Josiah's reform climaxes not in a battle but in a feast: the king commands the Passover “as it is written in this Book of the Covenant,” and the historian says no Passover like it had been kept since the days of the judges. The verse is a quiet measure of how far the feast had lapsed under the kings, and how central it was to covenant renewal: to come back to God was, concretely, to keep His calendar again.