Which king of Judah found the Book of the Law in the temple? Josiah did. During repairs to the Temple in Jerusalem, the high priest Hilkiah discovered a scroll described in 2 Kings as “the book of the Law.” He brought it to Josiah’s officials, who read it to the king.
Josiah responded with alarm because the scroll’s instructions exposed how far Judah had departed from its covenant obligations. He consulted Huldah the prophetess, then gathered the people and renewed the covenant. His reforms removed idols, suppressed non-Yahwistic worship, and centralized religious practice in Jerusalem.
The biblical accounts appear in 2 Kings 22–23 and 2 Chronicles 34–35. The text does not explicitly identify the scroll as the complete Pentateuch; many scholars connect it especially with Deuteronomy or an early form of that book. Josiah became known for an unusually thorough religious reform, though Judah’s later destruction was still portrayed as unavoidable because of earlier wrongdoing.
A common mix-up is with Hezekiah, another reforming king of Judah. Hezekiah purified worship, but the Temple discovery belongs specifically to Josiah’s reign.