MANASSEH. King of .Tudah. son of Heze kiah and father of Anion. He began to reign c.692 c.c., at the age of twelve. His reign is said to have extended over fifty-five years (II. Kings xxi. I: If. Chron. xxxiii. 1), but this figure may he somewhat too high, as his death appears to have taken place no later than.B.C. 641. Of the events during his long reign we know little.
The ir in Kings. being so largely interested in the religious side of history, contents him self merely with reference: to religious eon diti in in the days of Alan:I-sell. The King is not %iciied with favor by the pious narrator. The religious reforms introduced by Hezekiali, tending toward a purer Yahweh worship freed from the Canaanitish practices, naturally aroused opposition, and during Ilezekiah's life time symptoms of a reaction already began to manifest themselves. The death of Ilezekiah marked the height of the reaction, and Ma nasseh favored the old system and went even to greater lengths than his predecessors in blending the Yahweh with foreign elements. Be sides readuption of the old Canaanitish practices, Babylonian and Assyrian customs were intro duced (11. Kings, xxi. 5-7), and for this the King naturally incurred the hatred of the later He brew historians. who purposely ignored other events of his reign. It appears on the whole
to have been peaceable and prosperous, but Ma nasseh was obliged to pay tribute to Assyria. The story told in Chronicles (II. Chron. of Manasseh'.s capture by the Assyrians. and of his humbling himself before God and his acts of repentance, is thought to be fictitious. The Book of Kings does not say a word about it. and it resembles a Slidrashic tale to illustrate the pun ishment merited by a king, who, to the author of Chronicles, appeared the embodiment of wick edness. The later Jewish Haggada added to such stories of Manasseh's wickedness and subsequent conversion. The Prayer of Manasseh. the com position of which was suggested by the statement in 1 I. Chronicles xxxiii. 18-19, belongs to the Apocryphal literature. though received as canon ical by the Greek Church. It appears to have been originally written in Greek. though the sentiments are distinetively Jewish. The date of composition is uncertain ; in a general way it may be said to belong to the Ilellenistie period. Consult the commentary by Ball in the Speaker's Commentary, and the German translation with notes by Ryssel, in Kautsch. Apokryphen nod Pseudepigraphen (Halle, 1899).