The Bible emphatically states that the best king Judah ever had was Josiah: "Before him there was no king like him, who turned to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; nor did any like him arise after him" (vs. 25). Josiah earned his reputation from his spectacular acts of consecration and desecration.
Josiah consecrated the people by reaffirming the covenant that their ancestors had made with the Lord. He assembled all the people before the Temple (which he had renovated in chapter 22) and read to them all the words of the book of law that had been found in the house of the Lord (vs. 1-3). Then he continued to cleanse the temple from the practices of idolatry that had taken root there. He removed the images, the prostitutes, and the idolatrous priests. The people and their temple were once again consecrated to the Lord.
Similarly, Josiah desecrated those places and priests who had led the nation astray into idolatry. Verses 4-20 describe the burning of the graven images and defiling of the pagan sites. Josiah deposed even the ancient places that Solomon in his folly and Jeroboam in his rebellion had authorized. The altars to other gods were pulled down, defiled with human bones, and desecrated with the sacrifice of the idolatrous priests.
Unfortunately, Josiah's reforms came too late. Because of the horrendous actions of his grandfather Manasseh, who had ruled Judah for 55 years, judgment upon Judah is still coming. But, for one brief shining moment, the nation experienced the return to the Lord by a good king and repentance by the people, demonstrating the way that things ought to be.
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