2 Chronicles 22:5-12

22:5 He followed their advice and joined Ahab’s son King Joram ¹  of Israel in a battle against King Hazael of Syria ²  at Ramoth Gilead in which the Syrians defeated Joram. 22:6 Joram ³  returned to Jezreel to recover from the wounds he received from the Syrians ⁴  in Ramah when he fought against King Hazael of Syria. Ahaziah ⁵  son of King Jehoram of Judah went down to visit Joram son of Ahab in Jezreel, because he had been wounded. ⁶ 

22:7 God brought about Ahaziah’s downfall through his visit to Joram. ⁷  When Ahaziah ⁸  arrived, he went out with Joram to meet Jehu son of Nimshi, whom the Lord had commissioned ⁹  to wipe out Ahab’s family. ¹⁰  22:8 While Jehu was dishing out punishment to Ahab’s family, he discovered the officials of Judah and the sons of Ahaziah’s relatives who were serving Ahaziah and killed them. 22:9 He looked for Ahaziah, who was captured while hiding in Samaria. ¹¹  They brought him to Jehu and then executed him. They did give him a burial, for they reasoned, ¹²  “He is the son of Jehoshaphat, who sought the Lord with his whole heart.” There was no one in Ahaziah’s family strong enough to rule in his place. ¹³ 

Athaliah is Eliminated

22:10 When Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she was determined to destroy the entire royal line ¹⁴  of Judah. ¹⁵  22:11 So Jehoshabeath, ¹⁶  the daughter of King Jehoram, ¹⁷  took Ahaziah’s son Joash and sneaked him away ¹⁸  from the rest of the royal descendants who were to be executed. She hid him and his nurse in the room where the bed covers were stored. So Jehoshabeath the daughter of King Jehoram, wife of Jehoiada the priest and sister of Ahaziah, hid him from Athaliah so she could not execute him. 22:12 He remained in hiding in God’s temple ¹⁹  for six years, while Athaliah was ruling over the land.

¹ sn Jehoram and Joram are alternate spellings of the Israelite king’s name (also in vv. 6-7). The shorter form is used in these verse to avoid confusion with King Jehoram of Judah, father of Azariah.

² tn Heb “Aram” (also in v. 6).

³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Joram) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁴ tn Heb “which the Syrians inflicted [on] him.”

⁵ tc Most Hebrew mss read “Azariah.” A few Hebrew mss, the LXX, Vulgate, and Syriac read “Ahaziah” (cf. 2 Kgs 8:29).

⁶ tn Heb “because he was sick,” presumably referring to the wounds he received in the battle with the Syrians.

⁷ tn Heb “From God was the downfall of Ahaziah by going to Joram.”

⁸ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Ahaziah) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁹ tn Heb “anointed.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “to cut off the house of Ahab.”

¹¹ map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.

¹² tn Heb “they said.”

¹³ tn Heb “and there was no one belonging to the house of Ahaziah to retain strength for kingship.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “she arose and she destroyed all the royal offspring.” The verb קוּם (qum, “arise”) is here used in an auxiliary sense to indicate that she embarked on a campaign to destroy the royal offspring. See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 125.

¹⁵ tn Heb “house of Judah.”

¹⁶ sn Jehoshabeath is a variant spelling of the name Jehosheba (2 Kgs 11:2).

¹⁷ tn Heb “the king”; the referent (King Jehoram, see later in this verse) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁸ tn Heb “stole.”

¹⁹ tn Heb “and he was with them in the house of God hiding.”