2 Chronicleschapter 24
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Speaks with:2 Kings 12×62 Chronicles 24×42 Chronicles 25×22 Chronicles 21×22 Chronicles 28×22 Kings 11×1
Summary
Chapter summary
Joash does right all the days of Jehoiada. He repairs the house of Jehovah by setting a chest at the gate for the tax of Moses, and the people rejoice to bring in until the work is finished and vessels of gold and silver are made. But Jehoiada dies at a hundred and thirty, buried among the kings, and the princes flatter the young king into forsaking the house of God for the Asherim. The Spirit of God clothes Zechariah son of Jehoiada: 'Why transgress ye the commandments of Jehovah, so that ye cannot prosper?' They stone him in the temple court, and he dies saying, 'Jehovah look upon it, and require it': the murder Jesus names in Matthew 23:35.
Context
History · Ezra — 2 Chronicles overview
- A. 1–14 A chest set at the gate, and the house of God repaired
- B. 15–19 Jehoiada dies, and the princes flatter the king away
- C. 20–22 Zechariah stoned in the court: the LORD look upon it
- D. 23–27 A small Syrian company, and servants who kill a king in his bed
The outline
A.A chest set at the gate, and the house of God repairedvv. 1 to 14
Read vv. 1 to 14 →B.Jehoiada dies, and the princes flatter the king awayvv. 15 to 19
Read vv. 15 to 19 →C.Zechariah stoned in the court: the LORD look upon itvv. 20 to 22
Read vv. 20 to 22 →D.A small Syrian company, and servants who kill a king in his bedvv. 23 to 27
Read vv. 23 to 27 →
The world behind this chapter
2 Chronicles 24The history
The funding problem is the heart of the chapter. The tax of Moses — the half-shekel each man paid for the service of the tent — had lapsed, and the building had been damaged and stripped by Athaliah's household. The first attempt to raise money through the Levites in the towns went nowhere.
So they built a collection box: a chest with a hole bored in the lid, set outside at the gate of the house, with a proclamation sent through Judah and Jerusalem. People dropped their coins in until it was full, the king's scribe and the high priest's officer emptied it, and it went back out. Day after day, until there was plenty.
The money paid wages directly to masons, carpenters, and workers in iron and bronze, and the surplus went into vessels for the service. The building was restored to its original design and made stronger.
After Jehoiada dies, the officials come and flatter the young king, and the Asherah poles and idols return. Zechariah, Jehoiada's own son, stands up and says: why do you break the commandments of the LORD, so that you cannot prosper? They stoned him in the court of the house of the LORD at the king's order — the son of the man who had saved the king's life, killed in the building he had saved. Jesus later refers to a Zechariah killed between the sanctuary and the altar.
The ending is small and exact: a modest Aramean force defeats a much larger army, and Joash is murdered on his bed by his own servants because of the blood of the sons of Jehoiada, and is buried in the city but not in the tombs of the kings.
What it meant to them
The chest at the gate was a model for a poor community. Repairs funded by ordinary people, a coin at a time, with honest accounting and named officials — that is how the second temple was maintained too.
But the writer will not let the good half stand alone. The same reign that rebuilt the house murdered a prophet in its courtyard, and he places both in one chapter so no one can separate the building from the behavior.
Sources cited
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
- Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: Chronicles
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on 2 Chronicles 24. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.