A reading from the book of Second Kings.

In the 17th year of Pika, the son of Rimalaya, Ahaz, the son of Jotham, King of Judah, began to reign.

Ahaz was 20 years old when he began to reign, and he reigned 16 years in Jerusalem. And he did not do

what was right in the eyes of the Lord, his God, as his father David had done,

but he walked in the way of the kings of Israel. He even burned his son as an offering,

according to the despicable practices of the nations, whom the Lord drove out before the people

of Israel, and he sacrificed and made offerings on the high places and on the hills and under

every green tree. Then Resin King of Syria and

Pika, the son of Rimalaya, king of Israel, came up to wage war on Jerusalem, and they besieged

Ahaz, but could not conquer him. At that time, Resin, the king of Syria, recovered Elath for Syria,

and drove the men of Judah from Elath, and the Edomites came to Elath, where they dwelt to this day.

So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiklath Pileser, king of Assyria, saying,

I am your servant and your son. Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria,

and from the hand of the king of Israel who are attacking me.

Ahaz also took the silver and gold that was found in the house of the Lord,

and in the treasures of the king's house, and sent a present to the king of Assyria, and the king of

Assyria listened to him. The king of Assyria marched up against Damascus and took it,

carrying its people captive to Kerr, and he killed resin. When King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath Pileser, king of Assyria,

he saw the altar that was at Damascus, and King Ahaz sent to Uriah the priest a model of the altar,

and its pattern exact in all its details. And Uriah the priest built the altar, in accordance

with all that King Ahaz had sent from Damascus. So Yoriah the priest made it

before King Ahaz arrived from Damascus. And when the king came from Damascus, the king viewed the altar.

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