Thus saith Jehovah Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, all the curses that are written in the book which they have read before the king of Judah.
Josiah had just led a great reform, and then he heard the lost book of the law read aloud. He sent men to ask God what it meant, and the answer came back through Huldah the prophetess: disaster, and every curse written in that book.
The messenger says as much about the times as the message does. Judah had sunk so low that a woman held the prophet's office, and the king did not mind.
It strikes us here, too, that a woman held the prophetic office. It surely tells a tale. Things were low. But the grace of God was unfailing and abundant, and Josiah was so broken down that he was ready to receive God's mind through whatever channel it reached him. This was morally lovely. To nature's view it might seem very humiliating for a king of Judah to turn to a woman for counsel. But that woman held the mind of God, and that was quite enough for a humble and contrite spirit like Josiah's.
The curses were not new threats. They stood in a book the nation had lost for decades.
It was, no doubt, the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses — either the original, as written by Moses, or the temple copy (Deut. 31:26), used in days gone by at the coronation of their kings (see Deut. 17:18; 2 Chron. 23:11). No one knows how long it had been lost; probably since the beginning of Manasseh's reign at least.
Losing the book had not weakened it. Josiah's answer held both a mercy for him and a fixed sentence for the city.
Scripture may be neglected, but it cannot be broken. The Lord answers Josiah that the curses read out of the book will certainly take hold. Josiah himself has a tender heart and trembles at the word, so he will go to his fathers in peace and will not see the evil.
One sin stands behind this sentence, and behind every judgment before it.
My readers may have noticed something in Scripture. Every time God showed His displeasure with Israel, down to the point we have traced in their history, the main cause was idolatry... Israel was meant to be a standing witness against idolatry, and a witness to the unity of the true God — Jehovah — who had chosen to call them His people and to call Himself their God. When they became hardened idolaters themselves, what was left but that God should give them up to judgment and desolation, as He did?
Josiah's own faithfulness was exceptional. It still did not change the verdict.
She faithfully gave them God's answer: He would bring calamity upon Israel, all the curses written in the book Josiah had heard read. The reason is plain: "because they have forsaken Me and burned incense to other gods, that they might provoke Me to anger with all the works of their hands. Therefore My wrath will be poured out on this place, and not be quenched" (vv. 24-25). Not even the exceptional faithfulness of Josiah could avert this judgment.
Something was missing in the reform, and God said what it was. The change reached what people did, not what they loved.
The king's power had brought about a great reformation, but it left the hearts of the people mostly untouched... But why could not God rest in the outwardly improved state of the kingdom of Judah in Josiah's day? He looked beneath the surface. He looked for reality, for tenderness of conscience, for a heart subject to His word; and He found none. "The kindness of your youth, the love of your engagement," were missing. Nothing less than thoroughness will ever satisfy God.
The same word that announced this judgment had already broken the king. Not everyone answers it that way.
What a striking contrast! Josiah had a contrite heart, an awakened conscience, and torn garments, and he bowed down under the mighty working of the Word of God. Our modern skeptics and unbelievers do the opposite: with shocking boldness they dare to sit in judgement on that very same Word. Oh that men would be wise in time, and bow their hearts and consciences in reverent submission to the Word of the living God.
- Written — The disaster is nothing new. It is the curses already written in the book of Moses, lost for a generation and read aloud again to Josiah.
- Unbroken — Scripture can be neglected, but it cannot be broken. Years out of sight did not soften one line of it.
- Named — God gives the reason: they left Him for other gods. Idolatry lies behind almost every judgment that ever fell on this people.
- Unaverted — One man's exceptional faithfulness could not cancel the judgment. The nation's change was outward only.
- Personal — God did answer one tender heart. The word that sentenced the city was the word Josiah bowed under, and the call is to bow now, in time.
Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands; therefore my fury shall be poured out upon this place, and shall not be quenched.
Josiah had torn his clothes when the book was read aloud to him. He sent men to ask God what it meant for him and for the people. God's answer came back through the prophetess Huldah, and it begins here. It opens with a charge and a sentence, not with comfort. It also raises the hardest question of Josiah's reign: why could even his faithfulness not turn the judgement back?
God gives His reason before He gives the sentence. He names two charges: they abandoned Him, and they made offerings to other gods.
She faithfully gave the men God's answer. He would bring disaster on Israel — all the curses written in the book Josiah had heard read. God gives the reason plainly... Not even Josiah's exceptional faithfulness could turn this judgment aside.
The phrase is not a general word for bad behaviour. It carries a settled meaning across the Old Testament.
"The works of their hands"... is a phrase used only of pagan idolatry (Isaiah 2:8; Jeremiah 1:16; Deuteronomy 4:28; Psalm 115:4-7).
But hands are only the visible end of it. The root goes deeper than carved wood and metal.
The root of all idolatry is self-will; it is making a god of our own. It starts with self and fashions a god, not necessarily out of silver, and not necessarily with our hands... there is a tool more cunning and skilful than the hands, and that is the intellect of man. Wherever self takes the place of the will of God, you will find the human mind busy making a god to please itself. And it does this in the name of the Lord, in the name of the true God.
The wrath here is not a sudden reaction to one generation. Judah's guilt had a long history, and one earlier king weighs heaviest in it.
The first part of the message spoke of the ruin coming on the nation. Its cup of sin had been filling up for centuries. Manasseh's defiance of the Lord's Word, and his excessive evil, had made the cup overflow... So it was persistent and hopeless evil.
Josiah's faithfulness was real. Yet "will not be quenched" means what it says. An earlier king of Judah, Hezekiah, had already met the same limit.
Hezekiah had it in his heart to make a covenant with the Lord God of Israel, so that His fierce anger might turn away. But the sentence was already decreed. Neither Hezekiah's piety nor Josiah's could turn aside the judgement about to fall on Judah and Jerusalem. The most they gained was a delay.
Huldah's reply comes in two parts, and the change of address matters.
The first part begins with "tell the man." It states that the judgement will come and cannot be turned aside any more. The second part speaks to "the king of Judah." It reassures Josiah that God had accepted his humbling of himself, and would not bring the judgement in Josiah's day.
A settled sentence could have left Josiah doing nothing. It did not.
Josiah might have thought the case hopeless. He might have said that nothing could turn back the tide of wrath and judgement about to roll over Jerusalem and the land. He might have said that any move of his must prove useless, that the purpose was settled and the decree gone out, and that he had only to stand by and let things take their course. But Josiah did not reason like that... He humbled himself, tore his clothes, and wept. God took notice of this. Josiah's tears of repentance were precious to the Lord. The dreadful judgement still had to take its course, yet the penitent man escaped. And he did not only escape himself; he became the honoured instrument in the Lord's hand for delivering others as well. He did not give in to the harmful belief that nothing could be done. Instead, with a broken spirit and an earnest heart, he cast himself on God, confessing his own sins and the sins of his people.
- Cause. God gives the reason before the sentence: they forsook Him and made offerings to other gods. The judgement is explained, never arbitrary.
- Cup. The wrath answers evil that had been filling up for centuries. Manasseh made the cup overflow.
- Craft. "The works of their hands" is the language of idolatry. Its root is self-will — a god of our own making, often set up in the true God's name.
- Ceiling. Josiah's reform, like Hezekiah's, reached a limit. The sentence stood; the most it won was a delay.
- Contrition. What the reform could not cancel, a tender heart could still meet. Josiah refused to give up, wept, and escaped — and God used him to deliver others. Repentance stays open even when the sentence is fixed.