2 Kings 12:7

7 So King Joash called for Jehoiada and the other priests and asked them, "Why aren't you repairing the damage in the temple? Don't take any more money from the donors [for your own use]. Instead, use it to make repairs on the temple."

2 Kings 12:7 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 12:7

Then King Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and the other
priests
The common priests, Jehoiada being high priest:

and said unto them, why repair ye not the breaches of the house?
in which they appeared to him very dilatory; the reason might be, the people were not forward to pay in their money, and they might not choose to begin the repairs until they had got it all in, or at least what was sufficient to carry them through them:

now therefore receive no more money of your acquaintance;
suspecting that what they had received they kept for their own use:

but deliver it for the breaches of the house;
into other hands for that use, and so dismissed them at once from collecting the money, and being concerned in the repairs of the temple.

2 Kings 12:7 In-Context

5 Each of the priests should receive it from the donors and use it to make repairs on the temple where they are needed."

6 But by Joash's twenty-third year as king, the priests still had not repaired the temple.

7 So King Joash called for Jehoiada and the other priests and asked them, "Why aren't you repairing the damage in the temple? Don't take any more money from the donors [for your own use]. Instead, use it to make repairs on the temple."

8 The priests agreed neither to receive money from the people [for personal use] nor to be responsible for repairing the temple.

9 Then the priest Jehoiada took a box, drilled a hole in its lid, and put it at the right side of the altar as one comes into the LORD's temple. The priests who guarded the entrance put the money that was brought to the LORD's temple in the box.