d subsequently met with his
death (2 Chron. xxv. 27; 2 Kings xiv. 19). Uzziah's leprosy is
attributed to a ritual fault (2 Chron. xxvi. 4 seq., 16 sqq.; cf. 2
Kings xv. 3-5; see UZZIAH). The defeat and death of the good king
Josiah came through disobedience to the Divine will (2 Chron. xxxv. 21
seq.; see 2 Kings xxiii. 26 sqq.).

In addition to such supplementary information, another tendency of the
chronicler is the alteration of narratives that do not agree with the
later doctrines of the uniformity of religious institutions before and
after the exile. Thus, the reformation of Josiah has been thrust back
from his eighteenth to his twelfth year (when he was nineteen years
old) apparently because it was felt that so good a king would not have
tolerated the abuses of the land for so long a period,[6] but the
result of this is to leave an interval of ten years between his
conversion and the subsequent act of repentance (2 Chron. xxxiv. 3-6;
2 Kings xxii. seq.). References to Judaean idolatry are omitted (1
Kings xiv. 22-24; see 2 Chron. xii. 14; 2 Kings xviii. 4; 2 Chron.
xxxi. 1) or abbreviated (2 Kings xxiii. 1-20; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 29-33);
and if the earlier detailed accounts of Judaean heathenism were
repulsive, so the tragic account of the fate of Jerusalem was a
painful subject upon which the chronicler's age did not care to dwell
(contrast 2 Kings xxiv. 8-xxv. with the brief 2 Chron. xxxvi. 9-21).
At an age when the high places were regarded as idolatrous it was
considered only natural that the good kings should not have tolerated
them. So 2 Chron. xiv. 5, xvii. 6 (from unknown sources) contradict 1
Kings xv. 14, xxii. 43 (that Asa and Jehoshaphat did _not_ demolish
the high places), whereas xv. 16-18, xx. 31-34, are quoted from the
book of Kings and give the older view. The example is an illustration
of the simple methods of early compilers. Further, it is assumed that
the high place at Gibeon was a legitimate sanctuary (2 Chron. i. 3-6;
1 Kings iii. 2-4; 1 Chron. xxi. 28-30; 2 Sam. xxiv.); that the ark was
borne not by priests (1 Kings viii. 3) but by Levites (2 Chron. v. 4),
in accordance with post-exilic usage; and that the Levites, and not
the foreign bodyguard of the temple, helped to place Joash on the
throne (2 Chron. xxiii.).[7] Conversely 1 Chron. xv. 12 seq. explains
xiii. 10 (2 Sam. vi. 7) on the view that Uzza was not a Levite, hence