2 Kings 22:1

THE BOY-MONARCH

‘Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign.’

2 Kings 22:1

For all the years Josiah had been represented as one of the models of the Bible. Nothing appears in his history which the Lord seems to have disapproved. Four things there are in our verse which show the remarkableness of this boy-monarch’s piety; these we note in turn.

I. First, he was so young in years.—He was only sixteen at the time when he ‘began to seek after the God of David his father.’ It is a fine thing to have an ambition to be good and great when one is as yet a mere boy. Once, as Goethe’s mother saw him crossing a street with his boyish companions, she was struck with the extraordinary gravity of his carriage of himself. She asked him laughingly whether he expected to distinguish himself from the others by his sedateness. The little fellow replied: ‘I begin with this; later on in life I shall probably distinguish myself in far other ways from them.’

II. Next, Josiah’s piety was remarkable because he had had no paternal help.—Two generations of awful wickedness lay behind him; Amon was his father, and Amon was the son of Manasseh. Josiah had no Bible; in those days the ‘book of the law’ was lost. Jedidah is mentioned in the story; the name means ‘beloved of Jehovah’; and we really have a hope that Josiah felt the prayers and counsels of a pious mother.

When one is puzzled and baffled, perhaps even scandalised, by an older person’s behaviour, let him bear in mind that he was never bidden to imitate anybody but Jesus Christ. Once a man told Augustine that a strong wish was in his heart to become a Christian, but the imperfections of other people who professed religion kept him back; and the excellent preacher replied thus: ‘But you, yourself, lack nothing; what a neighbour lacks, be you for yourself; be a good Christian in order that you, by your consistency, may convince the most calumnious pagan!’

III. Josiah’s piety was also remarkable because he was reared in a palace of indolence and luxury.—He was a king’s heir, and was exposed to all the indulgence of easy-going life and the flatteries of court.

All this must be met by a resolute and devout heart. A youth with a real love for God and love for man has no miserable aristocracy of human rank in his disposition. In modern times, when the Duke of Gaudia arrived at Lisbon, and was waited upon by a man of quality who had received a royal order for that purpose from King Don John III, he noted that this suave companion kept giving him repeatedly the title of ‘most illustrious Lord,’ even when he did no more than ask him if he was not fatigued by his journey; at last the duke told the courtier frankly that he was not so very tired yet, only wearied by so much illustriousness heaped on him.

IV. Again, Josiah’s piety was remarkable because he was entrusted with the throne so early in his career.—He became king at eight years of age. Unlimited power came into his hands when he was as yet a mere child. Around him were the old vicious parasites of the realm, the veteran placemen who had been living and fattening on his father’s favour.

Often a boy is a regular little tyrant, lording it over nurse, or brothers and sisters—older as well as younger—or whomsoever else he can make subject to his will for the time being. A child of eight years old needs to know how to rule well in his sphere. A responsibility for good government is on him. He ought to be made to feel it betimes. And Josiah bore gravely, as a boy, the burden of royalty.

Illustrations

(1) ‘Even a child maketh himself known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right. Commonly it is before a child is eight years old that his character receives its permanent impress for good or evil, and that his line of conduct for life is indicated. Already he is either doing that which is right in the sight of the Lord, or doing that which is wrong in the Lord’s sight. How is it about the children of that age who are under your control?’

(2) ‘Much depends on the way one starts. It is said that, when the old Rudolph of Hapsburg was to be crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle, there was an imminent moment in which the pageant halted, for the imperial sceptre was mislaid by the attendants, and could not be found. The emperor was just in the act of investing the princes with their honours. With an admirable presence of mind, and in the true spirit of high religious chivalry of those times, he turned to the altar before which he stood; and, seizing from it the crucifix itself, exclaimed, “With this will I govern!” ’