King Joash (Judah)

Joash (Jehoash), the sole survivor of Athaliah's purge, was crowned at seven in the Temple and reigned 40 years in Jerusalem, guided by the priest Jehoiada. Finding the Temple still unrepaired in his 23rd year, he had Jehoiada set a chest with a hole in its lid beside the altar; the donations paid carpenters, masons and stonecutters directly (2 Kings 12). When Hazael of Aram took Gath and turned toward Jerusalem, Joash bought him off with the Temple and palace treasures.

After Jehoiada's death, 2 Chronicles 24 says, the king's officials led him to worship Asherah poles and idols. When Jehoiada's son Zechariah rebuked them, Joash had him stoned in the Temple court; dying, Zechariah said, "May the Lord see and avenge." Joash was later wounded by an Aramean raid and murdered in his bed by two of his servants. The Talmud (Gittin 57b) tells that Zechariah's blood kept seething on the Temple floor until the Babylonian conquest. A stone tablet describing his Temple repairs, the "Jehoash Inscription," which surfaced in 2003, was declared a forgery by the Israel Antiquities Authority.