Jotham rested with his ancestors and was buried in the City of David. And Ahaz his son succeeded him as king. – 2 Chronicles 27:9

Today’s Scripture Reading (January 21, 2020): 2 Chronicles 27

One morbid part of my personality is that I seem to have a craving to know how or why people die. Was the death of a person just the natural end of life, or was some other force involved? With historical figures, sometimes we know, and sometimes we don’t.

Jotham of Judah lies in the latter category. We don’t know how or why Jotham died. All we know is that he died at approximately the age of forty-one, and rested in the City of David. But there are some clues as to what it might have been that ended his life.

Jotham was a successful King. The truth is that he inherited a good, well-run kingdom from his father and that Jotham was able to maintain, and in some ways, even expand, the inheritance that had been left to him. We know that Jotham waged war with the Ammonites and defeated them, bringing into Judah payments of tribute (2 Chronicles 27:5). It is quite possible that Jotham was more concerned with expanding the Kingdom of Judah than his immediate predecessors had been.

But Jotham’s desire to expand Judah also brought him into conflict with his neighbors. 2 Kings specifically mentions that Rezin of Aram and Pekah of Israel started to move against Judah near the end of Jotham’s life (2 King 15:37). It is possible that Jotham fell in battle against these kings, but the Bible does not mention that this is what happened.

Another theory is that Assyria removed Jotham in favor of his son Ahaz, who was more willing to submit to the growing Assyrian Empire. In fact, when Rezin and Pekah attacked Ahaz early in his reign, they could not overpower him because Ahaz had Assyrian help (2 Kings 16:5, 7). It seems to be inconceivable that Jotham would have paid tribute to Assyria, but that is precisely what Ahaz did.

So, when we are asking why Jotham seemed to die suddenly at the relatively young age of forty-one, there might be more than a little palace intrigue in the answer. But the one thing that we do know for sure is that Jotham died, Ahaz succeeded him, and this exchange of Kings lessened the Kingdom of Judah. While Jotham worked hard to continue and live up to the legacy of his father, Uzziah (also known as Azariah), Ahaz seemed to set out to undo everything his father and grandfather had worked hard to accomplish in Judah.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Chronicles 28