Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Joash
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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2 Chronicles 24:1-2
II Chronicles 22:10 reads, “Now when Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal heirs of the house of Judah.” Athaliah, daughter of Israel's King Ahab and Jezebel and thus the granddaughter of Omri (II Chronicles 22:2), was the wife of Jehoram, king of Judah. Once her son had died by the hand of Jehu, she staged a coup, killing all of Ahaziah's heirs and taking the throne. She reigned for six years. But Jehoshabeath, who was the daughter of Jehoram and (perhaps) Athaliah, took Joash, her youngest nephew and still an infant, and hid him from Athaliah's henchmen, saving his life (II Chronicles 22:12). Evidently, when she saw the carnage taking place, she ran into the nursery, picked up Joash, and put him in one of her own rooms with a nurse. In short order, he was spirited away to the Temple, where he lived in secret for the next six years (II Chronicles 22:12). Jehoshabeath could do this because she had made an excellent marriage to Jehoiada, one of the best high priests in Israelite history. In the life of Joash, Jehoiada proved a powerful influence for good. Joash reigned for forty years, but unfortunately, Jehoiada did not live through its entirety. Despite being the front man as the heir of David, Joash did not really have it in him to be king—but Jehoiada did. We see this to be true in the next verses: Now after the death of Jehoiada the leaders of Judah came and bowed down to the king. And the king listened to them. Therefore they left the house of the LORD God of their fathers, and served wooden images and idols . . .. (II Chronicles 24:17-18) The wording in the first part of the last sentence implies that these Judahite leaders abandoned the way of life represented by the Temple. We would say that they “left the church.” In other words, the nation's entire political leadership apostatized, using weak Joash to return to the paganism they had enjoyed under Joash's grandfather, father, and grandmother. We could call Joash a “fellow traveler.” He was a leaner, a clinging vine, who did not have the resources within himself to forge his own path. Once Jehoiada died, whenever the pressure of leadership fell on him, he had no one to lean on, and he faltered and declined. Spiritually, he died. Without Jehoiada, Joash bent whichever way the wind blew. His peers in the realm found him easy to influence, as he would follow the crowd. His character reflected the group of courtiers around him at any given moment. When Jehoiada was with him, his beneficial influence made Joash compliant and a good king. But when he was with a bad crowd, men like the idolatrous leaders of Judah, he followed them like a lost puppy, too afraid to buck his peers. Finally, he would not repent when God warned him that he was going astray. Joash's fate was assassination and the disgrace of not being buried with the kings (II Chronicles 24:25). We can see Joash's character as merely programmed but not internalized. We might also describe it as reflective of those around him rather than genuinely his. Faith must be grounded within us and personally held. We cannot go through life on someone else's coattails. As Ezekiel 14:14 teaches, even Noah, Job, and Daniel, three of the most righteous, faithful men in all of history, could save only themselves.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Three Missing Kings (Part Two)
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2 Chronicles 24:2
In the life of Joash, Jehoiada proved a powerful influence for good. Joash reigned for forty years, but unfortunately, Jehoiada did not live through its entirety, as II Chronicles 24:15-16 relates: But Jehoiada grew old and full of days, and he died; he was one hundred and thirty years old when he died. And they buried him in the city of David among the kings. The Bible does not record that many high priests were buried with the kings of Judah. This honor is quite distinctive. It is a recognition of his being a great, righteous man and a tremendous, positive influence on Joash, as well as an acknowledgment that Jehoiada had actually ruled the kingdom. Despite being the front man as the heir of David, Joash did not really have it in him to be king—but Jehoiada did. We see this to be true in the next verses: Now after the death of Jehoiada the leaders of Judah came and bowed down to the king. And the king listened to them. Therefore they left the house of the LORD God of their fathers, and served wooden images and idols . . .. (II Chronicles 24:17-18) The wording in the first part of the last sentence implies that these Judahite leaders abandoned the way of life represented by the Temple. We would say that they “left the church.” In other words, the nation's entire political leadership apostatized, using weak Joash to return to the paganism they had enjoyed under Joash's grandfather, father, and grandmother. God was not pleased: . . . and wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem because of their trespass. Yet He sent prophets to them, to bring them back to the LORD; and they testified against them, but they would not listen. Then the Spirit of God came upon Zechariah, son of Jehoiada the priest, who stood above the people, and said to them, “Thus says God: 'Why do you transgress the commandments of the LORD so you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the LORD, He also has forsaken you.' So they conspired against him, and at the command of the king they stoned him with stones in the court of the house of the LORD. Thus Joash did not remember the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him . . .. (II Chronicles 24:18-22) Jehoiada was not his biological father, but he had acted as his father. He had reared this king of Judah from his infancy, but Joash appears not to have appreciated all that Jehoiada had done for him. Thus Joash the king did not remember the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him, but killed his son; and as he died, [Zechariah] said, “The LORD look on it, and repay!” (II Chronicles 24:22) This heinous act shows what ingratitude can do to a person's thinking. Jesus refers to this murder in Matthew 23:35-36 when He says that the Jewish authorities had slain His prophets “from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.” Interestingly, Jesus seems to answer Zechariah's plea to bring them to justice for his death, saying in verse 36, “Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.” God made him and his counselors account for Zechariah's death not long thereafter, sending the Syrians against Judah and Jerusalem (II Chronicles 24:23-24). The Syrian army not only plundered the wealth of the leaders of Judah, but they also killed them. So God punished them for their part in Zechariah's death. Joash did not escape the divine judgment. His fate was assassination and the disgrace of not being buried with the kings (II Chronicles 24:25). It makes for a fascinating contrast to compare him, a scion of David who suffered death at the hands of his servants, with his “father” Jehoiada, a descendant of Aaron whom the people held in such high regard that they buried him among the kings. The one's path led to shame while the other's led to honor.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Three Missing Kings (Part Two)
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2 Chronicles 24:2
Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah all started out well but later hardened their hearts. They all rejected God's Word and refused to repent. God wanted them to return to Him, but their intransigence forced His hand. Is God hard? Is He austere and unmerciful? Does God owe us salvation and eternal life? Is He bound to give us blessings regardless of our conduct, despite the direction of our lives? No, our choices decide our fate (see Ezekiel 18:23-28). God demands individual responsibility. He never condones sin nor grants license for anyone to disobey His commands. The subject here is not about transgressions done out of weakness or ignorance but those committed as a way of life with knowledge of wrongdoing. He judges such sins seriously. Yet, even for such sins, God always desires and allows the sinner to repent. As we see in the examples of these kings, He will always chase after the sinner with His Word and allow him time to repent. He always leaves the door open for a sinner who will return to Him. But eventually, the mind becomes set (Ecclesiastes 8:11), the conscience becomes seared (I Timothy 4:2), and repentance becomes impossible. At some point, a sinner will no longer change, and God says that He then makes a final judgment. He tells Moses after he had offered his own life for the sins of Israel, “Whoever has sinned against Me, I will blot him out of My book” (Exodus 32:33). God enters names into the Book of Life, and He has the prerogative to erase names from it as well—a sobering thought indeed. Essentially, Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah all quoted Deuteronomy 29:19: “I shall have peace, even though I walk in the imagination [dictates] of my heart.” At a certain point, confronted with their sins, they said, “I will not repent, I will not listen to God's prophets. I will continue in the direction I am going, and despite that, I will live in peace and prosperity.” God says that is the kind of thinking He expects from a drunk: “I can continue to drink and not get become impaired.” In verse 20, Moses reaches a scary conclusion about how God would deal with such a person at that point: The LORD would not spare him; for then the anger of the LORD and His jealousy would burn against that man, and every curse that is written in this book would settle on him, and the LORD would blot out his name from under heaven. Through Moses, God is saying, “Do not kid yourself. You cannot live in violation of My ways and expect Me not to respond.” Most of us have come out of a Protestant society that teaches that God is essentially obligated to give us salvation because of the depth of His grace. Protestant theology proclaims that His mercy is so great that, as long as we have accepted the blood of Jesus Christ, salvation is assured. This claim is not true. While this teaching tickles people's ears, they forget that God's justice perfectly balances His mercy, and His love tempers both. He knows that anybody who desires to live in a way opposed to His way of life would be miserable for all eternity should he inherit the Kingdom of God. God's sense of justice will not allow Him to give eternal life to such a person. He will not commit a person to that depth of misery, nor will He allow him to cause suffering for others. Like Satan, he would be a thorn in the side of the godly. If God determines that it would not be good for someone to live in His Kingdom, because he refuses to live as God requires, he will not be there.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Three Missing Kings (Part Two)
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2 Chronicles 24:15-16
It is not known if many high priests were buried among the kings. This honor was quite distinctive, and it was a recognition of two things: 1) that he was a great, righteous man and a tremendous influence on Joash; 2) that in reality Jehoiada actually ruled Judah for many years. He was the real king, whereas Joash, the front man, did not have what it took to be a good king. However, Jehoiada did.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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2 Chronicles 24:18-22
Jehoiada the priest was not Joash's biological father, but he had acted as a father to him. He had essentially reared this king of Judah. This passage recounts the murder that Jesus referred to in Matthew 23:35, when He said, "'You murdered [Zechariah] between the temple and the altar." It just shows what ingratitude can do to a person's thinking. Let us evaluate Joash's character. He was a "fellow traveler." He was a leaner, a clinging vine, who did not have the resources within himself to choose his own course. Whenever he was pressured, he had nothing within to give him strength, so he drooped and spiritually died. Joash bent whichever way the wind blew. He was easily influenced by his peers. He went whatever way the crowd was going. His character reflected the crowd that he had joined. When Jehoiada was with him, and the influence was for good, then Joash was compliant and seemingly a good king. However, when he was with his peers, a bad crowd, he was afraid to buck his peers and his character plummeted. We should also add that he did not repent when he was warned. In the end, he was assassinated and not buried with the kings (II Chronicles 24:25). Is that not an interesting contrast between him and his "father" Jehoiada, who was not even in the kingly line but a priest. Yet, he was held in such high regard that he was buried with the kings. We must conclude that Joash's character was merely programmed; it had not truly been internalized. It was not genuine. Faith and character have to be grounded within us and personally held. We should recall Ezekiel 14:14, concerning Noah, Job, and Daniel. Even these three righteous men could save only themselves.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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2 Chronicles 24:25
Most translators believe “sons” should be singular “son,” as the Septuagint reads. But it is not without precedence that monarchs have taken vengeance on family members of their opponents. Joash's grandfather and grandmother, Jehoram and Athaliah, both purged their families of potential rivals (II Chronicles 21:4; 22:10). Perhaps their examples inspired Joash to kill some of Jehoiada's family to somehow avert Zechariah's plea for divine repayment. If such were the case, plural “sons” would be correct.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Three Missing Kings (Part Two)
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2 Chronicles 25:18
In the parable, Amaziah of Judah is the thistle, and Joash of Israel is the cedar. A cedar is mighty and strong, while a thistle is so weak that a little old forest animal could trample it to smithereens and scatter it. He is taunting them, "Try to attack me, and I will step on you like on a thistle, and all the seeds will blow everywhere." Well, Amaziah, in his puffed-up pride, having just won a battle against the Edomites says "Heh, heh, I will get you," but he did not get them. He went to battle against Israel, and he got himself smashed, just as Joash said he would be.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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2 Chronicles 25:27-28
Most of us have probably seen a Western in which a man gets shot out the wilderness somewhere, and someone ties his body onto the horse, draped over the top, stomach to the saddle, with his hands tied to his feet underneath. That is what they did to Amaziah, just tied him to a horse and sent him back to Jerusalem. What an ignominious ending for the royal seed! Let us evaluate his character. What we see in him is vacillating instability. He was a great deal like Joash, but Amaziah wanted the best of both worlds. We could compare his life to the parable Jesus gave of a man who began to build yet was not able to finish. Amaziah started off well. He listened to the prophet of God and repented. When he changed his ways, God gave him a great victory, but then he began to turn. He was a man who was semi-religious and unsteady in character and conduct. He had the right kind of piety and godliness early in his life, but early piety and godliness is no excuse for self-indulgence later on. The flaw we see beginning to develop is that these three kings (Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah) all began well, but they did not finish well.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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2 Chronicles 26:5
Is this not reminiscent of Joash, who sought God in the days of Jehoiada? Here is Zechariah, another strong priest, who had understanding in the visions of God. As long as Uzziah sought the Lord, God made him prosper. God helped him against the Philistines, giving him many victories.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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Ezekiel 18:24-28
There is an individual responsibility. God never condones sin nor grants license for anyone to disobey His commands. This is not speaking about our transgressions done out of weakness or ignorance. These are transgressions that are done as a way of life with knowledge that one is doing wrong. However, God always allows the sinner to repent. He will always chase after the sinner with His Word, giving him the opportunity to turn around. We see that in the lives of the kings Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah. God always leaves the door open for a sinner who desires to repent. If he does not repent, his mind eventually becomes set, seared, and over time, repentance becomes impossible.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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Matthew 1:7-11
I Chronicles 3 contains a counterpart to Matthew's list, at least his middle section covering the kings of Judah, that is, the family of David: Solomon's son was Rehoboam; Abijah was his son, Asa his son, Jehoshaphat his son, Joram his son, Ahaziah his son, Joash his son, Amaziah his son, Azariah his son, Jotham his son, Ahaz his son, Hezekiah his son, Manasseh his son, Amon his son, Josiah his son. The sons of Josiah were Johanan the firstborn, the second Jehoiakim, the third Zedekiah, and the fourth Shallum. The sons of Jehoiakim were Jeconiah his son and Zedekiah his son. (I Chronicles 3:10-16) From David to Zedekiah, twenty-one kings reigned in Judah. But in Matthew's list, only the names of fifteen kings appear. Three of the six left out, the three who followed Josiah (Shallum/Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Zedekiah), were of the same generation, brothers—blood relatives, of the same family line. However, two of them, Shallum and Zedekiah, are not direct ancestors of Jesus and so are not included, providing a logical reason for their absence. Matthew further disparages this generation by skipping over Jehoiakim and naming his son, Jehoiachin or Jeconiah, as Josiah's son (his literal grandson). In addition, a renegade queen, Athaliah, is not on either list. She was the granddaughter of Omri, king of Israel (II Chronicles 22:2), and a truly evil woman. She usurped the throne following her son Ahaziah's death by killing all his heirs. She deserves exclusion, yet some of the most evil kings of Judah are on the list as part of Christ's ancestry. Another three kings whose names appear in the king list in I Chronicles 3 fail to appear in Matthew's list. Which three kings they are is not entirely clear because of a confusion of names. There are two possibilities. The kings in question appear in I Chronicles 3:11-12: “Joram his son, Ahaziah his son, Joash his son, Amaziah his son, Azariah his son, Jotham his son.” The first possibility is that Matthew excluded Ahaziah, Joash, and Amaziah from his list because of their connection to Athaliah. The second possibility is that he left Joash, Amaziah, and Azariah off his list. The last of these kings is better known as Uzziah. Why did Matthew drop them from Jesus' family tree? Rather than excluding them due to their connection to Athaliah, he may have omitted them to draw attention to a disastrous flaw these three men had in common. God does not tell us which is the correct answer. Either of the two possibilities would be a good enough reason for their absence from Matthew's list. The second, however, has greater application to Christians living and growing today. We are not descended from or have any direct connections to Athaliah, but we may well have a similar spiritual problem to what Joash, Amaziah, and Uzziah had.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Three Missing Kings (Part One)
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Find more Bible verses about Joash:
Joash {Nave's}
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