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2 Chronicles 25
Amaziah Organizes Judah’s Army
Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jehoaddan from Jerusalem. He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, but not with a whole heart. And it happened when the kingdom was firmly established for him that he put to death his servants who had struck his father the king. But he did not put their sons to death, according to what is written in the instruction, in the book of Moses, where the LORD commanded, saying, “Fathers shall not be put to death for sons, and sons shall not be put to death for fathers, but each person shall die for his own sin.” Amaziah gathered Judah and appointed them according to ancestral houses, commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds, throughout all Judah and Benjamin. He counted them from twenty years old and upward and found three hundred thousand choice men able to go out to war, handling spear and large shield. He also hired from Israel one hundred thousand mighty warriors for one hundred talents of silver.
A Man of God Warns Amaziah
But a man of God came to him, saying, “O king, do not let the army of Israel go with you, for the LORD is not with Israel, with all these children of Ephraim. But if you go, act, be strong for battle; God will make you stumble before the enemy, for God has power to help and to make stumble.” Amaziah said to the man of God, “And what about the one hundred talents that I gave to the troops of Israel?” The man of God said, “The LORD has much more than this to give you.” So Amaziah separated the troops who had come to him from Ephraim, that they should go to their place. Their anger burned greatly against Judah, and they returned to their place in fierce anger.
Amaziah Defeats Edom
Amaziah strengthened himself and led his people and went to the Valley of Salt. He struck ten thousand of the children of Seir. The children of Judah captured ten thousand alive and brought them to the top of the rock and threw them from the top of the rock, and all of them were broken to pieces. But the men of the troop whom Amaziah had sent back from going with him to battle raided the cities of Judah from Samaria as far as Beth-Horon. They struck three thousand of them and took much plunder.
Amaziah Worships the Gods of Edom
After Amaziah came from striking the Edomites, he brought the gods of the children of Seir, set them up for himself as gods, bowed down before them, and burned incense to them. Then the anger of the LORD burned against Amaziah, and he sent a prophet to him who said to him, “Why have you sought the gods of the people who did not rescue their own people from your hand?” And it happened as he spoke to him that the king said to him, “Have we appointed you as counselor to the king? Stop! Why should they strike you?” Then the prophet stopped, but said, “I know that God has determined to destroy you because you have done this and have not listened to my counsel.”
Amaziah Challenges Joash of Israel
Then Amaziah king of Judah took counsel and sent to Joash son of Jehoahaz son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying, “Come, let us look one another in the face.” Joash king of Israel sent to Amaziah king of Judah, saying, “The thornbush that was in Lebanon sent to the cedar that was in Lebanon, saying, ‘Give your daughter to my son as wife.’ But a wild animal of Lebanon passed by and trampled the thornbush. You say, ‘Look, I have struck Edom,’ and your heart has lifted you up to boast. Now stay in your house. Why should you provoke disaster and fall, you and Judah with you?”
Judah Is Defeated
But Amaziah did not listen, for it was from God, in order to give them into the hand of the enemy because they had sought the gods of Edom. So Joash king of Israel went up, and they looked one another in the face, he and Amaziah king of Judah, at Beth-Shemesh, which belongs to Judah. Judah was struck before Israel, and each man fled to his tent. Joash king of Israel captured Amaziah king of Judah, son of Joash son of Jehoahaz, at Beth-Shemesh. He brought him to Jerusalem and broke down the wall of Jerusalem from the Ephraim Gate to the Corner Gate, four hundred cubits. He took all the gold and silver and all the vessels found in the house of God with Obed-Edom, the treasures of the king’s house, and hostages, and returned to Samaria.
Amaziah Dies
Amaziah son of Joash king of Judah lived fifteen years after the death of Joash son of Jehoahaz king of Israel. Now the rest of the acts of Amaziah, first and last, look, are they not written in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel? From the time Amaziah turned away from following the LORD, they made a conspiracy against him in Jerusalem, and he fled to Lachish. But they sent after him to Lachish and put him to death there. They carried him on horses and buried him with his ancestors in the city of Judah.