king Sennacherib, who had an awful time with Hezekiah. This relationship carried over to Sennacherib’s son who became the Assyrian King after his father died. Despite the criticism in the text of Kings regarding Manasseh’s religious policy archeological evidence shows that there was relative peace and prosperity during the reign of Manasseh. In fact he is credited with reviving the Judean economy. Because he had to gain the trust of the Assyrians as well as some of the more affluent countrymen Manasseh relaxed some of the reforms of his father, Hezekiah, and allowed the high places to come back along with other pagan practices. This is not the last we will see of this King. There is nothing outside of the Biblical Account for the reign of Amon. He only ruled Judah for two years before being assassinated. Since he followed in the ways of his father he probably was not a thorn in the side of the Assyrians and therefore not worth mentioning in their records.
      Which brings us to the king that is credited with the origin of the Old Testament, Josiah. Josiah is the great grandson of the great reformer Hezekiah. He is eight years old when his father, Amon, was assassinated. From the beginning, according to the Book, he was a devoted follower of Yahweh and did what was right in His eyes just as King David had done. He even went so far as to tear down the shrines created by the first king of Israel, Jeroboam, after the split of Kingdom. In his eighteenth year as king, when he was 26, he ordered the Temple to be cleaned up and restored. He told his servants to give the priest, Hilkiah, as much money as was needed for the project. According to the Book, as well as other scrolls that have been found with the seal of Josiah stamped into it, during the renovation a very old collection of writings was discovered.
       The name used to describe these writings that were discovered are called The Book of the Torah in II Kings 22:8 which is the same title given to the writings given to Joshua by Moses in the Book of Joshua 1:8 and 8:34. It is this text that was discovered in the reign of Josiah that is the source for the Deuteronomic Reform of Josiah and later used as the source for the Deuteronomical Historian who took the history of Judah and Israel and combined it with the warnings given in the Book of the Torah by Moses.
Josiah is portrayed as an even greater king than Hezekiah and turned to Yahweh with all his heart and soul and strength, just as his ancestor David had done. Unfortunately, it is too little too late. The sins of the previous kings and the people they ruled are too numerous for Yahweh and destruction is still imminent according to the words of II Kings. During this period the ancient world is in flux. The Assyrian Empire was in decline and the Babylonians were not yet at a powerful position to be a superpower. Egypt had just thrown off Assyrian rule, but were not a powerful nation by any means. This allowed the small kingdom of Judah to flourish without any disturbances.
        But, all good things must come to an end and in the year 609 B.C. Egypt joined the Assyrians in a campaign to take over the region, including Judah. Josiah went to battle these forces and was killed. His successor, Jehoiakim, was only power for a few months, but he followed in the evil ways of the previous kings. He was imprisoned by the Pharaoh of Egypt who installed his uncle as the new King. It was this king that had the first dealings with the Babylonian invaders and his son Jehoiachin was the king of Judah when the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar invaded and ransacked Jersualem and the Temple of Yahweh. Another puppet king was put in place by the Babylonians, Zedekiah, who later rebelled against the Babylonians and brought their anger down on the Kingdom.
        The events of the destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar is not only recorded in the Bible, but has also been chronicled by the Babylonians themselves. Judah becomes just another city state within the Babylonian Empire. It will be a good long while that the children of Israel will be imprisoned in Babylon. However, when the Persian Empire takes over and they are allowed to return to Jerusalem one of the things they return with are the scriptures discovered during Josiah’s reign and around 520 B.C. the foundation for the first nine books of the Old Testament begins.