The King Repairs the Temple, Then Sheds Blood in Its Court

Seven at accession and forty years’ reign: the boy hidden in a storeroom holds the throne longer than any king since Solomon except his great-great-grandfather Asa, who reigned forty-one. His mother Zibiah, “gazelle”, came from Beersheba, the southern edge of the land.

2 Kings 12:2 says Joash did right “all his days wherein Jehoiada the priest instructed him.” Kings never tells of a falling away or of Zechariah’s death; both belong to the Book of 2 Chronicles alone, which is why its account of this reign reads so differently.

Jehoiada chooses the king’s wives, a guardian’s duty for a ward. After Athaliah’s massacre the house of David had been reduced to one child, and the note that Joash had sons and daughters records that the line was safe again.

“Was minded” is literally “it was with the heart of Joash”, his own desire. 2 Kings 12:6 adds a telling date: by the twenty-third year of his reign the priests had still not repaired the breaches, so the delay of the next verse ran for years.

The collection is to be yearly, “from year to year”, from “all Israel”. The Levites are sent out to the towns as Jehoshaphat once sent teachers in 17:7–9; this time the errand is money, and the errand stalls.

Jehoiada is called “the chief”, rosh, head of the priesthood. “The tabernacle of witness” is the tent of the testimony (Numbers 17:7), named for the tablets kept in the ark. It is the only time in the book that a king calls a high priest to account.

“That wicked woman” is a single Hebrew word, mirshaat, found nowhere else in the Old Testament. Athaliah’s own sons were dead by 22:1, so “the sons of Athaliah” may mean her partisans, or the brothers before they died. “Broken up” is parats, to breach walls.

The word for chest is aron, the word used for the ark of the covenant. 2 Kings 12:9 places it beside the altar inside the court; the Book of 2 Chronicles puts it outside the gate, where any worshipper could reach it without entering the priests’ space.

The levy of Moses was the half shekel paid by every man counted in the census, “an offering unto the LORD, to make an atonement for your souls” (Exodus 30:13–16). Its silver had been used for the sockets of the tabernacle itself (Exodus 38:25–27).

The giving is described as David’s temple gifts were: “the people rejoiced, for that they offered willingly” (1 Chronicles 29:9). “Until they had made an end” may mean until the chest was full, or until everyone had given; the Hebrew allows both.

Two officials, one royal and one priestly, empty the chest together. 2 Kings 12:10 says they bagged and counted the silver. Judah had no coins in the ninth century; “money” means silver weighed out in pieces, which is why tallying was a job for scribes.

The workers are hired, paid for their labour, where Solomon’s temple had been built partly by the levy the northern tribes resented (10:4). Iron and bronze workers are listed with masons and carpenters, a reminder that the temple had metal fittings, doors and bands.

“The work was perfected” is literally “healing went up on the work”: arukhah, the new flesh that grows over a wound (Jeremiah 30:17). The same word describes Jerusalem’s walls closing up in Nehemiah 4:7. “In his state” means to its proper specification.

2 Kings 12:13 says no silver bowls or vessels were made from this money; everything went to the workmen. The Book of 2 Chronicles says vessels were made from what was left after the work was finished. The two accounts can be read as during and after, though Chronicles is the one that mentions an after.

“Full of days” is said of Isaac (Genesis 35:29) and David (1 Chronicles 29:28). A hundred and thirty was Jacob’s age when he stood before Pharaoh (Genesis 47:9), and outside the patriarchs and the family of Moses no one in the historical books is given a longer life. Jehoiada may have been born under Solomon.

Only this priest is buried among the kings, the honour refused to Jehoram in 21:20. “Toward God, and toward his house” most naturally means God’s house, the temple Jehoiada guarded and restored; he had also kept alive the house of David, and some readers hear both.

“Made obeisance” is hishtahavah, the verb for bowing in worship as well as before a king. A Jewish tradition preserved by Rashi says the princes flattered Joash as more than human, since he had lived hidden in the Holy of Holies; that is midrash, not the text.

“Groves” are the Asherah poles again, and “idols” is atsabbim, carved images. “Trespass” is ashmah, guilt. The princes who bowed to the king in verse 17 lead the people away from the temple that the whole nation had just paid to repair.

“Testified against them” is heid, to call witnesses and give formal warning, the word used in 2 Kings 17:13 for the LORD’s warnings to Israel “by all the prophets”. These prophets are unnamed. The verse insists the warning was given before judgment came.

The Spirit literally “clothed” Zechariah, as it clothed Gideon (Judges 6:34) and Amasai (1 Chronicles 12:18): the prophet becomes the garment God wears. “That ye cannot prosper” turns the royal ambition of prosperity against those who pursue it.

Stoning was the law’s penalty for a false prophet and for one who entices others to other gods (Deuteronomy 13:5–10). Here the legal form is turned on a true prophet. A later Jewish legend (Talmud, Gittin 57b) said his blood kept seething in the court until the Babylonians came.

“Kindness” is hesed, loyal love, the bond of a covenant. “Require” is darash, the book’s great verb for seeking the LORD; here the LORD will seek out the blood, as he says in Genesis 9:5, “your blood of your lives will I require.”

“At the end of the year” is the turn of the year, spring, when kings went to war (1 Chronicles 20:1). The Syrian king was Hazael, who in 2 Kings 12:17–18 took Gath and was bought off with temple treasure. The Book of 2 Chronicles leaves out the payment.

Moses warned that one would chase a thousand only “except their Rock had sold them” (Deuteronomy 32:30). Earlier in this book small Judah beat large armies (13:3, 14:9); here the proportions are turned, and Judah is the “very great host” delivered up.

“Great diseases” probably means wounds from the battle. The Greek and Latin read “the blood of the son of Jehoiada”, singular. 2 Kings 12:20 places the murder “in the house of Millo, which goeth down to Silla”; Chronicles puts him on his bed.

2 Kings 12:21 names the killers Jozachar son of Shimeath and Jehozabad son of Shomer, both apparently sons of fathers. Chronicles gives them foreign mothers, an Ammonite and a Moabite, the two peoples who marched against Jehoshaphat in 20:1.

“The burdens” may be prophetic oracles, massa, spoken against Joash, or the tribute laid on him; the word means both. The source is called a midrash, the word’s only other appearance after 13:22. Amaziah comes to the throne through his father’s murder.