2 Kings 25:1

THE CAPTIVITY OF JUDAH.-- 2 Kings 25:1-12.

GOLDEN TEXT. -- By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.-- Psalms 137:1. TIME. --B. C. 590 to 588. PLACE. --Jerusalem, Jericho, Riblah. HELPFUL READINGS. -- 2 Chronicles 36:11-21; Jeremiah 34:1-12; Jeremiah 39:1-18; Jeremiah 52:1-12; Psalms 137:1-9. LESSON ANALYSIS. --1.. king and people weighed in the balances and found wanting. 2. Their place and kingdom taken away. 3. The favor of God lost and with it all things. 4. Without country, without God, and without hope.

INTRODUCTION.

The last of the Jewish kings of the race of David was Zedekiah. He was the son of the pious Josiah, and the uncle of the, late King Jehoiachin. When he ascended the throne, just at the verge of manhood, he seemed to give promise of his father's virtues, and of. better day for the waning fortunes of Israel. He endeavored to effect. reformation, and in. solemn, sacrificial feast induced the nobles, the court and the priesthood to covenant that they would restore to freedom the thousands of Hebrew slaves who had fallen into servitude during the troublous times, through poverty, and were held in perpetual bondage, in violation of the Jewish law. Also, his foreign policy at first was shaped according to the advice of the prophet Jeremiah, and he took. solemn oath of friendship and support to Nebuchadnezzar, in the, name of God. But in. short time there was. relapse. The emancipated Hebrews were still held in slavery; the king turned from the counsels of Jeremiah and his party to their enemies; the oath made to the king of Babylon was broken; an alliance was made with other kings; and open revolt against Nebuchadnezzar was begun. Jeremiah denounced with vigor the violation of plighted faith, and with wild imagery predicted the direful calamities that would shortly come, (Jeremiah 27:9-14; Jeremiah 28:1-17,) but he was treated as. madman. Then the overwhelming forces of the Chaldeans came pouring into the country. Palestine was overrun, and Jerusalem itself encompassed with armies.

1. In the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth day.

The tenth month of the Jewish year, which began with the first new moon after the venial equinox. As the great and memorable day of the final catastrophe approaches the historian becomes more exact in his dates, and marks not only the year, but the month and the day when the siege began and ended. The present month corresponds to January. Compare Jeremiah 52:4, and Ezekiel 24:1, the two great prophets of the time, one in Jerusalem, and the other already. captive in Mesopotamia. To the latter the beginning and the end of the siege were known on the very day of their occurrence.

Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.

The greatest of all the Babylonian kings, and one of the greatest of the ancient conquerors. We know much of his career from the exhumed records of Babylon, as well as from the book of Daniel. During the siege of Jerusalem he remained most of the time at Riblah, in northern Palestine, from whence he directed two sieges, that of Jerusalem and of Tyre.

Came, he and all his host, against Jerusalem.

"The nation never forgot the month and the day on which the armies of Chaldea finally invested the city. It was in January, on the tenth day of the tenth month. It was felt as the day of the deepest gloom by the Israelite exiles. (Ezekiel 24:1-27.) Round the walls were reared the gigantic mounds by which eastern armies conducted their approaches to besieged cities, and which were surmounted by forts overtopping the walls. Famine and the accompanying visitation of pestilence ravaged the crowded population within the walls. The store of bread was gradually exhausted. The nobles, with wasted skeleton forms, cared not to be recognized on the streets. The ladies of Jerusalem, in their magnificent crimson robes, might be seen sitting in despair on the piles of refuse. From these foul heaps were gathered morsels to eke out the failing supply of food." Lamentations 4:6, and Ezekiel 4:12.