Ἰωσίας

King of Israel, more just¹ than the kings before him. When he heard the law of the Lord being read, listening carefully and being very much disheartened, as he knew that this [law] had been trampled underfoot for so many years, tearing his garments in terror, he send to Hulda the prophetess, asking what the Lord wanted from him and from the whole people. She said: "thus says the Lord: inasmuch as your heart has been softened and you have turned from my face, as you have heard, that I spoke in reference to this place and its inhabitants that it should be for destruction and wrath, and you have torn your garments and wept before me, behold, I add you to your fathers in peace, and you will not see all the evils which I will bring on this place." But he, moved by godly zeal, not only overthrew from their bases the idols everywhere and the objects of worship, but also flogged and destroyed all the idolators, and those who were already dead he burned in their graves. And lifting his eyes towards the tomb of the man of God, he said, "what is that high place which I see?" And the men of the city said, "it is the man of God, the prophet,"-- these words in reference to the altar of Bethel. And he said, "leave it alone: let no one move his bones." And indeed he removed the ventriloquists and the false prophets and every abomination and offense in Jerusalem↗ and turned to the Lord with his whole heart and strength and soul according to the Law of Moses, and celebrated the Passover, as had not happened from the times of Joshua son of Nun and Samuel. At this festival he sacrificed 12 thousand oxen, 38 thousand sheep. And the deeds of Josiah were upright before the Lord in a heart full of piety. But the Lord did not turn from the anger of his wrath, with which he was angered against Judah for the provocations with which Manasses provoked him.