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Manasseh, King of Judah

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Of all Judah’s kings, Manasseh was by far the worst. No sooner had he established his power than he began a program of demolishing all the reforms that his father Hezekiah had introduced. With fanatical anti-God zeal, he reintroduced foreign religious practices of every kind (2 Kings 21:1-9). Fifty-five years of his rule corrupted Judah to the extent that its destruction was inevitable (2 Kings 21:10-16).

Towards the end of Manasseh’s reign, Assyria attacked Judah and took Manasseh captive. Fearful of God’s punishment, he repented of his wrong and decided to reform. But his limited reforms could not undo the damage he had done over the previous half-century, and they produced no lasting results (2 Chronicles 33:10-20). He died in 642 BC (2 Kings 21:17-18). Even the sweeping reforms of Josiah a few years later were not able to rid Judah of Manasseh’s evil (2 Kings 23:24-27).