¹ tn Heb “your repairers of damage.” See v. 9.

¹ tn Heb “and to buy wood and chiseled stone to repair the house.”

¹ tn Heb “and for all that which was going out concerning the house for repair.”

² tn Heb “and not to repair the damages to the temple.” This does not mean that the priests were no longer interested in repairing the temple. As the following context makes clear, the priests decided to hire skilled workers to repair the damage to the temple, rather than trying to make the repairs themselves.

³ tn Grk “he tears.” The point is that the new garment will be ruined to repair an older, less valuable one.

¹ tn Heb “and the doers of the work worked, and the repairs went up for the work by their hand.”

¹ tn Heb “and it was, later, there was with the heart of Joash to repair the house of the Lord.”

³ tn Heb “Like this I will break this people and this city, just as one breaks the vessel of a potter that is not able to be repaired.”

² tn Heb “and they gave it to the doers of the work who were working in the house of the Lord to restore and to repair the house.”

² tn Heb “and let them give it to the doers of the work who are in the house of the Lord to repair the damages to the house.”

² tn Heb “strengthening damages.” Here “to strengthen” means to repair. The word for “damages” occurs several times in 1 Kgs 12 about some type of damage to the temple, which may have referred to or included cracks. Since the context describes Tyre in its glory, we do not expect this reference to damages to be of significant scale, even if there are repairmen. This may refer to using pitch to seal the seams of the ship, which had to be done periodically and could be considered routine maintenance rather than repair of damage.

¹ tn Heb “Let the priests take for themselves, each from his treasurer, and let them repair the damage of the temple, with respect to all the damage that is found there.” The word מַכָּר (makar), translated here “treasurer,” occurs only in this passage. Some suggest it means “merchant” or “benefactor.” Its usage in Ugaritic texts, where it appears in a list of temple officials, suggests that it refers in this context to individuals who were in charge of disbursing temple funds.

¹ sn The word for “serve” is not the ordinary one. It means “to serve in a host,” especially in a war. It appears that women were organized into bands and served at the tent of meeting. S. R. Driver thinks that this meant “no doubt” washing, cleaning, or repairing (Exodus, 391). But there is no hint of that (see 1 Sam 2:22; and see Ps 68:11 [12 HT]). They seem to have had more to do than what Driver said.

² tc The Hebrew text has “the one who restores paths for dwelling.” The idea of “paths to dwell in” is not a common notion. Some have proposed emending נְתִיבוֹת (n^etivot, “paths”) to נְתִיצוֹת (n^etitsot, “ruins”), a passive participle from נָתַץ (natats, “tear down”; see HALOT 732 s.v. *נְתִיצָה), because tighter parallelism with the preceding line is achieved. However, none of the textual sources support this emendation. The line may mean that paths must be repaired in order to dwell in the land.

² tc The MT reads the anomalous מִכָּל־הַמְּקֹמוֹת (mikkol hamm^eqomot, “from every place”) but the BHS editors propose כָּל־הַמְּזִמּוֹת (kol hamm^ezimmot, “about every scheme”). The initial mem (מ) found in the MT may have been added accidentally due to dittography with the final mem (ם) on the immediately preceding word, and the MT qof (ק) may have arisen due to orthographic confusion with the similar looking zayin (ז). The emendation restores sense to the line in the MT, which makes little sense and features an abrupt change of referents: “Wherever you turn, they will be upon us!” The threat was not against the villagers living nearby but against those repairing the wall, as the following context indicates. See also the following note on the word “plotting.”

¹ tc Assuming that the MT reading וַיַּעַזְבוּ (vayyaʿaz^evu) is related to the root עָזַב I (“to abandon”)—which makes little sense contextually—some interpreters emend the MT to וַיַּעַזְרוּ (vayyaʿaz^eru, “they aided”), as suggested by the editors of BHS. However, it is better to relate this term to the root II עָזַב meaning “to restore; to repair” (BDB 738 s.v. II עָזַב) or “to plaster” (HALOT 807 s.v. II עזב qal.1). This homonymic root is rare, appearing elsewhere only in Exod 23:5 and Job 9:27, where it means “to restore; to put in order” (HALOT 807-8 s.v. II עזב qal.2). The related Mishnaic Hebrew noun מעזיבה refers to a “plastered floor.” This Hebrew root is probably related to the cognate Ugaritic, Old South Arabic and Sabean verbs that mean “to restore” and “to prepare; to lay” (see BDB 738 s.v.; HALOT 807 s.v.). Some scholars in the nineteenth century suggested that this term be nuanced “paved.” However, most modern English versions have “restored” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV) or “rebuilt” (so NCV, CEV).