Lesley,! ^^^ [May, 



him and the people and all Judah, concerning the words of the book : 

 "for great is the wrath of Jehovah kindled against us ; because our fatfters 

 have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according to all 

 that is written concerning us." 



Huldah, the prophetess, was the pythoness of whom they sought the 

 oracle. There is no mention of any oracle in the temple itself. There 

 seems to have been no Shekinah ; no high priest privileged to ask of 

 Jehovah himself. 



Huldah is thus described : "Huldah, the prophetess, wife of Shallum- 

 ben-Tikvah-ben-Harhas,* Keeper of the Wardrobe. She dwelt in the 

 college in Jerusalem." 2 K. 22 : 14. This is evidently an explanatory 

 gloss of later date. 



Huldah's prophecy of peace to the King, and disaster to the Kingdom, 

 then causes a convocation ; a solemn covenant between King, people 

 and Jehovah ; a complete cleansing of Jerusalem and of the whole land ; 

 the utter destruction of all idols, and abolition of strange rites. The story 

 is very elaborate, and fully proves the prevalence of every variety of 

 foreign cultus previously, and the virtual invention of the Passover as 

 a national festival at this time. And it looks as if the whole history of 

 the Exodus were invented on this occasion for the purpose of erecting an 

 impregnable barrier against Egyptian influence and ideas. 



However this may be, the Egyptian alliance was so completely broken 

 up, that when the Pharaoh Necho took the field against Assyria, Josiah 

 intercepted his march at Megiddo in the north, and was defeated and 

 slain, in spite of his pious zeal for Jehovah. It was no doubt to explain 

 this astounding calamity, that the story of Huldah was invented and 

 introduced into the annals of the reign, by subsequent historians. 



Jehoahaz, Josiah' s son, bore the name of a much more ancient King of 

 Israel, son of Jehu. — It is remarkable that Jehoahaz is said to have had 

 another name, Shallum, TiZ^^Wt " 7"eiri&?ifo"o?2, " which was the name of the 

 15th King of Israel, who slew Zechariah, son of Jeroboam II, and thus 

 extinguished the family of Jehu. It seems perfectly inexplicable that the 

 fanatical Jahvist Josiah should have given not merely one but two accursed 

 names to his son and heir ; and that one of these names should have 

 suggested the murder of the man's race who bore the other. — And another 

 remarkable thing is that Shallum was also the name of the husband of 

 Huldah the prophetess. — Either such names are merely the inventions of 

 subsequent chroniclers ; or, they are mixed up in the history so as to divest 

 them of all personal genuineness ; or, they were bestowed without regard 

 to their meanings ; or, lastly, their reputed meanings are good for 

 nothing. 



Jehoahaz was 23 years old, and only reigned three months after the 

 defeat and death of his father. He is said to have spent these three 



* The uncertainty surrounding hebrew private names is exlaibited here; for 

 the chronicler (2 Chron. xxxiv, 22) repeats the story almost verbatim, and yet 

 gives this name Ilarhas Onin, as Hasrah, mon, a totally irreconcilable dif- 

 ference, not to be explained by any ordinary blunder of transcription. 



