2 Kings 17:2-33
English Standard Version
Chapter 17
2And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, yet not as the kings of Israel who were before him. 3Against him came up Shalmaneser king of Assyria. And Hoshea became his vassal and paid him tribute. 4But the king of Assyria found treachery in Hoshea, for he had sent messengers to So, king of Egypt, and offered no tribute to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year. Therefore the king of Assyria shut him up and bound him in prison. 5Then the king of Assyria invaded all the land and came to Samaria, and for three years he besieged it.
7And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods
8and walked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, and in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced.
9And the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. They built for themselves high places in all their towns, from watchtower to fortified city.
10They set up for themselves pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree,
11and there they made offerings on all the high places, as the nations did whom the Lord carried away before them. And they did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger,
12and they served idols, of which the Lord had said to them, "You shall not do this."
13Yet the Lord warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and every seer, saying, "Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes, in accordance with all the Law that I commanded your fathers, and that I sent to you by my servants the prophets."
14But they would not listen, but were stubborn, as their fathers had been, who did not believe in the Lord their God.
15They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the Lord had commanded them that they should not do like them.
16And they abandoned all the commandments of the Lord their God, and made for themselves metal images of two calves; and they made an Asherah and worshiped all the host of heaven and served Baal.
17And they burned their sons and their daughters as offerings and used divination and omens and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.
18Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel and removed them out of his sight. None was left but the tribe of Judah only.
19Judah also did not keep the commandments of the Lord their God, but walked in the customs that Israel had introduced.
20And the Lord rejected all the descendants of Israel and afflicted them and gave them into the hand of plunderers, until he had cast them out of his sight.
21When he had torn Israel from the house of David, they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. And Jeroboam drove Israel from following the Lord and made them commit great sin.
22The people of Israel walked in all the sins that Jeroboam did. They did not depart from them,
23until the Lord removed Israel out of his sight, as he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day.
24And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and lived in its cities.
25And at the beginning of their dwelling there, they did not fear the Lord. Therefore the Lord sent lions among them, which killed some of them.
26So the king of Assyria was told, "The nations that you have carried away and placed in the cities of Samaria do not know the law of the god of the land. Therefore he has sent lions among them, and behold, they are killing them, because they do not know the law of the god of the land."
27Then the king of Assyria commanded, "Send there one of the priests whom you carried away from there, and let him go and dwell there and teach them the law of the god of the land."
28So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and lived in Bethel and taught them how they should fear the Lord.
29But every nation still made gods of its own and put them in the shrines of the high places that the Samaritans had made, every nation in the cities in which they lived.
30The men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the men of Cuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima,
31and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites burned their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim.
32They also feared the Lord and appointed from among themselves all sorts of people as priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places.
33So they feared the Lord but also served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away.
