Huldah authenticates the Law

Jeremiah was prophesying. Zephaniah was prophesying. When the high priest found the scroll of the Law in the temple, King Josiah sent his scribes to Huldah. Her ruling on the scroll is the foundation of the Josianic reform — and of the biblical canon itself.

In 622 BCE, during temple repairs, the high priest Hilkiah found a scroll — most likely a form of Deuteronomy. Instead of taking it to the prophets active at court, King Josiah's delegation (including Hilkiah himself) went to the prophetess Huldah, the wife of Shallum, in the Second Quarter of Jerusalem. Her two-part oracle authenticated the scroll as the word of God and became the charter of Josiah's sweeping reform. She is the first named woman in scripture to authoritatively interpret a written text, and her ruling is the hinge on which the Deuteronomistic canon turns.