2 Chronicleschapter 27
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Speaks with:2 Chronicles 26×42 Kings 15×32 Chronicles 20×21 Chronicles 3×1Hosea 1×12 Chronicles 33×1
Summary
Chapter summary
Jotham's reign is short and almost entirely positive, told in one careful contrast with his father: he did right according to all that Uzziah had done, 'howbeit he entered not into the temple of Jehovah', the son learned the lesson the father paid for. He builds the upper gate of the house, works extensively on the wall of Ophel, and raises cities in the hill country and castles and towers in the forests. He fights the Ammonites and receives a hundred talents of silver and ten thousand measures of wheat and barley for three years running. The Chronicler's summary is his cleanest formula for a life: 'So Jotham became mighty, because he ordered his ways before Jehovah his God.' The people still did corruptly.
Context
History · Ezra — 2 Chronicles overview
- A. 1–6 Jotham became mighty because he ordered his ways before God
- B. 7–9 The rest of his wars and the years of his reign
The outline
A.Jotham became mighty because he ordered his ways before Godvv. 1 to 6
Read vv. 1 to 6 →B.The rest of his wars and the years of his reignvv. 7 to 9
Read vv. 7 to 9 →
The world behind this chapter
2 Chronicles 27The history
Jotham's projects are all defensive and all sensible. He built the upper gate of the temple and did extensive work on the wall of Ophel — the ridge that connects the old city of David to the temple platform, and the weakest seam in Jerusalem's defenses. He built towns in the hill country and forts and towers in the wooded areas, which is where an invading force would try to move unseen.
The Ammonite tribute is recorded in kind, which is how tribute usually came: a hundred talents of silver, ten thousand measures of wheat, and ten thousand of barley, for three years running. Grain by the ton was as good as money, since it fed an army or a building crew.
The single most pointed line in the chapter is that he did not enter the temple of the LORD. Read after the previous chapter, it is not a criticism but a commendation — he learned from his father's disaster and stayed on the right side of the line.
And the chapter is honest about the limit of a good reign: the people still did corruptly. A king could build walls; he could not make a nation faithful.
What it meant to them
For a community rebuilding a wall with one hand and a trowel, a king remembered mainly for gates and towers was worth remembering.
The verdict on the people also spoke directly. Good leadership is necessary and not sufficient. The state of a nation is not the same thing as the state of its ruler.
Sources cited
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
- Edwin R. Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on 2 Chronicles 27. 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.