2 Kings 12:4

4 Jehoash said to the priests, "Collect all the currently available money relating to holy things that is brought to the temple-some is money people pay to redeem persons according to their assessed value. Collect all the money brought to the LORD's temple that people offer voluntarily.

2 Kings 12:4 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 12:4

And Jehoash said to the priests
Being minded or having it in his heart, to repair the temple, as in ( 2 Chronicles 24:4 ) not only because it was the sanctuary of the Lord, though that chiefly, but because it had been a sanctuary to him, where he was hid and preserved six years:

all the money of the dedicated things that is brought into the house of
the Lord:
or rather, "that is to be brought", as De Dieu, and others render it, the particulars of which follow:

even the money of everyone that passeth [the account];
or that passeth among them that are numbered, as in ( Exodus 30:13 Exodus 30:14 ) that were upwards of twenty years of age, and bound to pay the half shekel for the ransom of their souls; and it is called the collection or burden Moses laid on them in the wilderness, ( 2 Chronicles 24:6 2 Chronicles 24:9 )

the money that every man is set at;
the price the priest set upon or estimated a man at, or whomsoever that belonged to him, that he devoted to the Lord, which by the law he was bound to pay for his redemption, and, till that was done, he and they were not his, but the Lord's, of which see ( Leviticus 27:1-8 ) and here the Targum calls it, the money of the redemption of souls, which is the gift of a man for the redemption of his soul:

and all the money that cometh into any man's heart to bring into the
house of the Lord:
vows and freewill offerings made of their own accord.

2 Kings 12:4 In-Context

2 Jehoash always did what was right in the LORD's eyes, because the priest Jehoiada was his teacher.
3 However, the shrines were not removed. People kept sacrificing and burning incense at them.
4 Jehoash said to the priests, "Collect all the currently available money relating to holy things that is brought to the temple-some is money people pay to redeem persons according to their assessed value. Collect all the money brought to the LORD's temple that people offer voluntarily.
5 The priests should take the money from their donors and use it to repair the temple wherever such a need for repair is discovered."
6 But by the twenty-third year of King Jehoash, the priests still hadn't repaired the temple.

Footnotes 1

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