The Ironic End of Joash in Chronicles - Fontes - Lutheran School of ...

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122 Ralph W KleinJehoiada's Death and Burial15 Jehoiada grew old and full of days, and he died. He was 130 years old at hisdeath.16 They buried him in the city of David with the kings, for he had done good inIsrael and toward God and his house.The next three paragraphs, vv. 15-22, which are contained only in Chronicles, providethe theological rationale for the defeat and assassination of Joash. The Chronicler givesfull honors to Jehoiada by crediting him with a life as long as Jacob's (Gen. 47:9) andsimilar to that of other patriarchs, matriarchs, and heroes of the faith. 20 Jehoiada hadbenefited Israel by restoring Joash to the throne, perhaps also serving as regent during hismonarchy, and he had assisted God by repairing the house. This is the only time theChronicler reports the death and burial of someone other than a king. Jehoiada's burialwith the kings is a better fate than that of Joash (v. 25). With the death of Jehoiada,Joash's conduct and his fate turn from good to bad (cf. v. 2).Transgression17 After the death of Jehoiada, the officials of Judah came and paid homage to theking. Then the king hearkened to them. 18 They abandoned the house of Yahweh, theGod of their ancestors, and worshiped the Asherim and the idols. Consequentlythe wrath of Yahweh was on Judah and Jerusalem on account of this guilt.Joash listened to bad advisers, as had Rehoboam (2 Chron. 10:8-11), Ahab andJehoshaphat (2 Chron. 18:4-11), and Ahaziah, whose mother Athaliah was his counselor(2 Chron. 22:3-4). King and people together turned from the worship of Yahweh toAsherim (cf. the apostasy of Asa's mother in 2 Chron. 15:16 and of Manasseh in 2 Chron.33:3, 19) and idols (cf. the Philistines, who sent news of Saul's death to their idols [1Chron. 10:9]). The divine wrath for these offenses was manifested in the invasion of theArameans in vv. 23-24.Prophetic Warnings and Royal Murder19 He sent prophets among them to bring them back to Yahweh. They warned them,but they did not give heed. 20 Then the spirit of God clothed itself with Zechariah,the son of Jehoiada the priest. He stood above the people and said to them, "Thussays God: Why are you transgressing the commandments of Yahweh? You will notprosper. Since you have abandoned Yahweh, he has abandoned you." 21 They con20. Sarah, 127; Aaron, 123; Moses, 120; Joseph and Joshua, 110. Historically, ofcourse, Jehoiada's age seems unlikely because of general life expectancy and the agedifferential with his wife. Jehoshabeath was probably not much more than twenty at thedeath of her father Jehoram, who died when he was forty (2 Chron. 21:5). Ahaziah ruledfor one year and Athaliah for six. Hence she would have been no more than twenty-sevenat the time of the coup. Even if Jehoiada lived until two years before the death of Joash,he would have been sixty-five years older than his wife! Dillard (2 Chronicles, 192) is not
willing to preclude 130 as an accurate figure.spired against him and stoned him with stones, following the commandment of theking, in the court of the house of Yahweh. 22 Joash the king did not remember theloyalty that Jehoiada his father had shown to him, and so he killed his son. As hedied, he said, "May Yahweh see and avenge!"The guilt is shared by king and people alike; both refused to listen to prophets sent byGod just as both had practiced idolatry. Zechariah was endowed with prophetic powers (1Chron. 12:19; 2 Chron. 15:1) and delivered a speech which reflects the Chronicler's owntheology through and through. Prospering (or lack of it) is a typical reward (punishment)for good conduct (misconduct) in Chronicles, and the Chronicler notes elsewhere thatabandoning Yahweh leads to divine abandonment of the sinners (2 Chron. 12:5). A mobstoned Zechariah, on the king's orders. Thus, the son of the man who had made Joashking was executed at Joash's initiative, and the deed took place in the temple courts. AtJoash's own coronation, his supporters had taken care to get Athaliah out of the templeand into the palace before they killed her. Zechariah's request for vengeance is answeredin vv. 23-26.While the report about the group of prophets and the speech of Zechariah may be thecontribution of the Chronicler's own pen, the specific identity of Zechariah and hisviolent death may have come to the Chronicler from another source, perhaps the onementioned in v. 27. A recent inscription may also attest to the historicity of Zechariah, theson of Jehoiada: 21 "Just as Ashyahu [Joash] 22 commanded you to give by the hand ofZechariah silver of Tarshish to the house of -Yahweh. Three sheqels." Though the nameZechariah is very common, his connection here with Joash and with fund-raising for thetemple seems more than a coincidence.The royal hostility toward Zechariah and the priests is anticipated in the Book of Kings,when Joash criticized Jehoiada and the priests for not repairing the temple and whenJoash raided the temple to buy off Hazael.The Aramaean Attack2 Kings 12 2 Chronicles 2418 Then Hazael the king of Aram came up23 At the turn of the year, 23 an army hostand fought against Gath and took it. Arid came up against him. They came to JudahHazael set his face to go up against and Jerusalem and destroyed allJerusalem.the officials of the people from among thepeople, and all their spoil he sent to theking of Damascus.21. This was proposed by P Kyle McCarter, Jr., at the Annual Meeting of the Society ofBiblical Literature, San Francisco, November 1997.22. Other names are attested in which the divine name appears in both the second andfirst position: Coniah and Jehoiachin.
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Page 3 and 4: 8. GKC 158b. Cf. Gen. 30:18; 31:49;
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