1. Kept a passover. Chronicles gives a long and detailed account of Josiah’s Passover ( 1-19), whereas the parallel section in Kings is very brief (2 Kings 23:21-23).
There is no need to find, as some do, a difficulty in the narrative because so many activities of the 18th year of Josiah took place before the 14th of the 1st month of that year. It is obvious that 13 days is an impossibly short time to take away “all the abominations out of all the countries that pertained to the children of Israel”âto say nothing of slaying all the Israelite priests and moving those of the high places of Judah to Jerusalemâand to prepare for the greatest Passover ever held in the kingdom, even if, as some suggest, the long account in Kings includes some of the events of the earlier reform that began in the 12th year. It has been suggested that the campaign against idolatry of the 18th year did not begin until after the feasts of the Passover and of the Unleavened Bread. The sequence of the narratives seems to be against this, as is also the statement that the local priests of Judah were brought to Jerusalem to “eat of the unleavened bread among their brethren.”
But even if the campaign against idolatry is placed subsequent to the Passover, there is still insufficient time for the other events recorded to have taken place between the 1st and 14th day of the same month. The money had been counted and paid out to the contractors before the book was delivered to the king; then came the formal consultation with Huldah, the convening of a large assembly to make the covenant of obedience, and then preparations for a major festival by people unaccustomed to the procedure but determined to observe it according to all the regulations. The lambs (more than 30,000 were used) were normally set aside on the 10th of the month, and Temple arrangements needed to be made for these and for the thousands of other offerings; also multitudes of worshipers must travel to Jerusalem and find accommodations before the 14th. Even without the reform campaign the timing is impossible.
But attempts to crowd all these events into such a short period are unnecessary. The obvious solution lies in the fact that the month Abib (later Nisan), which was always numbered the first, was the first of the religious year, but not of the civil year (see II, 109, 110, 116). Obviously the 18th regnal year of Josiah did not begin two weeks before the Passover, but had begun six months earlier with the 1st of Tishri (the 7th month), the autumn New Year (see II, 106, 109, 134, 146).
The events leading up to this Passover may be summarized from 2 Kings 22 and 23; 2 Chron. 34 and 35, as follows:
1. In the 18th year of his reign Josiah sent Shaphan the scribe to tell the high priest to “sum the silver” (2 Kings 22:4) collected by the Temple doorkeepers and to make arrangements for repairing the Temple.
2. “When they brought out the money” (2 Chron. 34:14) the book of the law was found.
3. Hilkiah the priest gave the book to Shaphan, who read it.
4. Shaphan came before the king, announced that the money had been gathered and delivered to those who had oversight of the repair work, and then he read the newly found book to the king.
5. The king sent high officials to inquire of Huldah the prophetess.
6. Josiah summoned to the Temple “all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem” and “all the men of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem” as well as “all the people, great and small” (2 Chron. 34:29, 30) and read the book to them, whereupon the people made a covenant with the Lord to obey what was written in the book.
7. Josiah “took away all the abominations out of all the countries that pertained to the children of Israel” (2 Chron. 34:33). The campaign was thorough and extensive (2 Kings 23:4-20).
8. Josiah commanded the people to keep the Passover “as it is written in the book of this covenant” (2 Kings 23:21).
9. The Passover was kept, the greatest ever held in the kingdom, on the 14th of the 1st month of the same 18th year (2 Chron. 35:1, 19).
The fourteenth day of the first month. Moses directed that this was the date on which the Passover should be observed (Lev. 23:5); it was not a delayed feast in the second month, as was Hezekiah’s (2 Chron. 30:2, 13). The “first month” referred to the beginning of the religious year, and was called Abib (later Nisan), and came in the spring (see II, 105).