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CHAPTER 3 - JOASH, (EIGHTH) KING OF JUDAH. JEHOASH,
(TWELFTH AND THIRTEENTH) KINGS OF ISRAEL
Accession of Jehoahaz - Chronology of the Period - Character of his Reign - Wars with
Syria - The Assyrian Monuments - The Prayer of Jehoahaz and its Answer - Re-
arrangement of the Text -Spiritual Lessons of this History - Accession of Jehoash - The
Dynasty of Jehu and Reversal of the Policy of Ahab - The new Relation to the Prophets -
Explanation of it - The Three Fundamental Principles in the bearing of the Prophets -
Last Interview between Jehoash and Elisha - its Lessons - The Miracle after Elisha's
Death - Victories over Syria. (2 KINGS 13.)
THE reign of Joash, king of Judah, extended over the unusually long period of forty
years.* Acceding to the throne in the seventh year of Jehu, king of Israel, he survived not
only that monarch and his son and successor, Jehoahaz, but also witnessed the accession
of Jehoash. According to the Biblical text, Jehu was followed on the throne of Israel by
Jehoahaz, his son, in the twenty-third, or more strictly speaking, in the twenty-first year
of Joash, king of Judah.**
- The average duration of the reigns in Judah is twenty-two, that in Israel only twelve
years.
** A comparison of 2 Kings 13:1 ("the twenty-third year ") with ver. 10, ("the thirty-
seventh of Joash") shows that these two numbers are incompatible - since, if Jehoahaz
acceded in the twenty-third year of Joash, and "reigned seventeen years," the accession of
his son could not have taken place in "the thirty-seventh," but in the fortieth or in the
thirty-ninth year of the king of Judah, Without here entering into the controversy which
of these two dates should be "corrected," we assume with Josephus (Ant. 9. 8, 5) that the
accession of Jehoahaz of Israel really took place in "the twenty-first year" of Joash, king
of Judah. As, on any theory of the composition of the Books of Kings, the manifest
discrepancy between the numerals in vers. 1 and 10 could not have escaped the writer
there must be some explanation of it, although in the absence of definite materials, it is
impossible to propose any with absolute confidence. Possibly the conciliation may lie,
not in an error of transcription ( nk for ak ) but in the peculiar mode of calculating the
years of a reign in Judah (from the month Nisan)differing from that obtaining in Israel. In
any case, the occurrence of a discrepancy which cannot rationally be attributed to
ignorance on the part of the writer, should make us careful in our inferences about other
chronological difficulties, for which as yet no adequate solution has been found. It by no
means follows that further researches will not bring such to light. This remark applies
especially to the relation between the chronology of the Biblical documents and that on
the Assyrian monuments, which admittedly is not always absolutely exact (see Herzog's
Real-Encykl, new edition, vol. 17., p. 475). Such prospect of future conciliation seems to
(^)