“and crushed them to powder from thence,” and cast their dust into the Kidron valley. yaarots, not from רוּץ, to run, but from רצץ, to pound or crush to pieces. The alteration proposed by Thenius into ויּרץ, he caused to run and threw = he had them removed with all speed, is not only arbitrary, but unsuitable, because it is impossible to see why Josiah should merely have hurried the clearing away of the dust of these altars, whereas רצץ, to pound or grind to powder, was not superfluous after נתץ, to destroy, but really necessary, if the dust was to be thrown into the Kidron. ויּרץ is substantially equivalent to ויּדק in 2Ki 23:6.
Verses 13-14
The places of sacrifice built by Solomon upon the southern height of the Mount of Olives (see at 1Ki 11:7) Josiah defiled, reducing to ruins the monuments, cutting down the Asherah idols, and filling their places with human bones, which polluted a place, according to Num 19:16. 2Ki 23:14 gives a more precise definition of טמּא in 2Ki 23:13 in the form of a simple addition (with Vav cop.). הר־המּשׁחית, mountain of destruction (not unctionis = המּשׁחה, Rashi and Cler.), is the southern peak of the Mount of Olives, called in the tradition of the Church mons offensionis or scandali (see at 1Ki 11:7). For מצּבוה and אשׁרים see at 1Ki 14:23. מקומם are the places where the Mazzeboth and Asherim stood by the altars that were dedicated to Baal and Astarte, so that by defiling them the altar-places were also defiled.
Verses 15-20
2Ki 23:15-20Extermination of idolatry in Bethel and the cities of Samaria. - In order to suppress idolatry as far as possible, Josiah did not rest satisfied with the extermination of it in his own kingdom Judah, but also destroyed the temples of the high places and altars and idols in the land of the former kingdom of the ten tribes, slew all the priests of the high places that were there, and burned their bones upon the high places destroyed, in order to defile the ground. The warrant for this is not to be found, as Hess supposes, in the fact that Josiah, as vassal of the king of Assyria, had a certain limited power over these districts, and may have looked upon them as being in a certain sense his own territory, a power which the Assyrians may have allowed him the more readily, because they were sure of his fidelity in relation to Egypt. For we cannot infer that Josiah was a vassal of the Assyrians from the imprisonment and release of Manasseh by the king of Assyria, nor is there any historical evidence whatever to prove it. The only reason that
