2 Kings 21:9
But they hearkened not: and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom the LORD destroyed before the children of Israel. But they hearkened not: and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom the LORD destroyed before the children of Israel.
The greater evil of Manasseh's reign was the deliberate setting aside of the statutes recorded by Moses, and above all those contained in the book of the covenant in Deuteronomy. That rejection of revealed instruction was the measure by which Judah was led to exceed in wickedness the nations destroyed before Israel. Under Manasseh the temple copy of the book of the law was lost through careless neglect, leaving the people generally without its teaching for many years. This loss deprived successive generations of the guidance that should have restrained idolatry and injustice. It stood in sharp contrast to the reign of Hezekiah, when teaching priests read the law publicly day by day and the nation observed its statutes. That faithful attention to the law had made the nation prosperous.