2 Kings 12

1 In the seventh year of Jehu began Jehoash to reign; and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Zibiah of Beer-sheba.

When Jehu had been ruling Israel for almost seven years, Joash became the king of Judah. He ruled in Jerusalem for 40 years. His mother was Zibiah, from Beersheba [city].

2 And Jehoash did that which was right in the eyes of the LORD all his days wherein Jehoiada the priest instructed him.

All his life, he did what pleased Yahweh, because Jehoiada the priest instructed/taught him.

3 Howbeit the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and offered in the high places.

But the places where the people worshiped [Yahweh] on the tops of hills were not destroyed, and they continued to offer sacrifices and burn incense at those places, [instead of at the place that God had chosen for them in Jerusalem].

4 And Jehoash said to the priests: 'All the money of the hallowed things that is brought into the house of the LORD, in current money, the money of the persons for whom each man is rated, all the money that cometh into any man's heart to bring into the house of the LORD,

Joash said to the priests, “You must take all the money which the people contribute, both the money they are required to give and the money that they themselves decide to give, as sacred offerings to buy things for the temple.

5 let the priests take it to them, every man from him that bestoweth it upon him; and they shall repair the breaches of the house, wheresoever any breach shall be found.'

Each priest must take the money from people who know him (OR, from one of the treasurers), and he must use that money to repair the temple whenever he sees that there is something that needs to be repaired.”

6 But it was so, that in the three and twentieth year of king Jehoash the priests had not repaired the breaches of the house.

But after Joash had been ruling for almost twenty-three years, the priests still had not repaired anything in the temple.

7 Then king Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and for the other priests, and said unto them: 'Why repair ye not the breaches of the house? now therefore take no longer money from them that bestow it upon you, but deliver it for the breaches of the house.'

So Joash summoned Jehoiada and the other priests and said to them, “(Why are you not repairing things in the temple?/You should have been repairing things in the temple!) [RHQ] From now on, you must not keep the money that you receive from people who know you (OR, the treasurers). You must give it to the people who will be repairing things in the temple!”

8 And the priests consented that they should take no longer money from the people, neither repair the breaches of the house.

The priests agreed to do that, and they also agreed that they themselves would not do the repair work.

9 And Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it beside the altar, on the right side as one cometh into the house of the LORD; and the priests that kept the threshold put therein all the money that was brought into the house of the LORD.

Then Jehoiada took a chest and bored a hole in the lid. He placed it alongside the altar [for burning incense/sacrifices] that was on the right as anyone enters the temple. The priests who guarded the entrance to the temple put in the box the money that was brought to the temple.

10 And it was so, when they saw that there was much money in the chest, that the king's scribe and the high priest came up, and they put up in bags and counted the money that was found in the house of the LORD.

Whenever they saw that there was a lot of money in the chest, the king’s secretary and the Supreme Priest would come and count the money. Then they would put it in bags and tie the bags shut.

11 And they gave the money that was weighed out into the hands of them that did the work, that had the oversight of the house of the LORD; and they paid it out to the carpenters and the builders, that wrought upon the house of the LORD,

Then, after they weighed it, they would give the money to the men who supervised the work in the temple. Then the supervisors would use that money to pay the carpenters and builders who did the repair work in the temple,

12 and to the masons and the hewers of stone, and for buying timber and hewn stone to repair the breaches of the house of the LORD, and for all that was laid out for the house to repair it.

and the masons and the stone cutters. Also with some of that money they bought timber and stones that had been cut to be used in the repair work, and to pay all the other expenses for the repair work.

13 But there were not made for the house of the LORD cups of silver, snuffers, basins, trumpets, any vessels of gold, or vessels of silver, of the money that was brought into the house of the LORD;

But they did not use any of that money [to pay men] to make silver cups or wick trimmers or bowls or trumpets or any other items made of silver or gold to be used in the temple.

14 for they gave that to them that did the work, and repaired therewith the house of the LORD.

All that money was given to the men who were doing the work of repairing the temple.

15 Moreover they reckoned not with the men, into whose hand they delivered the money to give to them that did the work; for they dealt faithfully.

The men who supervised the work always did things honestly, so the king’s secretary and the Supreme Priest never required that the supervisors report what they had spent the money for.

16 The forfeit money, and the sin money, was not brought into the house of the LORD; it was the priests.

But the money that people gave to pay for the wrong things that they had done and the money they gave to purify themselves because of the sins that they had committed was not put in the chest. That money belonged to the priests.

17 Then Hazael king of Aram went up, and fought against Gath, and took it; and Hazael set his face to go up to Jerusalem.

At that time, Hazael, the king of Syria, went [with his army] and attacked Gath [city] and conquered it. Then he decided that they would attack Jerusalem.

18 And Jehoash king Judah took all the hallowed things that Jehoshaphat, and Jehoram, and Ahaziah, his fathers, kings of Judah, had dedicated, and his own hallowed things, and all the gold that was found in the treasures of the house of the LORD, and of the king's house, and sent it to Hazael king of Aram; and he went away from Jerusalem.

So Joash, the king of Judah, took all the money that the previous kings, Jehoshaphat and Jehoram and Ahaziah, had dedicated to Yahweh. He added some of his own money, and all the gold that was in the rooms in the temple where valuable things were kept/stored, and the gold in his palace, and sent it all to King Hazael, [to (appease him/persuade him to not attack Jerusalem)]. So King Hazael [took his army] away from Jerusalem.

19 Now 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?

[If you want to read more of] what Joash did, [it] is all written [RHQ] in the scroll called ‘The History of the Kings of Judah’.

20 And his servants arose, and made a conspiracy, and smote Joash at Beth-millo, on the way that goeth down to Silla.

Joash’s officials plotted against him, and two of them killed Joash on the road that goes down to [the] Silla [district]. The two men who did that were Jozabad, the son of Shimeath, and Jehozabad, the son of Shomer. Joash was buried in the place where his ancestors were buried, [in the part of Jerusalem called] ‘The City of David’. Then Joash’s son Amaziah became the king of Judah.

21 For Jozacar the son of Shimeath, and Jehozabad the son of Shomer, his servants, smote him, and he died; and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David; and Amaziah his son reigned in his stead.