Josiah
The short answer
Josiah became king of Judah as a child and grew into one of the most striking figures in the Old Testament. His story turns on a single, dramatic moment: during repairs to the temple in Jerusalem, workers found a scroll of God's law that had apparently been lost or neglected for generations. When the scroll was read aloud to Josiah, he tore his clothes in grief. He realized how far his nation had drifted from what God had asked of them, and he took it personally.
What happened next was not a private religious experience but a national overhaul. Josiah cleared the land of shrines to other gods, removed their altars and vessels, and even traveled north to destroy the old sanctuary at Bethel, a rival worship site that had stood since the kingdom split centuries earlier. Scholars have long noticed that the reforms Josiah carried out match the commands of Deuteronomy more closely than any other part of the Torah, which suggests the rediscovered scroll was some early form of that book. In other words, Josiah's reformation is the moment a written text stopped gathering dust and started shaping how a whole people lived.
The Bible's verdict on Josiah is unusually warm. Second Kings says he "did that which was right" in God's eyes and walked in the way of his ancestor David, swerving neither to the right nor to the left. That last image is the heart of his character: not perfection, but steadiness. Josiah heard God's word, believed it applied to him, and acted on it without hedging. His reign did not prevent Judah's eventual fall, but the book he took seriously outlived his kingdom—and his response to it became the model for what wholehearted obedience looks like.
What scholars say
How do we know what was in the scroll Josiah found, and why does his reign matter so much? Goldingay explains why the scroll was likely an early form of Deuteronomy and why Josiah's reformation is the key moment when that book became a living force in Israel's life, while Tanner sets out the biblical verdict on Josiah as a great reformer who destroyed the worship places of other gods, including Bethel.
“The Torah scroll that both scared and inspired Josiah seems to have been some form of Deuteronomy; at least, when you compare what Josiah did with the content of the various parts of the Torah, you get most matches with Deuteronomy. The Torah is not just one piece of teaching given to Israel before the people reached Canaan ; it brings together several versions of God’s instructions to Israel as these were given via people such as priests and prophets over the centuries in different contexts. So we can learn a bit about the origin and background of these various versions of that teaching by comparing them with the ongoing story of Israel’s history. The lynchpin for understanding that process has been the way Josiah’s great reformation seems to be the moment when Deuteronomy becomes a living force in Israel’s life.”
“Josiah was seen as a great king and reformer in the biblical texts of Kings and Chronicles: “He [Josiah] did what was right in the sight of [ Adoni ] and walked in all the ways of his father David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left” (2 Kgs. 22:2). He was remembered as one who destroyed all the worship places and vessels of the other gods, including places like Bethel in the old northern kingdom of Israel (23:4–20).”
What it means for you
Josiah's story asks a simple question: what do you do when you encounter a truth you've been avoiding—or never knew? Josiah could have filed the scroll away as an interesting artifact. Instead he let it read him, grieved honestly over the gap between what he found and how he lived, and then changed things, starting with what was closest to home.
For a modern reader, that pattern still holds. Taking Scripture seriously means letting it unsettle you before it comforts you, and letting conviction become action rather than mere feeling. Josiah reminds us that it is never too late for a fresh start, and that one person's honest response can ripple far beyond their own life.
In context
Josiah's story is told in 2 Kings 22–23 (with a parallel account in 2 Chronicles 34–35). He comes to the throne after two of Judah's worst kings, Manasseh and Amon, whose reigns filled the land with idol shrines. The scroll's discovery in 2 Kings 22 leads to a covenant-renewal ceremony, sweeping reforms, and a landmark Passover celebration in chapter 23. Josiah dies in battle at Megiddo, and within a generation Jerusalem falls to Babylon—making his reign a last bright moment before the exile.