Isaiah 36:3 - "And there came out to him Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, who was over the household, and Hebna the secretary, and Joah, the son of Asaph, the recorder."

The recorder was an officer of high rank in the Jewish state, exercising the functions, not simply of an annalist, but of chancellor or president of the privy council. He was not only the grand custodian of the public records, but also kept the responsible registry of the current transactions of government. Perhaps orginally he kept in mind the decrees and judgments of the king, and possibly the customs of the people.

In David’s court, the recorder appears among the high officers of his household; in Solomon’s court, the recorder is associated with the three secretaries, and is mentioned last, probably being their president. We may assume from the references to him, always in company with other high officials, that he served as an adviser to the king, as well as a chronicler. He was also involved in the payment of the laborers in the repairs to the temple made under Josiah; in this case he seems to outrank or at least to parallel the governor of the city.

He would, then, be comparable to our governmental advisers or, perhaps, a cabinet member in charge of overseeing the financial transactions of the government. Or, to stretch the imagination a bit, we might be able to consider him as a parallel to a recorder of such things as the Congressional Record, or even something as dry as the fiscal budget. At least, his records will survive to the future and give those to come an insight into our way of life, just as the ancient recorder left his records for us to read.