241 In his days, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up and Jehoiakim was his servant for three years; then he took up arms against him. 2 And the Lord sent against him bands of the Chaldaeans and of the Edomites and of the Moabites and of the children of Ammon; sending them against Judah for its destruction, as he had said by his servants the prophets. 3 Only by the word of the Lord did this fate come on Judah, to take them away from before his face; because of the sins of Manasseh and all the evil he did; 4 And because of the death of those who had done no wrong, for he made Jerusalem full of the blood of the upright; and the Lord had no forgiveness for it. 5 Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and all he did, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Judah? 6 So Jehoiakim went to rest with his fathers; and Jehoiachin his son became king in his place. 7 And the king of Egypt did not come out of his land again, for the king of Babylon had taken all his country, from the stream of Egypt to the river Euphrates.
8 Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king, he was ruling in Jerusalem for three months, and his mother's name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem. 9 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as his father had done. 10 At that time the armies of Nebuchadnezzar came up to Jerusalem and the town was shut in on every side. 11 And Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came there, while his servants were shutting in the town; 12 Then Jehoiachin, king of Judah, went out to the king of Babylon, with his mother and his servants and his chiefs and his unsexed servants; and in the eighth year of his rule the king of Babylon took him. 13 And he took away all the stored wealth of the Lord's house, and the goods from the king's store-house, cutting up all the gold vessels which Solomon, king of Israel, had made in the house of the Lord, as the Lord had said. 14 And he took away all the people of Jerusalem and all the chiefs and all the men of war, ten thousand prisoners; and all the expert workmen and the metal-workers; only the poorest sort of the people of the land were not taken away. 15 He took Jehoiachin a prisoner to Babylon, with his mother and his wives and his unsexed servants and the great men of the land; he took them all as prisoners from Jerusalem to Babylon. 16 And all the men of war, seven thousand of them, and a thousand expert workmen and metal-workers, all of them strong and able to take up arms, the king of Babylon took away as prisoners into Babylon. 17 And the king of Babylon made Mattaniah, his father's brother, king in place of Jehoiachin, changing his name to Zedekiah.
18 Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he was king in Jerusalem for eleven years; his mother's name was Hamutal, daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. 19 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as Jehoiakim had done. 20 And because of the wrath of the Lord, this came about in Jerusalem and Judah, till he had sent them all away from before him: and Zedekiah took up arms against the king of Babylon.
251 Now in the ninth year of his rule, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came against Jerusalem with all his army and took up his position before it, building earthworks all round the town. 2 And the town was shut in by their forces till the eleventh year of King Zedekiah. 3 Now on the ninth day of the fourth month, the store of food in the town was almost gone, so that there was no food for the people of the land. 4 So an opening was made in the wall of the town, and all the men of war went in flight by night through the doorway between the two walls which was by the king's garden; (now the Chaldaeans were stationed round the town:) and the king went by the way of the Arabah. 5 But the Chaldaean army went after the king, and overtook him in the lowlands of Jericho, and all his army went in flight from him in every direction. 6 And they made the king a prisoner and took him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah to be judged. 7 And they put the sons of Zedekiah to death before his eyes, and then they put out his eyes, and chaining him with iron bands, took him to Babylon.
8 Now in the fifth month, on the seventh day of the month, in the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the armed men, a servant of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem; 9 And he had the house of the Lord and the king's house and all the houses of Jerusalem, even every great house, burned with fire; 10 And the walls round Jerusalem were broken down by the Chaldaean army which was with the captain. 11 And the rest of the people who were still in the town, and all those who had given themselves up to the king of Babylon, and all the rest of the workmen, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the armed men, took away as prisoners; 12 But he let the poorest of the land go on living there, to take care of the vines and the fields. 13 And the brass pillars in the house of the Lord, and the wheeled bases, and the great brass water-vessel in the house of the Lord, were broken up by the Chaldaeans, who took the brass to Babylon. 14 And the pots and the spades and the scissors for the lights and the spoons, and all the brass vessels used in the Lord's house, they took away. 15 And the fire-trays and the basins; the gold of the gold vessels and the silver of the silver vessels, were all taken away by the captain of the armed men. 16 The two pillars, the great water-vessel and the wheeled bases, which Solomon had made for the house of the Lord: the brass of all these vessels was without weight. 17 One of the pillars was eighteen cubits high, with a crown of brass on it; the crown was three cubits high, circled with a network and apples all of brass; and the second pillar had the same. 18 And the captain of the armed men took Seraiah, the chief priest, and Zephaniah, the second priest, and the three door-keepers; 19 And from the town he took the unsexed servant who was over the men of war, and five of the king's near friends who were in the town, and the scribe of the captain of the army, who was responsible for getting the people of the land together in military order, and sixty men of the people of the land who were in the town. 20 These Nebuzaradan, the captain of the armed men, took with him to the king of Babylon at Riblah. 21 And the king of Babylon put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah was taken away prisoner from his land.
22 As for the people who were still living in the land of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, did not take away, he made Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, ruler over them. 23 Now the captains of the armed forces, hearing that the king of Babylon had made Gedaliah ruler, came with their men to Gedaliah at Mizpah; Ishmael, the son of Nethaniah, and Johanan, the son of Kareah, and Seraiah, the son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah, the son of the Maacathite, came with all their men. 24 Then Gedaliah gave his oath to them and their men, saying, Have no fear because of the servants of the Chaldaeans; go on living in the land under the rule of the king of Babylon, and all will be well. 25 But in the seventh month, Ishmael, the son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, of the king's seed, came with ten men and made an attack on Gedaliah, causing his death and the death of the Jews and the Chaldaeans who were with him at Mizpah. 26 Then all the people, small and great, and the captains of the forces, got up and went away to Egypt, for fear of the Chaldaeans.
27 And in the thirty-seventh year after Jehoiachin, king of Judah, had been taken prisoner, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, Evil-merodach, king of Babylon, in the first year of his rule, took Jehoiachin, king of Judah, out of prison; 28 And said kind words to him, and put his seat higher than the seats of the other kings who were with him in Babylon. 29 And his prison clothing was changed, and he was a guest at the king's table every day for the rest of his life. 30 And for his food, the king gave him a regular amount every day for the rest of his life.
361 Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz, the son of Josiah, and made him king in Jerusalem in place of his father. 2 Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for three months. 3 Then the king of Egypt took the kingdom from him in Jerusalem, and put on the land a tax of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. 4 And the king of Egypt made Eliakim his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem, changing his name to Jehoiakim. And Neco took his brother Jehoahaz away to Egypt.
5 Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for eleven years, and he did evil in the eyes of the Lord his God. 6 Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up against him, and took him away in chains to Babylon. 7 And Nebuchadnezzar took away some of the vessels of the Lord's house, and put them in the house of his god in Babylon. 8 Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim and the disgusting things he did, and all there is to be said against him, are recorded in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah; and Jehoiachin his son became king in his place.
9 Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for three months and ten days, and he did evil in the eyes of the Lord. 10 In the spring of the year King Nebuchadnezzar sent and took him away to Babylon, with the beautiful vessels of the house of the Lord, and made Zedekiah, his father's brother, king over Judah and Jerusalem.
11 Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for eleven years. 12 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, and did not make himself low before Jeremiah the prophet who gave him the word of the Lord. 13 And he took up arms against King Nebuchadnezzar, though he had made him take an oath by God; but he made his neck stiff and his heart hard, turning away from the Lord, the God of Israel. 14 And more than this, all the great men of Judah and the priests and the people made their sin great, turning to all the disgusting ways of the nations; and they made unclean the house of the Lord which he had made holy in Jerusalem. 15 And the Lord, the God of their fathers, sent word to them by his servants, sending early and frequently, because he had pity on his people and on his living-place; 16 But they put shame on the servants of God, making sport of his words and laughing at his prophets, till the wrath of God was moved against his people, till there was no help.
17 So he sent against them the king of the Chaldaeans, who put their young men to death with the sword in the house of their holy place, and had no pity for any, young man or virgin, old man or white-haired: God gave them all into his hands. 18 And all the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the stored wealth of the Lord's house and the wealth of the king and his chiefs, he took away to Babylon. 19 And the house of God was burned and the wall of Jerusalem broken down; all its great houses were burned with fire and all its beautiful vessels given up to destruction. 20 And all who had not come to death by the sword he took away prisoners to Babylon; and they became servants to him and to his sons till the kingdom of Persia came to power: 21 So that the words of the Lord, which he said by the mouth of Jeremiah, might come true, till the land had had pleasure in her Sabbaths; for as long as she was waste the land kept the Sabbath, till seventy years were complete.
22 Now in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order that the words which the Lord had said by the mouth of Jeremiah might come true, the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, was moved by the Lord, and he made a public statement and had it given out through all his kingdom and put in writing, saying, 23 Cyrus, king of Persia, has said, All the kingdoms of the earth have been given to me by the Lord, the God of heaven; and he has made me responsible for building a house for him in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever there is among you of all his people, may the Lord his God be with him and let him go up.
