“Because thine heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thyself
before the Lord, when thou heardest what I spake against this place,
and against the inhabitants thereof, that they should become a
desolation and a curse, and hast rent thy clothes, and wept before Me;
I also have heard thee, saith the Lord. Behold therefore, I will gather
thee unto thy fathers, and thou shalt be gathered into thy grave in
peace; and thine eyes shall not see all the evil which I will bring
upon this place.”—2 Kings xxii. 19, 20.
King Josiah, to whom these words are addressed, was one of the most
pious of the Jewish kings, and the most eminent reformer of them all.
On him, the last sovereign of David's house (for his sons had not an
independent rule), descended the zeal and prompt obedience which raised
the son of Jesse from the sheep-fold to the throne, as a man after
God's own heart. Thus, as an honour to David, the blessing upon his
posterity remained in its fulness even to the end; its light not waxing
“dim,” nor “its natural force abating.”
Both the character and the fortunes of Josiah are described in the
text, his character, in its saying that his “heart was tender,” and
that he feared God; and his fortunes, viz. an untimely death, designed
as a reward for his obedience: and the text is a part of the answer
which the Prophetess Huldah was instructed to make to him, when he
applied for encouragement and guidance after accidentally finding the
book of Moses' Law in the Temple. This discovery is the most remarkable
occurrence of his reign, and will fitly serve to introduce and connect
together what I wish now to set before you concerning Josiah.
The discovery of Moses' Law in the Temple is a very important
occurrence in the history, because it shows us that Holy Scripture had
been for a long while neglected, and to all practical purposes lost. By
the book of the law is meant, I need scarcely say, the five books of
Moses, which stand first in the Bible. These made up one book or
volume, and were to a Jew the most important part of the Old Testament,
as containing the original covenant between God and His people, and
explaining to them what their place was in the scheme of God's
providence, what were their duties, and what their privileges. Moses
had been directed to enforce the study of this law on the Israelites in
various ways. He exhorts them to “lay up his words in their heart and
in their soul, and to bind them for a sign upon their hand, that they
might be as frontlets between their eyes.” “And ye shall teach them
your children,” he proceeds, “speaking of them when thou sittest in
thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down,
and when thou risest up. And thou shalt write them upon the door-posts
of thine house, and upon thy gates[1].” Besides this general provision,
it was ordered that once in seven years the law should be read to the
whole people assembled at the feast of tabernacles[2]. And further
still, it was provided, that in case they ever had kings, each king was
to write out the whole of it from the original copy which was kept in
the ark. “And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the
days of his life . . . that his heart be not lifted up above his
brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right
hand or to the left; to the end that he may prolong his days in his
kingdom, he, and his children, in the midst of Israel[3].”
However, considering how soon the nation fell into a general
disregard of the law and worship which God gave them, it is not
wonderful that these wholesome precepts were neglected, which could not
be performed without testifying against their multiplied
transgressions. And much more when they took to themselves idols, did
they neglect, of course, to read the law which condemned them. And when
they had set a king over them against the will of God, it is not
strange that their kings, in turn, should neglect the direction given
them to copy out the law for themselves, such kings especially as fell
into idolatry.
All this applies particularly to the age in which Josiah succeeded
to the throne, so that it is in no way surprising that he knew nothing
of the law till it was by chance found in the Temple some years after
his accession. The last good king of Judah before him was Hezekiah, who
had been dead sixty or seventy years. That religious king had been
succeeded by his son Manasseh, the most profane of all the line of
David. He it was who committed those inexpiable sins which sealed the
sentence of Judah's destruction. He had set up an idol in the Temple;
had made his son pass through the fire; had dealt with familiar spirits
and wizards; had “shed innocent blood very much, till he had filled
Jerusalem from one end to another,” in a word, had “done wickedly above
all that the Amorites did which were before him[4].” On his return from
captivity in Babylon, whither he was taken captive, Manasseh attempted
a reformation; but, alas! he found it easier to seduce than to reclaim
his people[5]. Amon, who succeeded him, followed the first ways of his
father during his short reign. Instead of repenting, as his father had
done, he “trespassed more and more[6].” After a while, his subjects
conspired and slew him. Josiah was the son of this wicked king.
Here, then, we have sufficient explanation of Josiah's ignorance of
the law of Moses. He was brought up among very wicked men—in a corrupt
court—after an apostasy of more than half a century; far from God's
Prophets, and in the midst of idols.
In such times was Josiah born; and, like Manasseh, he came to the
throne in his boyhood. As if to show us that religion depends on a
man's self (under God, who gives grace), on the state of his heart, not
on outward circumstances, Manasseh was the son of the pious Hezekiah,
and Josiah was the son of wicked Amon. Josiah was but eight years old
when his father was slain. We hear nothing of his boyhood; but scarcely
was he of age to think for himself, and to profess himself a servant of
the true God, but he chose that “good part which could not be taken
away from him[7].” “In the eighth year of his reign” (i.e. when he was
sixteen years of age), “while he was yet young, he began to seek after
the God of David his father[8].” Blessed are they who so seek, for they
shall find. Josiah had not the aid of a revealed volume, at least not
of the Law; he was surrounded by the diversities of idol-worship, the
sophistries of unbelief, the seductions of sinful pleasure. He had
every temptation to go wrong; and had he done so, we might have made
allowances, and said that he was not so bad as the other kings, for he
knew no better, he had not sinned against light. Yes, he would have
sinned against light—the event shows it; for if he had light enough to
go right (which he had, for he did go right), it follows, that if he
had gone wrong, it would have been against light. Not, indeed, so
strong and clear a light as Solomon disobeyed, or Joash; still against
his better knowledge. This is very important. Every one, even the
poorest and most ignorant, has knowledge enough to be religious.
Education does not make a man religious: nor, again, is it an excuse
for a man's disobedience, that he has not been educated in his duty. It
only makes him less guilty than those who have been educated, that is
all: he is still guilty. Here, I say, the poorest and most unlearned
among us, may take a lesson from a Jewish king. Scarcely can any one in
a Christian land be in more disadvantageous circumstances than
Josiah—nay, scarcely in a heathen: he had idolatry around him, and at
the age he began to seek God, his mind was unformed. What, then, was it
that guided him? whence his knowledge? He had that, which all men have,
heathen as well as Christians, till they pervert or blunt it—a natural
sense of right and wrong; and he did not blunt it. In the words of the
text, “his heart was tender;” he acknowledged a constraining
force in the Divine voice within him—he heard and obeyed. Though all
the world had told him otherwise, he could not believe and would not,
that he might sin without offence—with impunity; that he might be
sensual, or cruel, after the manner of idolaters, and nothing would
come of it. And further, amid all the various worships offered to his
acceptance, this same inward sense of his, strengthened by practice,
unhesitatingly chose out the true one, the worship of the God of
Israel. It chose between the better and the worse, though it could not
have discovered the better of itself. Thus he was led right. In his
case was fulfilled the promise, “Who is among you that feareth the
Lord; that obeyeth the voice of His servant, that walketh in darkness,
and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon
his God[9].” Or, in the Psalmist's words, “The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do His
commandments[10].” Or (as he elsewhere expresses it), “I understand
more than the ancients, because I keep Thy precepts[11].”
Such was the beginning of Josiah's life. At sixteen he began to seek
after the God of his fathers; at twenty he commenced his reformation,
with a resolute faith and true-hearted generous devotion. From the
language of Scripture, it would seem, he began of himself; thus
he is left a pattern to all ages of prompt obedience for conscience'
sake. Jeremiah did not begin to prophesy till after the king
entered on his reformation, as if the great prophet's call were delayed
on purpose to try the strength of Josiah's loyalty to his God, while
his hands were yet unaided by the exertions of others, or by the
guidance of inspired men.
What knowledge of God's dealings with his nation and of His revealed
purposes Josiah had at this time, we can only conjecture; from the
priests he might learn much generally, and from the popular belief. The
miraculous destruction of Sennacherib's army was not so long since, and
it proved to him God's especial protection of the Jewish people.
Manasseh's repentance was more recent still; and the Temple itself, and
its service, contained much doctrine to a religious mind, even apart
from the law or the prophets. But he had no accurate knowledge.
At twenty, then, he commenced his reformation. At first, not having
the Book of the Law to guide him, he took such measures as natural
conscience suggested; he put away idolatry generally. Thus he set out,
not knowing whither he went. But it is the rule of God's providence,
that those who act up to their light, shall be rewarded with clearer
light. To him that hath, more shall be given. Accordingly, while he was
thus engaged, after a few years, he found the Book of the Law in the
course of his reformations. He was seeking God in the way of His
commandments, and God met him there. He set about repairing the Temple;
and it was in the course of this pious work that the high priest found
a copy of the Law of Moses in the Temple, probably the original copy
which was placed in the ark. Josiah's conduct on this discovery marks
his character. Many men, certainly many young men, who had been so
zealous as he had already shown himself for six years, would have
prided themselves on what they had done, and though they began humbly,
by this time would have become self-willed, self-confident, and
hard-hearted. He had already been engaged in repressing and punishing
God's enemies—this had a tendency to infect him with spiritual pride:
and he had a work of destruction to do—this, too, might have made him
cruel. Far from it: his peculiar praise is singleness of mind, a pure
conscience. Even after years of activity against idolatry, in the words
of the text, “his heart was tender,” and he still “humbled himself
before God.” He felt full well the immeasurable distance between
himself and his Maker; he felt his own blindness and weakness; and he
still earnestly sought to know his duty better than he did, and to
practise it more entirely. His was not that stern enthusiasm which has
displayed itself in some so-called reformations, fancying itself God's
peculiar choice, and “despising others.” Here we have the pattern of
reformers; singleness of heart, gentleness of temper, in the midst of
zeal, resoluteness, and decision in action. All God's Saints have this
union of opposite graces; Joseph, Moses, Samuel, David, Nehemiah, St.
Paul: but in which of them all is the wonder-working power of grace
shown more attractively than in Josiah? “Out of the strong came forth
sweetness[12];” or perhaps, as we may say more truly, Out of the sweet
came forth strength.
Observe, then, his conduct when the Law was read to him: “When the
king had heard the words of the book of the law, he rent his clothes
[13].” He thought far more of what he had not done, than of what he had
done. He felt how incomplete his reformation had been, and he felt how
far more guilty his whole people were than he had supposed, receiving,
as they had, such precise guidance in Scripture what to do, and such
solemn command to do it; and he learned, moreover, the fearful
punishment which was hanging over them; for in that Book of the Law
were contained the threats of vengeance to be fulfilled in case of
transgression. The passages read to him by the high priest seem to have
been some of those contained in the Book of Deuteronomy, in which Moses
sets good and evil before the people, to choose their portion. “See, I
have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil. . . .
. I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have
set before you life and death, blessing and cursing[14].” “A blessing
and a curse; a blessing if ye obey the commandments of the Lord your
God: . . . a curse if ye will not obey[15].” And there was more than
the mere words to terrify him; there had been a fulfilment of them.
Samaria, the ten revolting tribes, the kingdom of Israel, had been led
away captive. Doubtless he already knew that their sins had caused it;
but he found in the Book of the Law that it had been even threatened
them beforehand as the punishment; and he discovered that the same
punishment awaited his own people, should they persist in sin. Nay, a
judgment had already taken place in Judah; for Manasseh, his
grandfather, had been carried away into Babylon, and only restored upon
his repentance.
In the twenty-eighth chapter of Deuteronomy, you will see what was
to be the curse of disobedience: or again, consider the words of the
twenty-ninth chapter: “Ye stand this day all of you before the Lord
your God . . . that thou shouldest enter into covenant with Him, and
into His oath; . . . neither with you only do I make this
covenant and this oath; but with him that standeth here with us this
day before the Lord our God, and also with him that is not here
with us this day: . . . lest there should be among you man, or woman,
or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the Lord
our God” (alas! as it had happened in the event, even all ten
tribes, and then the whole twelve had fallen away) “to go and serve the
gods of these nations, lest there should be among you a root that
beareth gall and wormwood; and it come to pass, when he heareth the
words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I
shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to
add drunkenness to thirst: the Lord will not spare him, but then the
anger of the Lord and His jealousy shall smoke against that man, and
all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, . . .
so that . . . the strangers that shall come from a far land . . . when
they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the Lord
hath laid upon it . . . that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass
groweth therein, . . . even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the
Lord done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great
anger? Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of
the Lord God of their fathers, . . . for they went and served other
gods, . . . and the Lord rooted them out of their land in anger, and
cast them into another land.” These words, or such as these, either
about the people or relating to his own duties[16], Josiah read in the
Book of the Law, and thinking of the captivity which had overtaken
Israel already, and the sins of his own people Judah, he rent his
clothes. Then he bade the priests inquire of God for him what he ought
to do to avert His anger. “Go,” he said, “inquire of the Lord for me,
and for them that are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words
of the book that is found: for great is the wrath of the Lord that is
poured out upon us, because our fathers have not kept the word of the
Lord, to do after all that is written in this book[17].”
It is observable, that not even yet does he seem to have known the
prophets Jeremiah or Zephaniah, though the former had been called to
his office some years. Such was God's pleasure. And the priests and
scribes about him, though they seconded his pious designs, were in no
sense his guides: they were unacquainted with the Law of Moses, and
with the prophets, who were interpreters of that Law. But prophets
were, through God's mercy, in every city: and though Jeremiah might be
silent or might be away, still there were revelations from God even in
Jerusalem. To one of these prophets the priests applied. Shallum was
keeper of the king's wardrobe—his wife Huldah was known to be gifted
with the spirit of prophecy. To her they went. She answered in the
words of which the text forms a part: “Thus saith the Lord God of
Israel, Tell ye the man that sent you to Me, Thus saith the Lord,
Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants
thereof, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah hath
read; because they have forsaken Me, and have burnt incense unto other
gods . . . My wrath shall be kindled against this place, and shall not
be quenched. But to the king of Judah, which sent you to inquire of the
Lord, thus shall ye say to him, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, as
touching the words which thou hast heard; because thine heart was
tender, and thou hast humbled thyself before the Lord, when thou
heardest what I spake against this place, and against the inhabitants
thereof, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and hast
rent thy clothes, and wept before Me; I also have heard thee, saith the
Lord. Behold therefore, I will gather thee unto thy fathers, and thou
shall be gathered into thy grave in peace: and thine eyes shall not see
all the evil which I will bring upon this place. And they brought the
king word again.”
How King Josiah conducted himself after this message I need not
describe at any length. We have heard it in the First Lesson of this
Service[18]. He assembled all Judah at Jerusalem, and publicly read the
words of the Book of the Law, then he made all the people renew the
covenant with the God of their fathers; then he proceeded more exactly
in the work of reformation in Judah and Israel, keeping closely to the
directions of the Law; and after that he held his celebrated passover.
Thus his greater knowledge was followed by stricter obedience: his
accurate attention to the whole ritual is the very praise bestowed on
his passover; “Surely there was not holden such a passover from the
days of the judges[19].” Whatever he did, he did it with all his heart:
“Like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord
with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might,
according to all the Law of Moses[20].”
Passing by the particulars of his reformation, let us come to the
fulfilment of the promise made to him by Huldah, as the reward of his
obedience. “Behold therefore, I will gather thee to thy fathers, and
thou shalt be gathered into thy grave in peace; and thine eyes shall
not see all the evil which I will bring upon this place.” His reward
was an early death; the event proved that it was a violent one also.
The king of Egypt came up against the king of Assyria through the land
of Judah; Josiah, bound perhaps by an alliance to the king of Assyria,
or for some strong reason unknown, opposed him; a battle followed;
Josiah disguised himself that he might not be marked out for death; but
his hour was come—the promise of release was to be accomplished. “And
the archers shot at king Josiah; and the king said to his servants,
Have me away; for I am sore wounded. His servants, therefore . . .
brought him to Jerusalem; and he died, and was buried in one of the
sepulchres of his fathers[21].” Thus the best king of Judah died like
Ahab, the worst king of Israel; so little may we judge of God's love or
displeasure by outward appearances. “The righteous perisheth, and no
man layeth it to heart: and merciful men are taken away, none
considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come. He
shall enter into peace; they shall rest in their beds, each one walking
in his uprightness[22].”
The sacred narrative continues: “And all Judah and Jerusalem mourned
for Josiah. And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah; and all the singing men
and the singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations to this
day, and made them an ordinance in Israel:” probably there was a yearly
commemoration of his death; and so great was the mourning at the time,
that we find it referred to in the Prophet Zechariah[23] almost as a
proverb. So fell the last sovereign of the house of David. God
continued His promised mercies to His people through David's line till
they were too corrupt to receive them; the last king of the favoured
family was forcibly and prematurely cut off, in order to make way for
the display of God's vengeance in the captivity of the whole nation. He
was taken out of the way; they were carried off to Babylon. “Weep ye
not for the dead,” says the prophet, “neither bemoan him: but weep sore
for him that goeth away: for he shall return no more, nor see his
native country[24].” As for Josiah, as it is elsewhere written of him,
“His remembrance . . . is sweet as honey in all mouths, and as music at
a banquet of wine. He behaved himself uprightly in the conversion of
the people, and took away the abominations of iniquity. He directed his
heart unto the Lord, and in the time of the ungodly he established the
worship of God. All, except David, and Ezekias, and Josias, were
defective; for they forsook the law of the Most High, even the kings of
Juda failed[25].”
In conclusion, my brethren, I would have you observe in what
Josiah's chief excellence lay. This is the character given him when his
name is first mentioned; “He did . . . right in the sight of the Lord,
and walked in all the ways of David his father, and turned not aside to
the right hand or to the left[26].” He kept the narrow middle way. Now
what is this strict virtue called? it is called faith. It is no
matter whether we call it faith or conscientiousness, they are in
substance one and the same: where there is faith, there is
conscientiousness—where there is conscientiousness, there is faith;
they may be distinguished from each other in words, but they are not
divided in fact. They belong to one, and but one, habit of
mind—dutifulness; they show themselves in obedience, in the careful,
anxious observance of God's will, however we learn it. Hence it is that
St. Paul tells us that “the just shall live by faith” under every
dispensation of God's mercy. And this is called faith, because
it implies a reliance on the mere word of the unseen God overpowering
the temptations of sight. Whether it be we read and accept His word in
Scripture (as Christians do), or His word in our conscience, the law
written on the heart (as is the case with heathens); in either case, it
is by following it, in spite of the seductions of the world around us,
that we please God. St. Paul calls it faith; saying after the prophet,
“The just shall live by faith:” and St. Peter, in the tenth chapter of
the Acts, calls it “fearing and working righteousness,” where he
says, that “in every nation he that feareth God and worketh
righteousness is accepted with Him.” It is all one: both Apostles say
that God loves those who prefer Him to the world; whose character
and frame of mind is such. Elsewhere St. Paul also speaks like St.
Peter, when he declares that God will render eternal life to them, who
by “patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory[27].” St.
John adds his testimony: “Little children, let no man deceive you. He
that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as He is righteous[28].”
And our Saviour's last words at the end of the whole Scripture, long
after the coming of the Spirit, after the death of all the Apostles but
St. John, are the same: “Blessed are they that do His
commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life[29].”
And if such is God's mercy, as we trust, to all men, wherever any
one with a perfect heart seeks Him, what think you is His mercy upon
Christians? Something far greater, and more wonderful; for we are
elected out of the world, in Jesus Christ our Saviour, to a glory
incomprehensible and eternal. We are the heirs of promise; God has
loved us before we were born. He had us taken into His Church in our
infancy. He by Baptism made us new creatures, giving us powers which we
by nature had not, and raising us to the unseen society of Saints and
Angels. And all this we enjoy on our faith; that is, on our believing
that we have them, and seriously trying to profit by them. May God
grant, that we, like Josiah, may improve our gifts, and trade and make
merchandise with them, so that, when He cometh to reckon with us, we
may be accepted!
[1] Deut. xi. 18-20.
[2] Deut. xxxi. 9-13.
[3] Deut. xvii. 19, 20.
[4] 2 Kings xxi. 11.
[5] 2 Chron. xxxiii. 15-25.
[6] Ibid. 23.
[7] Luke x. 43.
[8] 2 Chron. xxxiv. 3.
[9] Isa. l. 10.
[10] Ps. cxi. 10.
[11] Ps. cxix. 100.
[12] Judges xiv. 14.
[13] 2 Kings xxii. 11.
[14] Deut. xxx. 16, 19.
[15] Deut. xi. 26-28.
[16] Vide Deut. xvii.
[17] 2 Chron. xxxiv. 21.
[18] Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity.
[19] 2 Kings xxiii. 22.
[20] 2 Kings xxiii. 25.
[21] 2 Chron. xxxv. 23-25.
[22] Isa. lvii. 1.
[23] Zech. xii. 11.
[24] Jer. xxii. 10.
[25] Eccles. xlix. 1-4.
[26] 2 Kings xxii. 2.
[27] Rom. ii. 7.
[28] 1 John iii. 7.
[29] Rev. xxii. 14.