Bible in Basic English
"In the eighth year of his rule, while he was still young, his heart was first turned to the God of his father David; and in the twelfth year he undertook the clearing away of all the high places and the pillars and the images of wood and metal from Judah and Jerusalem."
— 2 Chronicles 34:3, Bible in Basic English
“For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father: and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images.”
Josiah was eight years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for thirty-one years.
And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, walking in the ways of his father David, without turning to the right hand or to the left.
In the eighth year of his rule, while he was still young, his heart was first turned to the God of his father David; and in the twelfth year he undertook the clearing away of all the high places and the pillars and the images of wood and metal from Judah and Jerusalem.
He had the altars of the Baals broken down, while he himself was present; and the sun-images which were placed on high over them he had cut down; and the pillars of wood and the metal images he had broken up and crushed to dust, dropping the dust over the resting-places of the dead who had made offerings to them.
And he had the bones of the priests burned on their altars, and so he made Judah and Jerusalem clean.
And in all the towns of Manasseh and Ephraim and Simeon as far as Naphtali, he made waste their houses round about.