Jeremiah 52
52
Babylon Destroys Jerusalem
1Zedekiah was 21 years old when he became king and he reigned 11 years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.
2And he did what was evil in Adonai’s eyes, just like all Jehoiakim had done.
3Because of Adonai’s anger it came to the point in Jerusalem and Judah that He had them cast out of His presence. So Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.
4It came to pass in the ninth year of his reign in the tenth month, the tenth day of the month, that King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came—he and all his army—against Jerusalem, and besieged it. They built a siege wall all around it.
5So the city was besieged until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.
6In the fourth month, the ninth day of the month, the famine was so severe in the city, that there was no food for the people of the land.
7Then the city was broken into, and all the men of war fled, going out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was near the king’s garden—even though the Chaldeans were all around the city. They were heading along the way of the Arabah.
8But the Chaldean army pursued the king and overtook Zedekiah in the desert plains of Jericho. Then all his army was scattered from him.
9Then they took the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah in the land of Hamath. He passed judgment on him.
10At Riblah, the king of Babylon slaughtered Zedekiah’s sons before his eyes, and also all the Judean leaders.
11Then he put out Zedekiah’s eyes. Then the king of Babylon bound him in bronze chains, and brought him to Babylon, where he put him in prison until the day of his death.
12Now in the fifth month, the tenth day of the month—which was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon—Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard came into Jerusalem to represent the king of Babylon.
13Then he burned the House of Adonai, the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem. He burned every large house with fire.
14Then all the Chaldean army, which was with the captain of the guard, broke down all the walls of Jerusalem all around.
15Then Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried into exile some of the poorest of the people, the rest of the people who were left in the city, the deserters who had defected to the king of Babylon, and what remained of the craftsmen.
16But Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left some of the poorest of the land to be vinedressers and plowmen.
17The Chaldeans smashed the bronze pillars of the House of Adonai, the stands and the bronze sea that were in the House of Adonai, and carried all the bronze to Babylon.
18The pots, the shovels, the wick trimmers, the basins, the pans, and all the bronze articles for Temple service, they also took away.
19The cups, the fire-pans, the basins, the pots, the menorot, the pans, and the drink offering bowls—whatever was gold or silver—the captain of the guard took away.
20As for the two pillars, one sea, and twelve bronze bulls that were under the stands that King Solomon had made for the House of Adonai—all these articles had bronze beyond weighing.
21The height of one pillar was 18 cubits and it was twelve cubits in circumference and four fingers in its thickness—it was hollow.
22There was a bronze capital on it—the height of one capital was five cubits, with latticework and pomegranates upon the capital all around, all of bronze. The second pillar was the same, with pomegranates.
23There were 96 pomegranates on the outside; including all the pomegranates around the lattice, there were 100.
24Then the captain of the guard took Seraiah the kohen gadol , and Zephaniah the second kohen, and the three doorkeepers.
25From the city he took an officer who had been appointed over the men of war as well as seven men who saw the king’s face, who were found in the city, the scribe of the commander of the army, who enlisted people of the land, and 60 men of the people of the land who were found within the city.
26Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard took them and brought them to the king of Babylon to Riblah.
27The king of Babylon struck them down and put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. Then Judah was led away into exile from its land.
28These are the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year 3,023 Jews;
29in Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year, 832 people from Jerusalem;
30in the Nebuchadnezzar’s twenty-third year, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard exiled 745 of the Jews—all together 4,600 people.
Release of King Jehoiachin
31Now it came to pass on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month of the thirty-seventh year of the captivity of Judah’s King Jehoiachin, that King Evil-merodach of Babylon, in the first year of his reign, lifted up the head of Judah’s King Jehoiachin, and released him out of prison.
32He spoke kindly to him and gave him a throne above the throne of the kings who were with him in Babylon.
33Then he changed out of his prison garments, dined regularly before him all the days of his life.
34As for his allowance, a regular allowance was given to him by the king of Babylon, a portion for each day until the day of his death, all the days of his life.
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Copyright © 2014 - Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society
Jeremiah 52
52
The Destruction of Jerusalem and Exile of Judah
1Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he started out as king. He was king in Jerusalem for eleven years. His mother’s name was Hamutal, the daughter of Jeremiah. Her hometown was Libnah.
2As far as God was concerned, Zedekiah was just one more evil king, a carbon copy of Jehoiakim.
3-5The source of all this doom to Jerusalem and Judah was God’s anger. God turned his back on them as an act of judgment.
Zedekiah revolted against the king of Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar set out for Jerusalem with a full army. He set up camp and sealed off the city by building siege mounds around it. He arrived on the ninth year and tenth month of Zedekiah’s reign. The city was under siege for nineteen months (until the eleventh year of Zedekiah).
6-8By the fourth month of Zedekiah’s eleventh year, on the ninth day of the month, the famine was so bad that there wasn’t so much as a crumb of bread for anyone. Then the Babylonians broke through the city walls. Under cover of the night darkness, the entire Judean army fled through an opening in the wall (it was the gate between the two walls above the King’s Garden). They slipped through the lines of the Babylonians who surrounded the city and headed for the Jordan into the Arabah Valley, but the Babylonians were in full pursuit. They caught up with them in the Plains of Jericho. But by then Zedekiah’s army had deserted and was scattered.
9-11The Babylonians captured Zedekiah and marched him off to the king of Babylon at Riblah in Hamath, who tried and sentenced him on the spot. The king of Babylon then killed Zedekiah’s sons right before his eyes. The summary murder of his sons was the last thing Zedekiah saw, for they then blinded him. The king of Babylon followed that up by killing all the officials of Judah. Securely handcuffed, Zedekiah was hauled off to Babylon. The king of Babylon threw him in prison, where he stayed until the day he died.
12-16In the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon on the seventh day of the fifth month, Nebuzaradan, the king of Babylon’s chief deputy, arrived in Jerusalem. He burned the Temple of God to the ground, went on to the royal palace, and then finished off the city. He burned the whole place down. He put the Babylonian troops he had with him to work knocking down the city walls. Finally, he rounded up everyone left in the city, including those who had earlier deserted to the king of Babylon, and took them off into exile. He left a few poor dirt farmers behind to tend the vineyards and what was left of the fields.
17-19The Babylonians broke up the bronze pillars, the bronze washstands, and the huge bronze basin (the Sea) that were in the Temple of God, and hauled the bronze off to Babylon. They also took the various bronze-crafted liturgical accessories, as well as the gold and silver censers and sprinkling bowls, used in the services of Temple worship. The king’s deputy didn’t miss a thing. He took every scrap of precious metal he could find.
20-23The amount of bronze they got from the two pillars, the Sea, the twelve bronze bulls that supported the Sea, and the ten washstands that Solomon had made for the Temple of God was enormous. They couldn’t weigh it all! Each pillar stood twenty-seven feet high with a circumference of eighteen feet. The pillars were hollow, the bronze a little less than an inch thick. Each pillar was topped with an ornate capital of bronze pomegranates and filigree, which added another seven and a half feet to its height. There were ninety-six pomegranates evenly spaced—in all, a hundred pomegranates worked into the filigree.
24-27The king’s deputy took a number of special prisoners: Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the associate priest, three wardens, the chief remaining army officer, seven of the king’s counselors who happened to be in the city, the chief recruiting officer for the army, and sixty men of standing from among the people who were still there. Nebuzaradan the king’s deputy marched them all off to the king of Babylon at Riblah. And there at Riblah, in the land of Hamath, the king of Babylon killed the lot of them in cold blood.
Judah went into exile, orphaned from her land.
* * *
283,023 men of Judah were taken into exile by Nebuchadnezzar in the seventh year of his reign.
29832 from Jerusalem were taken in the eighteenth year of his reign.
30745 men from Judah were taken off by Nebuzaradan, the king’s chief deputy, in Nebuchadnezzar’s twenty-third year.
The total number of exiles was 4,600.
* * *
31-34When Jehoiachin king of Judah had been in exile for thirty-seven years, Evil-Merodach became king in Babylon and let Jehoiachin out of prison. This release took place on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month. The king treated him most courteously and gave him preferential treatment beyond anything experienced by the political prisoners held in Babylon. Jehoiachin took off his prison garb and from then on ate his meals in company with the king. The king provided everything he needed to live comfortably for the rest of his life.
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.