Thus Joas came to the throne as a boy of seven years old, and his reign at Jerusalem lasted forty years. His mother’s name was Sebia, a woman of Bersabee.

As long as the high priest Joiada was alive, Joas obeyed the Lord’s will,

and it was Joiada who found him his two wives, that bore sons and daughters to him.

And now Joas had a mind to put the Lord’s house in repair.

He summoned priests and Levites, and bade them go round the cities of Juda, collecting money from all that were of Israel’s race every year, so as to repair the temple of the Lord their God; and this he would have them do with all speed. But the Levites went about their work slowly,

and the king must needs send for the high priest Joiada; Why hast thou been at no pains, he asked, to make the Levites collect money throughout Juda and Jerusalem, the same money which the Lord’s servant Moses bade all Israel devote to the needs of the tabernacle?✻

Here is God’s house all laid waste by Athalia, the godless queen, and those sons of hers, that would deck Baal’s temple with all the votive offerings that were once in the temple of the Lord.

Then the king bade them have a chest made, and this they put by the outer gate of the Lord’s house.

And word went round Juda and Jerusalem that each man was to pay the tax Moses enjoined on all Israel, out in the desert.

Gladly did chieftains and common folk together come in with their gifts for the Lord’s treasury, piling the chest high till it was full.

When the Levites saw that a great sum was amassed, it was time they should take it into the royal presence. The king’s secretary would come in, and with him one that was appointed by the high priest; together they poured out the money that was in the chest, which they then put back in its place. Every day this was done, and the great sum thus collected

was paid over by the king and Joiada to the master-builders, who hired stone-cutters with it, and other craftsmen, to repair the Lord’s house; workers, too, in iron and bronze, so as to prop up what was like to fall down.

Busily these men went about their tasks, till the breach was healed under their hands, and the building restored to its former state; the house stood firm once more.

It was only when they had finished all this that the rest of the money collected was brought before the king and Joiada; with this they made all the appurtenances for worship and offering sacrifice in the temple; bowls, too, and other ornaments of gold and silver.✻

All through Joiada’s life-time burnt-sacrifice was offered in the Lord’s house;

but at last he grew old, and the full tale of his years was complete; he died at the age of a hundred and thirty.

And for his great services to Israel and to David’s house, they buried him in David’s own Keep, among the kings.

But now that he was dead, the chieftains of Juda came in to do the king reverence, and with their smooth speech won him over to another mind;

forgotten, now, was the Lord’s temple, God of their fathers though he were; they must worship before forest shrines, and carved images. This guilt of theirs brought the Lord’s vengeance on Juda and Jerusalem;

still he would send them prophets, to bring them back to him, but their protest went unheeded.

At last the divine spirit fell on the high priest Zacharias, that was son to Joiada; full in the presence of the people he stood up and gave them a message from the Lord God: What means it that you so transgress the Lord’s command, to your peril, forsaking him, and by him forsaken?

But they, at the king’s orders, gathered about him and stoned him, there in the court of the Lord’s house.

Such was the gratitude of Joas; for the great services the father had done him, the son must die. And as he died, he said, May the Lord look on this, and exact the penalty.

A year passed, and the army of Syria was on the march against Joas. Into Juda, into Jerusalem they came, killed all that were of note among the people, plundered, and sent back what they had plundered to their master at Damascus.

It was but a small force of Syrians that came, yet the Lord gave them the mastery over a great host; and all because Juda had forsaken the Lord God of their fathers. A shameful punishment Joas must undergo,

and when they left him, they left him a prey to heavy sickness. Then, in vengeance for the murder of the high priest’s son, courtiers of his own conspired against him and slew him in his bed. So dying, he received burial in the Keep of David, but not in the burying-place of the kings.

It was Zabad, son of the Ammonitess Semmaath, and Josabad, son of the Moabitess Semarith, that made the plot against him.

What sons he had, what moneys he amassed, how he restored the house of God, may all be found set out in the Records of the Kings; and the throne passed to his son Amasias.