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Bible Dictionaries
Hilkiah
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
or HILKIAH (‘Jah [is] my portion,’ or ‘portion of Jah’). A favourite priestly name. 1. Father of Eliakim, Hezekiah’s chief of the household ( 2 Kings 18:18 etc.= Isaiah 36:3 etc., Isaiah 22:20-25 ). 2. A priest of Anathoth, probably of the line of Eli (see 1 Kings 2:26-27 ), father of Jeremiah ( Jeremiah 1:1 ); he is not to be identified with the next. 3. The high priest in b.c. 621, who ‘found’ during the repairs of the Temple and brought to Josiah’s notice, through Shaphan, ‘the book of the law’ ( 2 Kings 22:3-11 = 2 Chronicles 34:8-19 ), which occasioned the reformation of religion thereafter effected ( 2 Kings 23:1-24 = 2 Chronicles 34:29 to 2 Chronicles 35:19 ). Hilkiah headed the deputation sent to consult Huldah on this discovery ( 2 Kings 22:12-20 = 2 Chronicles 34:20-28 ); and presided over the subsequent purification of the Temple ( 2 Kings 23:4 ff.). He was a chief actor in the whole movement. There is no reason to doubt that his find was the genuine discovery of a lost law-book; this book was unmistakably the code of Deuteronomy (wh. see). 4. Father of the Gemariah of Jeremiah 29:3 . Jeremiah 29:5 , Jeremiah 29:6 . Levites of the clan of Merari ( 1 Chronicles 6:45; 1 Chronicles 26:11 ). 7. A ‘chief of the priests’ returning from the Exile in b.c. 536 ( Nehemiah 12:7; Nehemiah 12:21 ). 8. A companion of Ezra at the public reading of the Law ( Nehemiah 8:4 ); he appears as Ezekias in 1Es 9:43 .
G. G. Findlay.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Hilkiah'. Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdb/h/hilkiah.html. 1909.
