2 Kings 12


2 Kings 12 is the twelfth chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the reign of Joash as the king of Judah.

Text

This chapter was originally written in the Hebrew language. It is divided into 21 verses in Christian Bibles, but into 22 verses in the Hebrew Bible as in the verse numbering comparison table below.

Verse numbering

This article generally follows the common numbering in Christian English Bible versions, with notes to the numbering in Hebrew Bible versions.

Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter in Hebrew are of the Masoretic Text tradition, which includes the Codex Cairensis, Aleppo Codex, and Codex Leningradensis.
There is also a translation into Koine Greek known as the Septuagint, made in the last few centuries BCE. Extant ancient manuscripts of the Septuagint version include Codex Vaticanus and Codex Alexandrinus.

Old Testament references

  • :
  • :

    Analysis

A parallel pattern of sequence is observed in the final sections of 2 Kings between 2 Kings 11–20 and 2 Kings 21–25, as follows:
This chapter consists of three parts:
  1. Introductory regnal information
  2. Account of reign with two episodes
  3. # Joash's financial arrangement for temple repairs and
  4. # Joash's payment to Hazael from the temple fund to ward off the attack of the Arameas
  5. Concluding regnal information

    The Temple renovation during the reign of Joash (12:1–16)

Joash is given a relatively positive rating in the books of Kings, first because of his succession to replace the Omride queen Athaliah, and secondly due to his care of the temple of YHWH. Joash arranged that temple renovation was no longer solely directed by the priests, but was decreed by the palace, and that donations for this project were placed in a collection box, to be counted communally at intervals, then given to a building administration. As animal and vegetable sacrifices were reserved for God and his priests, others could be made by paying in silver, so a group of lower caste 'priests who guarded the threshold' was assigned to deposit these in a designated chest.

Verse 1

  • Cross reference: 2 Chronicles 24:1
  • "Jehoash": an alternate spelling of Joash as in 11:2; also verses 2, 4, 6, 7, 18.
  • "Forty years": According to Thiele's chronology, following "non-accession year method", Jehoash was the king of Israel starting between April and September 835 BCE until his death between April and September 796 BCE.

    Verse 6

  • "The 23th year of King Jehoash": According to Thiele's chronology, this period of time falls in 814/813 BCE.

    Joash's reign (12:17–21)

During the later parts of Joash's reign, Hazael, the king of Aram in Damascus, placed both the northern kingdom of Jehu and the kingdom of Judah under heavy burden of tributes. The threat of Hazael to Jerusalem indicates a continuous concern for the Aramean invasion to the land of Israel since the time of Omri's dynasty to the early parts of Jehu's dynasty until king Jehoash ben Jehoahaz of Israel defeated the Arameans following the death of prophet Elisha. The payment of tribute to Hazael may mean that all the funds for temple repairs collected by Jehoash were lost to the Arameans.
Jehoash's assassination could be explained from historiographical perspectives, beginning with Jehoshaphat giving his son Jehoram in marriage to Athaliah, so the house of David thereafter descended from the house of Omri, and the next three kings of Judah were assassinated as the consequences of Elijah's prophecy that every male of Ahab in Israel would be cut off until the reign of Uzziah ben Amaziah of Judah which coincides the time king Jeroboam ben Jehoash of Israel restored the borders of Israel.

Verse 19

  • Cross reference: 2 Chronicles 24:27
  • "Are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?": This formal phrase concludes the account of almost every king of Judah.

    Verse 21

  • Cross reference:
  • "Jozachar": or "Zabad" in 2 Chronicles 24:26.
  • "Shomer: or "Shimrith" in 2 Chronicles 24:26.