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Damascus Falls

10 Now King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-pileser the king of Assyria, and saw the pagan altar which was at Damascus. Then King Ahaz sent a model of the altar to Urijah the priest along with a [detailed] pattern for all its construction. 11 So Urijah the priest built an altar; in accordance with everything that King Ahaz had sent from Damascus, that is how Urijah the priest made it before King Ahaz returned from Damascus. 12 When the king came from Damascus, he saw the altar; then the king approached the altar and offered [sacrifices] on it, 13 and burned his burnt offering and his grain offering, and poured out his drink offering, and sprinkled the blood of his peace offerings on the altar. 14 He brought the bronze altar, which was before the Lord, from the front of the house (temple), from between the [new] altar and the house of the Lord, and put it on the north side of the [new] altar. 15 Then King Ahaz commanded Urijah the priest, saying, “Upon the great [new] altar, burn the morning burnt offering and the evening grain offering, and the king’s burnt offering and his grain offering, with the burnt offering of all the people of the land and their grain offering and their drink offerings; and sprinkle on the new altar all the blood of the burnt offering and all the blood of the sacrifice. But the [old] bronze altar shall be kept for me to use to [a]examine the sacrifices.” 16 Urijah the priest acted in accordance with everything that King Ahaz commanded.

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Footnotes

  1. 2 Kings 16:15 The meaning of the Hebrew here is not certain, but Ahaz was probably referring to the pagan practice of examining the entrails of sacrifices as omens for deciding whether to go to war or for other major decisions.

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