2 Kings 12:4 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

And Jehoash said to the priests The house of God having been neglected, and suffered to go to decay in the time of Athaliah and her son, Jehoash, in gratitude to God, who had preserved him there, resolved to have it repaired; and, in order thereto, commanded what money should be set apart for that purpose. All the money of the dedicated things That had been or should hereafter be brought and dedicated to the service of God and of the temple. As it appears from 2 Chronicles 24:5, that the priests went through the land to collect money, it seems the people were required to dedicate something toward these repairs. The money of every one that passeth the account The words, the account, are not in the Hebrew, so that it is likely this clause is to be understood of the offerings which pious people cast into the boxes prepared to receive them, as they passed into the temple. The money that every man is set at Namely, the money that every man, who had vowed his person to God, paid or was to pay for his redemption, by the estimation made by the priest, according to the law, Leviticus 27:2-3. In the Hebrew it is the money of souls, or persons according to his taxing. As soon as this money was paid by any one, he was freed from the vow wherewith he had bound himself: but till it was paid, his life was not his own, but God's. All the money that cometh into any man's heart to bring, &c. This was the third sort of money for the reparation of the temple; that which any man would give freely for that service.