And said unto them, hear me, ye Levites; sanctify yourselves,.... By washing their bodies and their garments, that no pollution might attend them in their service, see Isa 52:11. and sanctify the house of the Lord God of your fathers; by carrying out of it all manner of uncleanness, as they did, Ch2 29:16, and carry forth the filthiness out of the holy place; or the abomination; the altar, like that at Damascus, which Ahaz, removing the altar of the Lord, had placed in the court of the priests; or, as Kimchi thinks, an idol, which he had set upon that altar.