Judah’s King Manasseh

21 Manasseh^(A) was 12 years old when he became king and reigned 55 years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hephzibah.^{(B) 2} He did what was evil in the Lord’s sight,^(C) imitating the detestable practices of the nations that the Lord had dispossessed before the Israelites.^{(D) 3} He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed^(E) and reestablished the altars for Baal. He made an Asherah,^(F) as King Ahab of Israel had done;^(G) he also worshiped the whole heavenly host^(H) and served them. ⁴ He built altars in the Lord’s temple,^(I) where the Lord had said, “Jerusalem is where I will put My name.”^{(J) 5} He built altars to the whole heavenly host^(K) in both courtyards of the Lord’s temple.^{(L) 6} He made his son pass through the fire,^(M) practiced witchcraft and divination, and consulted mediums and spiritists.^(N) He did a great amount of evil in the Lord’s sight, provoking Him.^(O)

⁷ Manasseh set up the carved image of Asherah, which he made, in the temple that the Lord had spoken about to David and his son Solomon, “I will establish My name forever in this temple and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel.^{(P) 8} I will never again cause the feet of the Israelites to wander from the land I gave to their ancestors if only they will be careful to do all I have commanded them—the whole law that My servant Moses commanded them.”^{(Q) 9} But they did not listen; Manasseh caused them to stray so that they did greater evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites.^(R)