2 Chronicles 33:1

The Message

Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king. He ruled for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. In God’s opinion he was a bad king—an evil king. He reintroduced all the moral rot and spiritual corruption that had been scoured from the country when God dispossessed the pagan nations in favor of the children of Israel. He rebuilt the sex-and-religion shrines that his father Hezekiah had torn down, he built altars and phallic images for the sex god Baal and the sex goddess Asherah and worshiped the cosmic powers, taking orders from the constellations. He built shrines to the cosmic powers and placed them in both courtyards of The Temple of God, the very Jerusalem Temple dedicated exclusively by God’s decree to God’s Name (“in Jerusalem I place my Name”). He burned his own sons in a sacrificial rite in the Valley of Ben Hinnom. He practiced witchcraft and fortunetelling. He held séances and consulted spirits from the underworld. Much evil—in God’s view a career in evil. And God was angry.

Cross References

Ecclesiastes 10:16

Unlucky the land whose king is a young pup, And whose princes party all night. Lucky the land whose king is mature, Where the princes behave themselves And don’t drink themselves silly. * * *

Isaiah 3:12

“Skinny kids terrorize my people. Silly girls bully them around. My dear people! Your leaders are taking you down a blind alley. They’re sending you off on a wild-goose chase.”