1. In the second year of Joash, son of Jehoahaz, king of Israel, Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah, became king.
2. He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jehoaddin, from Jerusalem.
3. He did what was right in the Lord’s eyes, though not like David his father. He did just as his father Joash had done,
4. though the high places did not disappear, and the people continued to sacrifice and to burn incense on the high places.
5. When Amaziah had the kingdom firmly in hand, he struck down the officials who had struck down the king, his father.
6. But their children he did not put to death, according to what is written in the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord commanded: “Parents shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their parents; only for one’s own crimes shall a person be put to death.”
7. Amaziah struck down ten thousand Edomites in the Salt Valley. He took Sela in battle and renamed it Joktheel, the name it has to this day.
8. Then Amaziah sent messengers to Joash, son of Jehoahaz, son of Jehu, king of Israel, with this message: “Come, let us meet face to face.”
9. Joash, king of Israel, sent this reply to Amaziah, king of Judah: “A thistle of Lebanon sent word to a cedar of Lebanon, ‘Give your daughter to my son in marriage,’ but an animal of Lebanon passed by and trampled the thistle underfoot.