¹⁶At that time King Ahaz sent for help from the king of Assyria. ¹⁷The Edomites had again come and attacked Judah and carried away captives. ¹⁸The Philistines had also raided the cities of the foothills and the Negev of Judah, capturing and occupying Beth-shemesh, Aijalon, and Gederoth, as well as Soco, Timnah, and Gimzo with their villages. ¹⁹For the LORD humbled Judah because Ahaz king of Israel had thrown off restraint in Judah and had been most unfaithful to the LORD. ²⁰Then Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria came to Ahaz but afflicted him rather than strengthening him. ²¹Although Ahaz had taken a portion from the house of the LORD, from the royal palace, and from the princes and had presented it to the king of Assyria, it did not help him. ²²In the time of his distress, King Ahaz became even more unfaithful to the LORD. ²³He sacrificed to the gods of Damascus, who had defeated him, and he said, “Because the gods of the kings of Aram have helped them, I will sacrifice to them that they may help me.” But these gods were the downfall of Ahaz and of all Israel. ²⁴Then Ahaz gathered up the articles of the house of God, cut them into pieces, shut the doors of the house of the LORD, and set up altars of his own on every street corner in Jerusalem. ²⁵In every city of Judah he built high places to offer incense to other gods, and so he provoked the LORD, the God of his fathers. ²⁶As for the rest of the acts of Ahaz and all his ways, from beginning to end, they are indeed written in the Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel. ²⁷And Ahaz rested with his fathers and was buried in the city of Jerusalem, but he was not placed in the tombs of the kings of Israel. And his son Hezekiah reigned in his place.