2 Chronicles 36

1The people of the land now took Josiah’s son Jehoahaz and made him king in Jerusalem in his father’s place. 2Joahaz was twenty-three when he came to the throne, and his reign in Jerusalem lasted three months. 3At Jerusalem the king of Egypt removed him from the throne and laid on the land a levy of a hundred talents of silver and one talent of gold. 4Over Judah and Jerusalem the king of Egypt set Eliakim, brother of Joahaz, and gave him the new name Jehoiakim; Joahaz himself Necho seized and brought down to Egypt. 5Jehoiakim came to the throne at twenty-five, and for eleven years he reigned in Jerusalem. He did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh his God. 6Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against him and bound him in bronze shackles to take him away to Babylon. 7Some of the vessels of the house of Yahweh Nebuchadnezzar took with him to Babylon, and there he placed them in his own temple. 8The rest of Jehoiakim’s acts, the detestable things he did and what was found against him — they are written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah. And his son Jehoiachin became king in his place. 9Jehoiachin was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem. He did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh.* 10At the turn of the year King Nebuchadnezzar sent for him and had him brought to Babylon, together with the precious vessels of the house of Yahweh, and he made Zedekiah, his brother, king over Judah and Jerusalem.*

Zedekiah and the Fall of Jerusalem

11At twenty-one years of age Zedekiah became king, and his reign in Jerusalem lasted eleven years. 12He did what was evil in the eyes of Yahweh his God, and he did not humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet, who spoke from the mouth of Yahweh. 13He rebelled, moreover, against King Nebuchadnezzar, though the king had put him under oath by God. Stiff-necked and stubborn at heart, he refused to turn back to Yahweh, the God of Israel. 14All the chiefs of the priests and the people likewise heaped treachery upon treachery, following every detestable practice of the nations, and they defiled the house of Yahweh, which he had consecrated in Jerusalem. 15Again and again, from early on, Yahweh the God of their ancestors sent his messengers to warn them, for he felt pity for his people and for the place where he dwelt. 16But they mocked the messengers of God, despised his words and jeered at his prophets, until the fury of Yahweh rose against his people beyond all remedy. 17So he brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans, who put their young men to the sword inside their sanctuary. He spared neither young man nor young woman, neither the old nor the infirm; he gave them all into his hand. 18Everything he carried off to Babylon: the vessels of the house of God, large and small alike, the stores of the house of Yahweh, and the stores of the king and of his officials. 19They burned the house of God, tore down the wall of Jerusalem, set fire to all its palaces and ruined everything of value in it. 20Those who had escaped the sword he carried off to Babylon, and there they became servants to him and to his sons until the kingdom of Persia came to power. 21So the word of Yahweh spoken through Jeremiah was fulfilled, until the land had made up for its sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath, until seventy years were complete.

The Decree of Cyrus

22In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, so that the word of Yahweh spoken through Jeremiah might be completed, Yahweh stirred the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, and he had a proclamation sent through his whole kingdom, and put in writing as well: 23“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: Yahweh, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever among you belongs to all his people — may Yahweh his God be with him. Let him go up.”