I have been loving the book of Zephaniah lately, and it has led me to look at the story of King Josiah differently than ever before because Zephaniah prophesied during his rule. Josiah is one of the better known Old Testament kings of Judah, famous for taking the throne at the age of 8 and of being an exceptionally righteous king in a long line of bad apples. His story is found in 2 Kings 22-23 and 2 Chronicles 34-35, although those stories paint a very different portrait of the situation than the book of Zephaniah. Two and a half of the three chapters are warnings of judgment and condemnation for arrogance and sin. Judah is front and center in this critique, although the surrounding nations are also condemned. I was confused when I read this because we taught the story of Josiah at our church VBS last week, and he is known as the boy king who got rid of all the idols.
Here’s the thing about the story of Josiah – the reforms he’s so famous for took place beginning in the eighteenth year of his reign. It started as a project to revitalize the temple, during which the book of the Law was found, and everyone realized they had gone way off track in terms of obeying God. There were high places and idols all over the city, Asherah (idols) in the very temple, and male cult prostitutes operating out of the temple as well. For eighteen years, this nonsense went on unquestioned except for a few prophets freaking out here and there, and Josiah was king over it all. Yet, his legacy is that “he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.” (2 Kings 22:2) It is understandable that an 8 year old king did not challenge the status quo, and I’m not saying it’s bad that he took 18 years to get his country on track, but this story has taken on a new sense for me, not the Sunday school, feel-good version, but a more realistic portrait.
In Zephaniah, Josiah is called son of Amon, but in Kings his mother’s name is given (Jedidah, which means beloved) and her father’s name (Adaiah, which means witness of God). To me this emphasizes that legacy can change over time, that in this life we constantly make decisions that shape our legacy, and the final result can’t be known until our life is over. For Zephaniah, prophesying before Josiah’s reforms, the king was ruling no differently than his father. But in the book of Kings, Josiah’s repentance was so complete that nothing he did before finding the book of the Law was worth recording. His transformation, and the change of heart that swept his whole nation, was so complete that his story is listed separate from his sinful father’s story. In Kings, he is no longer “son of Amon” but a beloved witness of God.
Exactly what I needed to read today! Thank you.
I’m so happy to hear! I always love to know you’re reading 🙂
I hope this will be so eye-opening, it will make heads spin! There is the corrupted Bible version, the NIV, that replaces, wrongly, “sodomites” for “male shrine prostitutes”! The King James Version, or KJV, reads:
2 Kings 23:7 — “And he brake down the houses of the sodomites…”
The NIV 2 Kings 23:7 reads: “He also tore down the quarters of the male shrine prostitutes…”
According to With One Accord Ministries’ director, William Schnoebelen, in his free article “Straight Talk on Homosexuality and Spiritual Warfare #33, he told of a lesbian woman named Virginia Mollenkott who worked on the NIV committee. She insisted that all references made to sodomites be changed to some kind of prostitutes! (Although in his article, he said the reference to sodomites was changed in the NIV to “temple prostitutes” but maybe he got mixed up with another corrupted version, as the NIV in this verse reads “male shrine prostitutes”).
It is totally important that we don’t follow the corrupted Bible versions, and pray for God’s direction in this matter.
William Schnoebelen’s article is available for free downloading from:
http://www.withoneaccord.org/assets/images/freedownloads/ST33-HoSpirWarfare.pdf
I read corrupted Bible versions, and how many there are, until I read one article by Texe Marrs that got me right out of it, especially where the NIV called Jesus by a title for Lucifer! I’ll go look it up and make another post here.
In my previous post, how the NIV called Jesus by a title for Lucifer:
The KJV Bible in Isaiah 14:12 — “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning…”
The corrupted NIV in Isaiah 14:12 — “How you have fallen from heaven, O morning star, son of the dawn…”
Now just WHO was the morning star? Let’s find it in the KJV in Revelation 22:16 — “I am the … bright and morning star…”!
OOPS! I’m terribly sorry but I made a mistake in my previous posts! A mistake I never made before!
I should have wrote that in Isaiah 14:12 in the corrupted NIV Bible, the NIV called Lucifer a title that is for Jesus, not Jesus was called a title for Lucifer!
Here are several translation comparisons to consider:
Zechariah 13: 6 in KJV : …What are these wounds in thine hands?…
” ” ” in NIV : …What are these wounds on your body?
” ” ” in ASV: …What are these wounds between your arms…
” ” ” in Good News: … What are these wounds on your chest?
God is not the author of confusion. 1 Cor. 14:33
The devil is..a liar and the father of it! John 8:44
Hi Ericka, thanks for your comments and your concern about accurate Bible translations. Personally, I am extremely comfortable reading and studying several modern day translations of the Bible. I believe that great and sincere efforts are made on the part of translators to accurately translate God’s word and that the Holy Spirit continues to play a role in preserving scripture, as has been the case throughout history, even before the KJV was created.
Certainly the KJV has an ongoing value to biblical studies, but I do not feel it is the only translation that should be used – I found a lot of the information on this website to be helpful and hope it will be a blessing to you 🙂
http://www.rapidnet.com/~jbeard//bdm/Psychology/kjvonly.htm
Sincerely,
Alyssa
Hi Alyssa: I appreciate your tactfulness, but I must say that I don’t believe that anyone professing Christianity as their religion should be using the corrupted, innaccurate “modern” Bible translations. As I showed already the glaring differences in the different translations, and in Isaiah 14:12 where Lucifer is called a title for Jesus, and the differences in Zechariah 13:6 and that there was a lesbian on the NIV committee who changed sodomites, obvious in the KJV to male shrine prostitutes!
I only meant that in English the KJV is the only true Bible, however, there are true Bibles in other languages. The website I mentioned, which I know has some errors in the articles, and I told the director about them, also has something in the Free Resources section about the modern corrupted versions.
There is also one other thing, if anyone here is still not convinced, those who claim that the modern versions are “easier to understand”:
What about in the KJV, in the following verses: Ezra 8:36. Esther 3:12, Esther 8:9, Esther 9:3 where the word “lieutenants” is used. BUT what have we here, in the NIV?
In those same verses in the NIV, the word “satraps” is used instead of lieutenants! Like, what in the world are satraps? Have you ever heard of that word?
The Bible gave a serious warning in Revelations about taking away from or adding to God’s word, but this computer is shutting down and also won’t let me minimize the page so I can look up verses in biblestudytools.com, but I’m sure you must know where that verse is. I ask people to ask the LORD for His direction. And thank God I ripped up every page of every corrupted translation I ever had.