8. His officials also gave a freewill offering to the people, the kohanim and the Levites. Hilkiah, Zechariah and Jehiel—the administrators of the House of God—donated to the kohanim 2,600 Passover offerings, and 300 bulls.
9. Likewise, Conaniah along with Shemaiah and Nethaniel, his brothers, and Hashabiah, Jeiel and Jozabad, leaders of the Levites, provided 5,000 Passover lambs for the Levites and 500 bulls.
10. So the avodah was prepared and the kohanim stood at their posts with the Levites in their divisions according to the king’s command.
11. They slaughtered the Passover lambs and while the kohanim sprinkled the blood handed to them, the Levites flayed them.
12. Then they removed the portions to be burnt to give them to the divisions of ancestral houses of the people to present to Adonai, as it is written in the book of Moses. They did the same with the bulls.
13. They roasted the Passover lambs with fire according to the ordinance, then boiled the sacred parts in pots, caldrons and pans, and brought them quickly to all the people.
14. Afterward, they made preparations for themselves and for the kohanim, because the kohanim, the sons of Aaron, were busy sacrificing the burnt offerings and the fat until nightfall. So the Levites made preparations for themselves and for the kohanim, the sons of Aaron.
15. The singers, the descendants of Asaph, were at their stations according to the commandment of David, Asaph, Heman and Jeduthun, the king’s seer. The gatekeepers were at every gate. They did not need to depart from their posts for their fellow Levites provided for them.
16. So on that day the entire service of Adonai was prepared to keep the Passover and to offer burnt offerings upon the altar of Adonai according to the command of King Josiah.
17. The Bnei-Yisrael present celebrated the Passover at that time and observed the Feast of Matzot for seven days.
18. Passover had not been celebrated like that in Israel since the days of Samuel the prophet, and none of the kings of Israel had ever celebrated such a Passover as Josiah did with the kohanim, the Levites, all Judah and Israel who were present and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
19. This Passover was celebrated in the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah.
20. After all this, when Josiah had set the House in order, King Neco of Egypt came up to fight at Carchemish on the Euphrates and Josiah went out to engage him.
21. But Neco sent messengers to him saying, “What is there between me and you, king of Judah? I am not coming against you today but against the house that wars with me and God has ordered me to hurry. Stop for your sake from meddling with God who is with me, so that He will not destroy you!”
22. Josiah, however, would not turn away from him but disguised himself in order to fight him. He did not listen to Neco’s words from the mouth of God and went to fight him in the plain of Megiddo.