2 Kings 17
1 Elah’s son Hoshea began to rule Israel after King Ahaz had ruled Judah for twelve years. Hoshea ruled in Samaria for nine years.
In the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah began Hoshea the son of Elah to reign in Samaria over Israel nine years.
2 He did many things that Yahweh considered to be evil, but he did not do as many evil things as the previous kings of Israel had done.
And he did [that which was] evil in the sight of the LORD, but not as the kings of Israel that were before him.
3 [The army of] King Shalmaneser of Assyria attacked and defeated [the army of] King Hoshea. As a result, the Israelis were forced to pay a lot of tribute/taxes to Assyria each year.
Against him came up Shalmaneser king of Assyria; and Hoshea became his servant, and gave him presents.
4 But several years later, Hoshea secretly planned to rebel against the rulers of Assyria. He sent messengers to So/Osorkon, the king of Egypt, [asking if his army could help the Israelis fight against the army of Assyria]. Hoshea also stopped paying the tribute/taxes that he had been paying to Assyria every year. But the king of Assyria found out about those things, so he told his officers to put Hoshea in prison.
And the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea: for he had sent messengers to So king of Egypt, and brought no present to the king of Assyria, as [he had done] year by year: therefore the king of Assyria shut him up, and bound him in prison.
5 Then he [brought the army of] Assyria to Israel, and they attacked everywhere in that land. His army surrounded Samaria [city] for three years.
Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years.
6 Finally, after King Hoshea had been ruling Israel for nine years, the army of Assyria [MTY] [forcefully entered] the city [and] captured [the people]. They took the Israeli people to Assyria and forced some of them to live in Halah [town]. They forced others to live near the Habor River in Gozan district. They forced others to live in the towns where the Mede people-group lived.
In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor [by] the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.
7 Those things happened because the Israeli people had sinned against Yahweh their God. He had rescued their [ancestors] from the power [MTY] of the king of Egypt and brought them [safely] out of Egypt, but later they began to worship other gods.
For [so] it was, that the children of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, which had brought them up out of the land of Egypt, from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods,
8 They imitated the things that the heathen/pagan people-groups did. Those were the groups that Yahweh had expelled as the Israelis occupied their land. The Israeli people also did the evil things that the kings of Israel (introduced/showed to them).
And walked in the statutes of the heathen, whom the LORD cast out from before the children of Israel, and of the kings of Israel, which they had made.
9 The Israeli people also secretly did many things that were not pleasing to Yahweh their God. They built shrines [to worship idols] in all their cities, including small towns and big cities with walls around them.
And the children of Israel did secretly [those] things that [were] not right against the LORD their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city.
10 They set up stone pillars [to honor gods], and poles [to worship the goddess] Asherah at the top of every high hill and under every [big] tree.
And they set them up images and groves in every high hill, and under every green tree:
11 The Israelis burned incense in every place where they worshiped those gods, just like the people-groups who lived there previously had done—the groups that Yahweh had expelled from the land. The Israelis did many wicked things that caused Yahweh to become angry.
And there they burnt incense in all the high places, as [did] the heathen whom the LORD carried away before them; and wrought wicked things to provoke the LORD to anger:
12 Yahweh warned them many times that they should not worship idols, but they did it anyway.
For they served idols, whereof the LORD had said unto them, Ye shall not do this thing.
13 Yahweh frequently sent his prophets and (seers/those who saw visions from Yahweh) to warn the people of Israel and the people of Judah. The message that Yahweh gave them was, “Turn away from all your evil behavior. Obey my commands and my laws, the laws that I told your ancestors [to obey] and which I told the prophets who served me to tell to you [again].”
Yet the LORD testified against Israel, and against Judah, by all the prophets, [and by] all the seers, saying, Turn ye from your evil ways, and keep my commandments [and] my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets.
14 But the Israeli people would not pay attention. They were stubborn [IDM] just like their ancestors were. Just like their ancestors did, they refused to believe in Yahweh their God.
Notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their necks, like to the neck of their fathers, that did not believe in the LORD their God.
15 They rejected Yahweh’s laws and the agreement that he had made with their ancestors. They ignored Yahweh’s warnings. They worshiped worthless idols and as a result they themselves became worthless. Although Yahweh had commanded them not to imitate the evil behavior of the people-groups that lived near them, they disobeyed that command.
And they rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified against them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and went after the heathen that [were] round about them, [concerning] whom the LORD had charged them, that they should not do like them.
16 The Israeli people disobeyed all of Yahweh’s commands. They made two metal calves [to worship]. They set up two poles [to worship the goddess] Asherah, and they worshiped [the god] Baal, and the sun, the moon, and the stars.
And they left all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them molten images, [even] two calves, and made a grove, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served Baal.
17 They also burned their own sons and daughters to be sacrifices [to those gods]. They went to fortune-tellers and they practiced sorcery. They continually chose [MET] to do [all kinds of] evil things that caused Yahweh to become angry.
And they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger.
18 So, because Yahweh was very angry with the Israeli people, he allowed [their enemies] to take them away [from their country]. Only the people of the tribe of Judah were left [in the land].
Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah only.
19 But even the people of Judah did not obey the commands of Yahweh their God. They imitated the evil customs that the Israelis had introduced.
Also Judah kept not the commandments of the LORD their God, but walked in the statutes of Israel which they made.
20 So Yahweh rejected all the people of Israel and of Judah. He punished them by allowing the armies of other nations to defeat them [and take them away]. He got rid of all of them.
And the LORD rejected all the seed of Israel, and afflicted them, and delivered them into the hand of spoilers, until he had cast them out of his sight.
21 Earlier, when Yahweh allowed the people of Israel to separate/break away from the area [MTY] that King David [had estabished], they chose Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, to be their king. Then Jeroboam enticed the people of Israel to stop worshiping Yahweh [and to worship idols instead]. He led them to commit great sins.
For he rent Israel from the house of David; and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king: and Jeroboam drave Israel from following the LORD, and made them sin a great sin.
22 And the Israeli people continued to do the evil things that Jeroboam introduced. They did not turn away from those sins,
For the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did; they departed not from them;
23 until finally Yahweh got rid of them. That was just what his prophets had warned would happen. The Israeli people were taken away to the land of Assyria, and they still remain there.
Until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had said by all his servants the prophets. So was Israel carried away out of their own land to Assyria unto this day.
24 The king of Assyria [ordered his soldiers to] take [groups of] people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim [cities] to [the] Samaria [region], and to resettle them in the towns there, to take the place of the Israelis [who lived there previously]. Those people took control over [the whole] Samaria [region] and lived in the towns there.
And the king of Assyria brought [men] from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed [them] in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.
25 But those people [who came from other countries] did not worship Yahweh when they first arrived in Samaria. So Yahweh sent lions to kill some of them.
And [so] it was at the beginning of their dwelling there, [that] they feared not the LORD: therefore the LORD sent lions among them, which slew [some] of them.
26 Then those people sent a message to the king of Assyria. They wrote, “We people who have resettled in the towns in Samaria do not know how to worship the God [that the Israelis worshiped] in this land. So he has sent lions among us to kill us, because we have not worshiped him correctly.”
Wherefore they spake to the king of Assyria, saying, The nations which thou hast removed, and placed in the cities of Samaria, know not the manner of the God of the land: therefore he hath sent lions among them, and, behold, they slay them, because they know not the manner of the God of the land.
27 [When] the king of Assyria [read this letter, he] commanded [his officers], “You brought many priests here from Samaria. Send one of them back there. Tell him to teach the people who are now living there how to worship correctly the God whom the Israelis worshiped in that land.”
Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Carry thither one of the priests whom ye brought from thence; and let them go and dwell there, and let him teach them the manner of the God of the land.
28 So [the officers did that]. They sent one of the Israeli priests back to Samaria. That priest went to live in Bethel [city], and he taught the people there how to worship Yahweh.
Then one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Beth-el, and taught them how they should fear the LORD.
29 But the people [who returned from Babylon and started to live in Samaria and] continued to make their own idols. They placed them in the shrines that the Israelis had built there. The people of each people-group made idols in the cities in which they were living.
Howbeit every nation made gods of their own, and put [them] in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt.
30 The people from Babylon made idols to represent their god Succoth-Benoth. The people from Cuthah made idols to represent their god Nergal. The people from Hamath made idols to represent their god Ashima.
And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima,
31 The people of Avva made idols to represent their gods Nibhaz and Tartak. The people from Sepharvaim sacrificed their own children. They completely burned them [in pits where hot fires were kept burning, ] as offerings to their gods Adrammelech and Anammelech.
And the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak, and the Sepharvites burnt their children in fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim.
32 But those people also worshiped Yahweh, and they appointed from among their own groups many people to be priests at the shrines on the tops of the hills, in order that those priests could offer sacrifices for them there.
So they feared the LORD, and made unto themselves of the lowest of them priests of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.
33 So they revered Yahweh, but they also worshiped their own gods, just as the people living in the countries from which they had been taken to Samaria did.
They feared the LORD, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from thence.
34 They still keep their old customs. They really do not worship Yahweh, and they do not obey all the laws and commands that Yahweh gave to the descendants of Jacob, to whom he gave the new name Israel.
Unto this day they do after the former manners: they fear not the LORD, neither do they after their statutes, or after their ordinances, or after the law and commandment which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel;
35 Yahweh had previously made an agreement with their ancestors, commanding them not to worship other gods or bow down to honor them or do other things to please them or offer sacrifices to them.
With whom the LORD had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them:
36 He had said to them, “You must have an awesome respect for me, Yahweh, the one who brought you out of Egypt with my very great power [DOU]. I am the one whom you must bow down to honor, and I am the one to whom you must offer sacrifices.
But the LORD, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and a stretched out arm, him shall ye fear, and him shall ye worship, and to him shall ye do sacrifice.
37 You must always obey the laws and commands that I [told Moses to] write for you. You must not worship other gods.
And the statutes, and the ordinances, and the law, and the commandment, which he wrote for you, ye shall observe to do for evermore; and ye shall not fear other gods.
38 And you must not forget the agreement that I made with your ancestors. You must not revere other gods.
And the covenant that I have made with you ye shall not forget; neither shall ye fear other gods.
39 Instead, you must revere me, Yahweh, your God. If you do that, I will rescue you from the power [MTY] of all your enemies.”
But the LORD your God ye shall fear; and he shall deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.
40 But the people [from those foreign nations] would not heed what Yahweh said. Instead, they continued to adhere to their old customs.
Howbeit they did not hearken, but they did after their former manner.
41 So, they worshiped Yahweh, but they also worshiped their idols. And their descendants still do the same thing.
So these nations feared the LORD, and served their graven images, both their children, and their children’s children: as did their fathers, so do they unto this day.
