2 Chronicles 23-25

Lexham English Bible

Joash Is Made King

23 And in the seventh year Jehoiada strengthened himself and took with him into a covenant relationship the commanders of hundreds: Azariah the son of Jeroham, Ishmael the son of Jehohanan, Azariah the son of Obed, Maaseiah the son of Adaiah, and Elishaphat the son of Zicri. ² And they went around in Judah and gathered the Levites from all the cities of Judah, and the heads of the families^[a] of Israel, and they came to Jerusalem. ³ And all the assembly made^[b] a covenant with the king in the house of God. And he said to them, “Behold, the son of the king shall reign as Yahweh has spoken concerning the sons of David. ⁴ This is the thing that you must do: one third of you priests and Levites coming off duty on the Sabbath^[c] shall be gatekeepers at the entrances, ⁵ and one third at the house of the king, and one third at the Gate of the Foundation. And all the people shall be in the courtyards of the house of Yahweh. ⁶ Let no one enter into the house of Yahweh except the priests and the ministering Levites. They themselves may enter, for they are holy, but all the people shall keep the requirements of Yahweh. ⁷ And the Levites shall surround the king all around, each with his weapons in his hand. And whoever comes into the house shall be put to death. You shall be with the king when he comes in and when he goes out.”

⁸ And the Levites and all Judah did according to all that Jehoiada the priest commanded. And they each took his men who were coming off duty on the Sabbath^[d] with the ones going out to duty on the Sabbath,^[e] for Jehoiada the priest did not dismiss the working groups. ⁹ And Jehoiada the priest gave the spears and small shields that had belonged to King David that were in the house of God to the commanders of hundreds. ¹⁰ And he appointed all the people, each with his weapon in his hand from the south side of the house to the north side of the house around the altar and the house. ¹¹ Then they brought out the son of the king and set upon him the crown and gave him the statute and made him king. And Jehoiada and his sons anointed him and said, “Long live the king!”^[f]

¹² When Athaliah heard the sound of the people running and praising the king, she came to the people at the house of Yahweh. ¹³ And she looked and, behold, the king was standing by his column at the entrance, and the commanders and trumpeters beside the king, along with all the people of the land, rejoicing and blowing with trumpets, and the singers with the instruments of song leading the praise. And Athaliah tore her garments and cried, “Conspiracy! Conspiracy!” ¹⁴ Then Jehoiada the priest brought out the commanders of the hundreds appointed over the troops, and he said to them, “Bring her out between the ranks, and whoever goes after her shall be put to death with the sword.” For the priest had said, “You must not kill her in the house of Yahweh.” ¹⁵ And they laid hands on her, and she went into the entrance of the Horse Gate of the house of the king, and they killed her there.

¹⁶ And Jehoiada made^[g] a covenant between himself and all the people and the king, that they should be Yahweh’s people. ¹⁷ Then all the people went to the house of Baal and broke it down. And they smashed his altars and his images, and they killed Mattan the priest of Baal before the altars. ¹⁸ And Jehoiada placed appointees at the house of Yahweh under the hand of the Levitical priests whom David had allotted to the house of Yahweh to offer burnt offerings to Yahweh as was written in the law of Moses, with joy and with song, according to the order of David.^{[h] 19} And he set the gatekeepers at the gates of the house of Yahweh so that no person unclean with respect to any matter could enter. ²⁰ And he took the commanders of hundreds, the noblemen, the governors over the people, and all the people of the land, and they brought the king down from the house of Yahweh. And they came through the upper gate to the house of the king, and they set the king upon the throne of the kingdom. ²¹ So all the people of the land rejoiced, and the city was quiet after Athaliah had been killed with the sword.

Joash Repairs the Temple

24 Joash was seven years old when he became king, and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem. And the name of his mother was Zibiah from Beersheba. ² And Joash did what was right in the eyes of Yahweh all the days of Jehoiada the priest. ³ And Jehoiada took two wives for him, and he fathered sons and daughters.

⁴ And afterward it was in the heart of Joash to repair the house of Yahweh. ⁵ So he gathered the priests and the Levites and said to them, “Go out to the cities of Judah and gather money from all Israel to strengthen the house of your God sufficiently year by year. Now you yourselves must hasten to the matter.” But the Levites did not act with haste. ⁶ So the king called Jehoiada the chief, and he said to him, “Why have you not required the Levites to bring from Judah and Jerusalem the tax of Moses, the servant of Yahweh, and of the assembly of Israel for the tent of the testimony?” ⁷ For the sons of the wicked Athaliah had broken into the house of God and had used all the holy vessels of the house of Yahweh for the Baals.

⁸ Then the king commanded, and they made a chest and put it at the gate outside the house of Yahweh. ⁹ And they issued a proclamation^[i] in Judah and in Jerusalem to bring to Yahweh the tax that Moses the servant of God had levied upon Israel in the wilderness. ¹⁰ And all the princes and all the people rejoiced, and they brought their tax and threw it into the chest until it was finished. ¹¹ And whenever he brought the chest to the appointee of the king by the hand of the Levites, and when they saw that there was much money in it, then the secretary of the king and the officer of the chief priest came and emptied the chest, then they took it and returned it to its place. Thus they did day by day and gathered money in abundance. ¹² And the king and Jehoiada gave it to those who did the work of the service of the house of Yahweh. And they hired stonemasons and skilled craftsmen to restore the house of Yahweh, and also workers in iron and bronze to repair the house of Yahweh. ¹³ So those doing the work labored, and the restoration for the work made progress under their hand. And they restored the house of God to its position and strengthened it. ¹⁴ And when they had finished, they brought the remainder of the money before the king and Jehoiada, and they used it for objects for the house of Yahweh, objects for the service and the burnt offerings, dishes, and objects of gold and silver. And they were offering burnt offerings in the house of Yahweh regularly, all the days of Jehoiada.

¹⁵ And Jehoiada grew old and full of days, and he died; he was one hundred and thirty years old at his death. ¹⁶ And they buried him in the city of David with the kings, for he did good in Israel and with respect to God and his house.

¹⁷ Now after the death of Jehoiada, the princes of Judah came and bowed down to the king. Then the king listened to them. ¹⁸ And they forsook the house of Yahweh, the God of their ancestors^[j] and served the Asherahs and the idols. And wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem on account of this guilt. ¹⁹ But he sent prophets among them, to bring them back to Yahweh. And they testified against them, and they did not obey.

²⁰ Then the Spirit of God clothed Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest, and he stood above the people and said to them, “Thus says God: ‘Why are you transgressing the commandments of Yahweh so that you will not succeed? For you have forsaken Yahweh, so he will forsake you.’” ²¹ Then they conspired against him and stoned him with stones at the command of the king in the courtyard of the house of Yahweh. ²² So King Joash did not remember the loyal love that Jehoiada had shown to him, and he killed his son. And as he was dying he said, “May Yahweh see and avenge!”

The Death of Joash

²³ And it happened at the turn of the year that the army of Aram^[k] went up against him, and they came to Judah and Jerusalem and destroyed all the commanders of the people from among the people, and all the war booty they sent to the king of Damascus. ²⁴ Though the army of Aram^[l] came with few men, Yahweh gave a very large army into their hand, for they had forsaken Yahweh, the God of their ancestors.^[m] And they inflicted punishment on Joash.

²⁵ And when they were going away from him (for they had left him with many wounds), his servants conspired against him on account of the blood of the sons^[n] of Jehoiada the priest. So they killed him on his bed and he died. And they buried him in the city of David, but they did not bury him at the burial sites of the kings. ²⁶ Now these are the ones who conspired against him: Zabad the son of Shimeath, the Ammonite, and Jehozabad the son of Shimrith, the Moabite. ²⁷ And as for his sons, the many oracles against him, and his repair of the foundation of the house of God, behold, they are written in the story of the scroll of the kings. And Amaziah his son reigned in his place.

The Reign of Amaziah

25 Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he became king. And he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem, and the name of his mother was Jehoaddan from Jerusalem. ² And he did what was right in the eyes of Yahweh, only not with a fully-devoted heart. ³ And it happened that as his reign was strengthened, he killed his servants who had killed his father the king. ⁴ But he did not put their children to death, according to what is written in the law, in the scroll of Moses, where Yahweh commanded, saying, “Fathers shall not be put to death on account of the sons, and the sons shall not be put to death on account of the fathers, but each shall be put to death for his own sin.”

⁵ Then Amaziah assembled the men of Judah and set them by families^[o] under commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds for all Judah and Benjamin. And he counted them from twenty years old and upward, and found them to be three hundred thousand chosen for going out to battle, able with spear and shield. ⁶ And he hired from Israel one hundred thousand strong, mighty warriors for one hundred talents.

⁷ But a man of God came to him, saying, “O king, do not let the army of Israel go with you, for Yahweh is not with Israel, all the Ephraimites. ⁸ But even still, you yourself go, do! Be strong for the battle else God will make you stumble before the enemy! For there is power with God to help and to cause stumbling.” ⁹ And Amaziah said to the man of God, “Now what should I do with the one hundred talents that I have given to the troops of Israel?” And the man of God said, “Yahweh is able to give^[p] to you more than this.” ¹⁰ Then Amaziah dismissed the troops that came to him from Ephraim to go to their home.^[q] And they became very angry^[r] with Judah, and they returned to their home in great anger.^[s]

¹¹ Then Amaziah strengthened himself, and leading his army, he went to the Valley of Salt. And he struck down ten thousand men^[t] of Seir. ¹² Now the troops^[u] captured ten thousand others alive, and they brought them to the top of the rock and threw them from the top of the rock. So all of them were smashed to pieces.

¹³ As for the troops^[v] Amaziah had sent back from going with him to war, they raided the cities of Judah from Samaria to Beth-Horon. And they struck down three thousand of them and plundered much booty.

¹⁴ And it happened that after Amaziah came back from killing the Edomites, he brought the gods of the sons of Seir, and he stood them up to himself as gods and bowed down before them and make smoke offerings for them. ¹⁵ So Yahweh became very angry^[w] with Amaziah and sent a prophet to him, and he said to him, “Why have you sought the gods of the people who could not deliver their own people from your hand?” ¹⁶ And it happened that while he was speaking to him, he said to him, “Have we appointed you as a counselor to the king? Stop—why should you be killed?”^[x] So the prophet stopped and said, “I know that God has determined to destroy you, because you have done this and have not listened to my advice.”

¹⁷ Then Amaziah king of Judah took counsel, and he sent to Joash the son of Jehoahaz the son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying, “Come,^[y] let us face one another.^{[z] 18} And Joash the king of Israel sent to Amaziah king of Judah, saying, “The thorn bush that is in Lebanon has sent to the cedar which is in Lebanon, saying, ‘Give your daughter to my son as wife.’ But a wild animal of the field that was in Lebanon passed by and trampled the thorn bush. ¹⁹ Look, you say that you have struck Edom, and your heart has lifted you up to boast. Now remain at your home. Why stir up disaster that you fall, you and Judah with you?”

²⁰ But Amaziah did not listen, for it was from God that he might give them into the hand of enemies, because they sought the gods of Edom. ²¹ So Joash the king of Israel went up, and he and Amaziah the king of Judah faced one another^[aa] at Beth-Shemesh, which belongs to Judah. ²² And Judah was defeated before Israel, and each man fled to his tent. ²³ And Joash the king of Israel captured Amaziah the king of Judah, the son of Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, at Beth-Shemesh. And they brought him to Jerusalem and broke down the wall of Jerusalem from the Gate of Ephraim to the Corner Gate, four hundred cubits. ²⁴ Then with all the gold and silver, all the objects found in the house of God with Obed-Edom, the storehouses of the house of the king, and the hostages,^[ab] he returned to Samaria.

²⁵ And Amaziah the son of Joash, king of Judah, lived after the death of Joash the son of Jehoahaz, the king of Israel, fifteen years. ²⁶ Now the remainder of the words of Amaziah, from the first to the last, behold, are they not written in the scroll of the kings of Judah and Israel? ²⁷ And from the time that Amaziah turned away from Yahweh, they had plotted a conspiracy against him in Jerusalem. And he fled to Lachish, but they sent after him to Lachish and killed him there. ²⁸ And they carried him on the horses and buried him with his ancestors^[ac] in the city of Judah.