JOSI'AII (Heb. Yoshiyahu, will help"), one of the kings of Judah, was the son of Amon and Jedidah, and succeeded his father (641 u. c.) at the age of 8 years. He was apparently brought up under the care of the priesthood, early manifested a, pious disposition, and became a determined religious reformer, purging Judah and Jeru salem from idolatry. In like manner, it seems, he marched through the land of Israel. This statement has naturally excited much surprise. For more than a hundred years. the kingdom of Israel had been a part of the Assyrian empire; its people were, for the. most part, carried into exile and their place supplied by heathen colonists. It was in the reign of Josiah that Hilkialt the high priest found the " hook of the Torah"—by which some understand Deuteronomy, others Exodus, and others, again, the whole Pen mteuch—while the workmen were repairing the temple. Josiah does not appear to have
heard of its existence before; at least, the words of it strike him as something novel, and excite the profoundest emotions in his breast. In commemoration of the dis covery the king celebrated the feast of the passover with a splendor never before equaled. After this he continued his work of extirpating every trace of idolatry. Wizards, conjurers, "all the abominations" that could be "spied in the land," were " put away." In these efforts the monarch seems to have spent the greater part of his reign. He met his death at Megiddo, in the valley of Esdraelon, when attempting to check the advance of Pharaoh.-Necho against the Assyrians. (Compare Herod. 11. 159.) Josiah was the last of the good kings of Judah. In his days prophesied Jeremiah and Zephaniah.