1Forsooth Azariah, the son of Oded, when the spirit of the Lord was come into him,

2he went out into the meeting of Asa; and said to him, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin, hear ye me; the Lord is with you, for ye were with him; if ye seek him, ye shall find him; soothly if ye forsake him, he shall forsake you.

3Forsooth many days shall pass in Israel without very God, and without priest, and without teacher, and without law.

4And when they turn again in their anguish, and cry to the Lord God of Israel, and seek him, they shall find him.

5In that time [there] shall not be peace to go out and to go in, but dreads on all sides on all the dwellers of the land.

6For folk shall fight against folk, and a city against a city, for the Lord shall disturb [or trouble] them in all anguish;

7but be ye comforted, and your hands be not slacked; for meed shall be to your work.

8And when Asa had heard this thing, that is, the words and [the] prophecy of Azariah, the son of Oded, the prophet, he was comforted, and he did away all the idols from all the land of Judah and of Benjamin, and from the cities which he had taken of the hill of Ephraim. And he hallowed the altar of the Lord, that was before the porch of the house of the Lord.

9And he gathered together all Judah and Benjamin, and with them the comelings of Ephraim, and of Manasseh, and of Simeon; for many of Israel, seeing that his Lord God was with him, fled over to him.

10And when they had come into Jerusalem, in the third month, in the fifteen year of the realm of Asa,

11they offered to the Lord in that day, both of the spoils and of the prey, which they had brought, seven hundred oxen, and seven thousand wethers.

12And Asa entered by custom to make strong the bond of peace, that they should seek the Lord God of their fathers in all their heart, and in all their soul.

13And the king said, If any man seeketh not the Lord God of Israel, die he, from the least unto the most, from man unto woman.

14And all that were in Judah swore with cursing to the Lord, that is, oblig-ing themselves to cursing and pain of death, if they did against the oath, with [a] great voice, in hearty song, and in sound of trump, and in sound of clarions;

15for they swore in all their heart, and in all their will they sought him, and found him; and the Lord gave to them rest by compass.

16But also he put down Maachah, the grandmother of Asa the king, that is, his own grandmother, from the strait empire, for she had made in a wood a simulacrum, or a likeness, of a man’s rod; and he all-brake that simulacrum, and pounded it into gobbets, and burnt it in the strand [or stream] of Kidron.

17But yet [the] high places were left in Israel; nevertheless the heart of Asa was rightful in all his days.

18And he brought into the house of the Lord those things that his father [had] avowed, silver and gold, and diverse appurtenance of vessels;

19and battle was not unto the five and thirtieth year of the realm of Asa.