CHAPTER 52

(588 B.C.)

THE REIGN OF ZEDEKIAH

¹Zedekiah was one and twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And his mothers name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. (It is not known if Jeremiah is the author of this final Chapter, as the closing words of the last Verse of the previous Chapter might very well affirm that those words closed his Prophecies.

The capture of Jerusalem and the deportation of its people have little interest for historians, but so great an interest for God that the event is narrated four times with considerable detail [II Ki. 24:25; II Chron., Chpt. 36; Jer. 29:52]. Incidentally, the Jeremiah of this Verse is not the Jeremiah of this Book.)

²And he did that which was evil in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that Jehoiakim had done. (Irrespective of Gods Love, appalling chastisement must visit aggravated sinfulness. Therefore, Judah and Jerusalem were taken into captivity.

Actually, Zedekiah was not of the royal line of David and, therefore, the last king to grace the throne who was in the royal line of David was Jehoiachin [Coniah].)

³For through the anger of the LORD it came to pass in Jerusalem and Judah, till He had cast them out from His presence, that Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon. (The first part of this Verse refers to sin as the reason, which God cannot abide. Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon because he thought Egypt would come to his rescue. Actually, Zedekiah rebelled against the Lord.)

THE FALL OF JERUSALEM

⁴And it came to pass in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and pitched against it, and built forts against it round about. (The Holy Spirit records the exact day of the siege, because it was against Jerusalem, which was His City and the place of His Dwelling. However, He would now leave it, as recorded in Ezek. 11:23.)

⁵So the city was besieged unto the eleventh year of king Zedekiah. (Jerusalem, in her backsliding, did not understand Who her Saviour was and, therefore, trusted in Egypt, who could not even save herself, much less Judah and Jerusalem! Therefore, the Holy Spirit proclaims, the city was besieged.)

⁶And in the fourth month, in the ninth day of the month, the famine was sore in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land. (Exactly what Moses said in Deut., Chpt. 28, was now coming to pass.)

⁷Then the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled, and went forth out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the kings garden; (now the Chaldeans were by the city round about:) and they went by the way of the plain. (For some 40 years, Jeremiah had warned of this time, pleading with the people to repent, but to no avail! Now, and exactly as the Holy Spirit through the Prophet had said, all comes to pass. How this must have crushed the already broken heart of the Prophet!)

JUDGMENT ON ZEDEKIAH

⁸But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him. (No amount of skill or sagacity can defeat the purposes and judgments of God. Zedekiah and his soldiers thought to escape by making a hole in the city wall at nighttime; but they were defeated and captured at the very scene of Israels first victory many hundreds of years before, which was Jericho.)

⁹Then they took the king, and carried him up unto the king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; where he gave judgment upon him. (The king of Babylon was Nebuchadnezzar. Where he gave judgment upon him, refers to a terrible severity.)

¹⁰And the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes: he killed also all the princes of Judah in Riblah.

¹¹Then he put out the eyes of Zedekiah; and the king of Babylon bound him in chains, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death. (The prison was a house of hard labor. And yet, there is some small evidence that Zedekiah came to the Lord while in this prison.)

JERUSALEM DESTROYED; FINAL CAPTIVITY OF JUDAH; A REMNANT LEFT

¹²Now in the fifth month, in the tenth day of the month, which was the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, came Nebuzar-adan, captain of the guard, which served the king of Babylon, into Jerusalem (II Ki. 25:8 says, The seventh day of the month. However, there is no discrepancy. II Kings uses the words, unto Jerusalem, whereas the words here are into Jerusalem. The two are not the same; the former refers to the approach to the city, while the latter refers to actually entering the city. Evidently, Nebuzar-adan needed some three days of preparation after arriving outside the city before entering it),

¹³And burned the House of the LORD, and the kings house; and all the houses of Jerusalem, and all the houses of the great men, burned he with fire (the Lord allowed His House to be burned because His People had discredited it):

¹⁴And all the army of the Chaldeans, who were with the captain of the guard, broke down all the walls of Jerusalem round about. (Their protection and security depended on their obedience to God. Upon obedience, no power on Earth could defeat them. Upon disobedience, the Lord lifted His Hand of protection, and the walls were broken.)

¹⁵Then Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard carried away captive certain of the poor of the people, and the residue of the people who remained in the city, and those who fell away, who fell to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the multitude. (Upon the advent of disobedience, the Lords Hand is lifted, and the end result is the same as then, i.e., captive of Satan.)

¹⁶But Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard left certain of the poor of the land for vinedressers and for husbandmen. (The poor of the land refers to those who had been slaves, or else nearly so, and had consequently been denied ownership of property, but now would be the possessors of the finest land and vineyards in Judah.)

TEMPLE RICHES TAKEN

¹⁷Also the pillars of brass that were in the House of the LORD, and the bases, and the Brazen Sea that was in the House of the LORD, the Chaldeans broke, and carried all the brass of them to Babylon. (The breaking of these symbols and the carrying of them to Babylon would sadly signify the victory of the flesh over the Spirit. Such was the ruin of Judah, and such is the ruin of the modern Believer.)

¹⁸The caldrons also, and the shovels, and the snuffers, and the bowls, and the spoons, and all the vessels of brass wherewith they ministered, took they away. (These words could hold little meaning to the carnal mind, but are given here with a sob by the Holy Spirit. These symbols of worship were removed, because the people no longer worshipped God, but rather idols.)

¹⁹And the basons, and the firepans, and the bowls, and the caldrons, and the candlesticks, and the spoons, and the cups; that which was of gold in gold, and that which was of silver in silver, took the captain of the guard away. (These beauteous and precious vessels and pillars pictured the Power and Glories of Christ, which Judah no longer desired. So they lost them!)

²⁰The two pillars, one sea, and twelve brazen bulls that were under the bases, which king Solomon had made in the House of the LORD: the brass of all these vessels was without weight. (These twelve brazen bulls or oxen were designed by the Holy Spirit, with the design given to David, and he to Solomon. They represented the Word of God [I Ki. 7:25-26]. These oxen or bulls were placed three to the side, portraying the Word of God as applicable to all directions: north, south, east, and west.)

²¹And concerning the pillars, the height of one pillar was eighteen cubits; and a fillet of twelve cubits did compass it; and the thickness thereof was four fingers: it was hollow.

²²And a chapiter of brass was upon it; and the height of one chapiter was five cubits, with network and pomegranates upon the chapiters round about, all of brass. The second pillar also and the pomegranates were like unto these. (Pomegranates are fruit, and thus symbolized the fruitfulness of the Child of God [Jn. 15:1-5]. In the Passage in St. John, He says, Every branch in Me that bears not fruit, He takes away, symbolizing the removal carried out by Babylon.)

²³And there were ninety and six pomegranates on a side; and all the pomegranates upon the network were an hundred round about. (Such symbolized the much fruit spoken of by Christ in Jn. 15:5. Each pomegranate was precious to Him, and should be precious to us, as well!)

PRIESTS AND PRINCES EXECUTED

²⁴And the captain of the guard took Seraiah the Chief Priest, and Zephaniah the second Priest, and the three keepers of the door (the three keepers of the door were taken and executed, because they did not truly keep the door. The Preacher of the Gospel is the keeper of the door, and if he does not keep Babylon from it, Babylon will come into it):

²⁵He took also out of the city an eunuch, which had the charge of the men of war; and seven men of them who were near the kings person, who were found in the city; and the principal scribe of the host, who mustered the people of the land; and threescore men of the people of the land, who were found in the midst of the city. (II Ki. 25:19 records five men. This marks accuracy and not error, for the greater includes the less, and since Riblah was many days journey from Jerusalem, two of the captives may have escaped or died during the journey.)

²⁶So Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard took them, and brought them to the king of Babylon to Riblah.

²⁷And the king of Babylon smote them, and put them to death in Riblah in the land of Hamath. Thus Judah was carried away captive out of his own land. (Of all the captivity spread out over a number of years, the captivity of this Verse is actually the great captivity when Jerusalem was destroyed.)

THREE DEPORTATIONS TO BABYLON

²⁸This is the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year three thousand Jews and three and twenty (the Hebrews and the Babylonians did not reckon time in exactly the same manner. Hence, the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar according to the one reckoning would be the eighth according to the other [II Ki. 24:12, 14, 16]. This is the first deportation, which was under Jehoiakim. During this time, Daniel and the three Hebrew children were taken to Babylon, with many others):

²⁹In the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar he carried away captive from Jerusalem eight hundred thirty and two persons (this would have been the second deportation under Jehoiachin. In this, Mordecai and Esther were taken to Babylon [Esther 2:5-6]):

³⁰In the three and twentieth year of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard carried away captive of the Jews seven hundred forty and five persons: all the persons were four thousand and six hundred. (This was the last deportation, which was under Zedekiah, during which time Jerusalem was completely destroyed, including the Temple.)

JEHOIACHIN RELEASED IN BABYLON

³¹And it came to pass in the seven and thirtieth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, in the five and twentieth day of the month, that Evil-merodach king of Babylon in the first year of his reign lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah, and brought him forth out of prison, (Jehoiachin was only 18 years old when he began to reign, and actually only reigned for three months and ten days in Jerusalem. As well, Jehoiachin was the last king in the Davidic line, as Zedekiah, although of the royal family, was not in the kingly line, being only an uncle of Jehoiachin.

Jehoiachin was in captivity for 37 years; thus, he would have been 55 years old at the time he was freed from prison.)

³²And spoke kindly unto him, and set his throne above the throne of the kings who were with him in Babylon (these were perhaps captive kings who had been taken in the many campaigns of Nebuchadnezzar),

³³And changed his prison garments: and he did continually eat bread before him all the days of his life. (It is not known why Jehoiachin was favored by the king of Babylon. As well, nothing is known of his spiritual condition.)

³⁴And for his diet, there was a continual diet given him of the king of Babylon, every day a portion until the day of his death, all the days of his life. (Evil-merodach was the son of Nebuchadnezzar. Perhaps his favorable treatment of Jehoiachin was the result of the influence of his father Nebuchadnezzar, who showed some inclination in his closing years of turning to Jehovah.)