Jehoash Reigns over Judah

1In the seventh year of Jehu, Jehoash became king, and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Zibiah of Beersheba. 2And Jehoash did what was right in the sight of Yahweh all his days in which Jehoiada the priest instructed him. 3Only the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.

Jehoash Repairs the House of Yahweh

4Then Jehoash said to the priests, “All the money of the sacred things which is brought into the house of Yahweh, both the money for each [†]numbered man—the money from each person’s assessment in the census—and all the money which any man’s heart prompts him to bring into the house of Yahweh, 5let the priests take it for themselves, each from his acquaintance; and they shall repair the [†]damages of the house wherever any damage may be found.”

6Now it happened that in the twenty-third year of King Jehoash the priests had not repaired the damages of the house. 7Then King Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and for the other priests and said to them, “Why do you not repair the damages of the house? So now, take no more money from your acquaintances, but give it over to pay for the damages of the house.” 8So the priests agreed that they would take no more money from the people, nor repair the damages of the house.

9But Jehoiada the priest took a chest and bored a hole in its lid and put it beside the altar, on the right side as one comes into the house of Yahweh; and the priests who kept watch over the threshold put in it all the money which was brought into the house of Yahweh. 10Now it happened that when they saw that there was much money in the chest, the king’s scribe and the high priest came up and tied it in bags and counted the money which was found in the house of Yahweh. 11And they gave the money, which was weighed out, into the hands of those who did the work, who had the oversight of the house of Yahweh; and they [†]paid it out to the craftsmen of wood and the builders who worked on the house of Yahweh; 12and to the masons and the hewers of stone, and for buying timber and hewn stone to repair the damages to the house of Yahweh, and for all that [†]was laid out for the house to repair it. 13But there were not made for the house of Yahweh silver cups, snuffers, bowls, trumpets, any vessels of gold, or vessels of silver from the money which was brought into the house of Yahweh; 14for they gave that to those who did the work, and with it they repaired the house of Yahweh. 15Moreover, they did not require an accounting from the men into whose hand they paid the money in order to pay those who did the work, for they were doing it faithfully. 16The money from the guilt offerings and the money from the sin offerings was not brought into the house of Yahweh; it was for the priests.

17Then Hazael king of Aram went up and fought against Gath and captured it, and Hazael set his face to go up to Jerusalem. 18And Jehoash king of Judah took all the holy things that Jehoshaphat and Jehoram and Ahaziah, his fathers, kings of Judah, had set apart as holy, and his own holy things and all the gold that was found among the treasuries of the house of Yahweh and of the king’s house, and sent them to Hazael king of Aram. Then he went away from Jerusalem.

Amaziah Reigns over Judah

19Now the rest of the acts of Joash and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? 20And his servants arose and made a conspiracy and struck down Joash at the house of Millo as he was going down to Silla. 21Now Jozacar the son of Shimeath and Jehozabad the son of Shomer, his servants, struck him and he died; and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and Amaziah his son became king in his place.