The consequences of the good king Jehoshaphat's alliance with the house of Ahab are still evident in the record of Judah's history here given us, and it could not well be otherwise while Jezebel's daughter, Athaliah, was in power. Ahaziah, the youngest and only living son of Jehoram was made king in his father's stead, and his short reign is only spoken of as characterized by the ways of the house of Ahab, king of Israel, his mother being his guide in wickedness apparently from his boyhood on, and Ahab's family were his counsellors after the death of his father. Would these things pass under the eye of God without notice ? Verse 7 tells us otherwise.
Ahaziah's age was 22 when he began to reign; not 42, an error having been made by a copyist and repeated in our translation. He went with the king of Israel, his uncle (his mother's brother) to war with the king of Syria, as Jehoshaphat had done in Ahab's day, and Jehoram was wounded, returning to Jezreel to be healed. Ahaziah later came to see him, for he was sick.
A fuller account of what happened at Jezreel is given in 2 Kings 9. It suffices the Holy Spirit here to show us that when judgment at the hand of Jehu fell upon Ahab's house to the full, it also fell upon the princes of Judah and the sons of the brethren of Ahaziah—his cousins—who were with Ahaziah at Jezreel, and upon Ahaziah also. None of the house of Ahaziah was able to hold the kingdom.
The wicked Athaliah, seeing what had happened to her brothers and her children, moved as it would appear by a Satanic resolve to cut off completely the house of David, killed every male of them that was left, except a baby, Ahaziah's son Joash, whom Jehoshabeath, her daughter took and hid in the bedroom at the time of the slaughter. Thus God intervened, though for six years the murderess-idolater was allowed to reign over Judah.
Jehoshabeath, moved by God to preserve the infant, was the wife of Jehoiada the priest, and the little one was hid in the temple, its existence unknown to its grandmother who would have killed it. What care must have been taken to hide the child so that its presence might not be known! We are reminded of the infant Moses, hid three months (Exodus 2:1-101And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. 2And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. 3And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink. 4And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him. 5And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by the river's side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. 6And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children. 7Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee? 8And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother. 9And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. 10And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water. (Exodus 2:1‑10)), and preserved by God for His service.