Bad Theology

Text for today: II Kings 22 viii-xx; II Chronicles 34 viii-xxviii

God causes the book of the law to be found so that His people may know how far they have strayed from its precepts and how much they deserve His latest round of punishments.

Having become a religious fanatic at the age of sixteen, and spent eighteen happy years persecuting those who do not share his beliefs, King Josiah is disturbed when the book of God's law is discovered during a refurbishment of the temple. The priest's secretary reads him the book, and Josiah is astounded and horrified to discover that the laws of a wandering desert community are not being strictly kept by the people of a settled nation some half-dozen centuries later. Doubtless it was this combination of realism and acumen which caused Josiah to accept the book at face value, and to continue his persecutions even after being informed that they would make no difference to the fate of his realm.

Josiah sends to a prophetess, who promises that God will bring new disasters to the nation because of the people's religious tolerance. In subsequent chapters, He duly sets up these disasters by appointing a sequence of impious kings and then venting His righteous wrath in the accustomed manner. However, in His infinite compassion God takes account of Josiah's grovelling, and graciously promises to have the king killed before any unpleasantness occurs.