2 Kings 24:1-20

III. THE REIGN AND REBELLION OF JEHOIAKIM 23:36-24:7

TRANSLATION

(36) Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And the name of his mother was Zebudah the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah. (37) And he did evil in the eyes of the LORD according to all which his fathers had done. (1) In his days, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up, and Jehoiakim became his vassal three years; then he turned away and rebelled against him. (2) And the LORD sent against him bands of Chaldeans and bands of Arameans and bands of Moabites and bands of the children of Ammon, and sent them against Judah to destroy it according to the word of the LORD which He spoke by the hand of His servants the prophets. (3) Surely on account of the word of the LORD it came on Judah to remove them from before His face for the sins of Manasseh, according to all he had done. (4) And also for the blood of the innocent which he shed when he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood; and the LORD would not pardon this. (5) Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim and all which he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? (6) And Jehoiakim slept with his fathers and Jehoiachin his son ruled in his place. (7) And the king of Egypt did not again go out from his land because the king of Babylon had taken the land from the brook of Egypt to the river Euphrates, all which had belonged to the king of Egypt.

Seventeenth King of Judah
JEHOIAKIM BENJOSIAH
609-597 B.C.
(Yabweb will set up)

Contemporary Prophets
Jeremiah; Uriah; Daniel

Mother: Zebudah

Appraisal: Bad

He will be buried with a donkey's burial, dragged off and thrown out beyond the gates of Jerusalem. Jeremiah 22:19

COMMENTS

Since Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, he was therefore older than his deposed half-brother.[667] He reigned eleven years over Judah, from 609-597 B.C.(2 Kings 23:36) Under Jehoiakim, all the idolatrous practices of the Manasseh era were reintroduced (2 Kings 23:37). In spite of the national poverty, this petty little king spent huge sums of money on himself. In one of Jeremiah's blistering sermons he condemned Jehoiakim for building for himself a fancy new palace (Jeremiah 22:13-14). Jehoiakim was the villain of the closing years of Judah's history. He was everything that is despicable in a national leader. He was a spendthrift, a bigot, an arrogant and irreverent tyrant who brooked no criticism, not even when that criticism came from a man of God. A prophet named Uriah was too bold in his denunciation of the king, and paid for his boldness with his life (Jeremiah 26:21). Jeremiah was in danger on more than one occasion during the reign of this king.

[667] The mother of Jehoahaz was Hamutal (2 Kings 23:31); the mother of Jehoiakim was Zebudah (2 Kings 23:36). Rumah, the hometown of Zebudah, was in the vicinity of Shechem.

Jehoiakim carefully watched the political developments on the Euphrates River to the north. From July 609 to June 605 B.C. the armies of the Babylonians and the Assyro-Egyptian coalition sparred. For the most part during those years the Babylonians were on the defensive. Finally, the Babylonian army under the brilliant young crown prince Nebuchadnezzar was able to launch a mighty offensive which was to have worldwide significance. The focus of the attack was the fortress of Carchemish on the Euphrates. Nebuchadnezzar won a crushing victory. The tattered Egyptian armies fled southward from Carchemish in disarray. Nebuchadnezzar was able to roam at will through Syria-Palestine, the Hatti-land as he calls it in his annals.

Shortly after Carchemish Nebuchadnezzar went up and besieged Jerusalem. According to one system of counting regnal years, this siege fell in the third year of King Jehoiakim (Daniel 1:1-3).[668] It is not entirely clear whether or not Jehoiakim actually swore allegiance to Nebuchadnezzar at this time. It may be that Jehoiakim merely tried to bribe the Chaldean prince by sending to him some of the valuable Temple vessels and some prize youth of the land, viz., Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego.

[668] Using a different system, Jeremiah 46:2 dates the battle of Carchemish to the fourth year of Jehoiakim. For a discussion of the two dating systems, see Thiele, MNHK, p. 162ff.

Nebuchadnezzar's campaign in the Hatti-land was cut short by the death of his father, King Nabopolassar, on August 16, 605 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar hastened immediately back to Babylon where he was crowned on September 6, 605 B.C. Upon assuming the throne, Nebuchadnezzar returned to the Hatti-land (Syria-Palestine) to continue his conquests. The Babylonian records do not indicate precisely what cities he conquered at this time. A third campaign to the Hatti-land took place in the late spring and early summer of 604 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar's official scribe declares that on this occasion all the kings of the Hatti-land came before him and he received their heavy tribute.[669] It was probably at this time that Nebuchadnezzar bound King Jehoiakim to take him to Babylon (2 Chronicles 36:6). No evidence exists that Jehoiakim was actually taken to Babylon, and so one must conclude that for some reason Nebuchadnezzar changed his mind about the matter. Perhaps Jehoiakim took a solemn and sacred oath of allegiance to the Great King, and so Nebuchadnezzar decided to leave him on the throne of Jerusalem as his vassal.[670]

[669] DOTT, p. 79.
[670] It cannot be known for certain on which of the three campaigns of 605-604 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar came against Jerusalem and bound Jehoiakim. However in both Chronicles and Kings he is called king at the time he came against Jerusalem. This would suggest that he had already been crowned king and would thus eliminate the first campaign to the Hatti-land when he was only crown-prince.

Jehoiakim had no intention of remaining permanently the vassal of Nebuchadnezzar. He did serve the Babylonian for three years.[671] But since Pharaoh Necho was regaining strength down in Egypt, Jehoiakim was encouraged to rebel against his overlord. In 601 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar brought his armies down the coastal plain of Palestine apparently intent on invading Egypt and destroying Necho once and for all. However, it appears from a Babylonian text that Nebuchadnezzar met with a stinging defeat on the borders of Egypt.[672] This meant that for the last years of his reign Jehoiakim was an independent ruler.

[671] It is not certain at exactly what time Jehoiakim took his vassal oath to Nebuchadnezzar. What little evidence there is points to the summer of 604 B.C. Gray (OTL, pp. 756f.), however, thinks Jehoiakim was left independent from 604-601 B.C. Only in 601 B.C. when Jehoiakim showed signs of sympathy with Necho did Nebuchadnezzar impose tribute on him. Thus in Gray's view, the three years of vassalage were 601-599 B.C. In the opinion of the present writer, 604-601 B.C. is more likely.
[672] See ANET, p. 564.

That Nebuchadnezzar had received a rather severe blow in his battle with the Egyptians in 601 B.C. is indicated by the fact that for some eighteen months he was unable to personally attend to his rebellious vassal in Jerusalem. In the meanwhile, he sent bands of Edomites, Moabites and Ammonites and local contingents of Chaldean soldiers to harass the Judaeans. Though these small units were probably unable to do much damage to the fortified cities of Judah, they did force the rural people to seek refuge in Jerusalem (Jeremiah 35:11). By authorizing these raids of reprisal, Nebuchadnezzar was unconsciously beginning to fulfill the threats which the Lord had made against Judah through his great prophets. In reality it was the Lord through His permissive will who sent these raiders against Judah (2 Kings 23:2).

The final destruction of Judah had been decreed by the mouth of the Lord. Judah was to be removed from His sightcarried off to a foreign landbecause of the sins of Manasseh (2 Kings 23:3). This should not be interpreted to mean that the nation was being punished for the sins of a man long since dead. Rather the meaning is that the class of sins introduced by Manasseh still persisted in the nation. The sins of Manasseh included: (1) idolatry, accompanied by licentious rites; (2) child sacrifice to Moloch; (3) sodomy; (4) occult practices; and (5) the shedding of innocent blood. This shedding of innocent blood would include child sacrifice, but would also embrace the persecution of righteous saints. This kind of bloodshed continued under Jehoiakim. Reference has already been made to the execution of Uriah the prophet (Jeremiah 26:23). The blood of innocent saints cried out to God for vengeance. God could no longer overlook or pardon those crimes (2 Kings 23:4).

The author of Kings closes out his brief treatment of the reign of Jehoiakim by referring his readers to the prophetic chronicles of his reign (2 Kings 23:5). The Book of Jeremiah relates several other facts about Jehoiakim: (1) that he executed Uriah the prophet (Jeremiah 26:23); (2) that he destroyed the scroll of Jeremiah's sermons (Jeremiah 36:20-23); and (3) that he ordered Jeremiah and Baruch to be arrested (Jeremiah 36:26).

Jehoiakim died on December 9, 598 B.C. The circumstances of his death are not entirely clear. Jeremiah had predicted that he would be buried with the burial of a donkey. His death, said the prophet, would be unlamented (Jeremiah 22:18-19). These words suggest that Jehoiakim was assassinated, or at least that his body was dishonored after death by his own countrymen. It is also possible that when the Chaldeans arrived in force at Jerusalem to punish the rebellious city they disinterred the corpse and exposed it to the indignities here described.

Whether by violence or natural death, Jehoiakim was dead when the Chaldeans arrived. His young son Jehoiachin[673] was left to face the wrath of the mighty Nebuchadnezzar (2 Kings 23:6). No further aid from Egypt was forthcoming. Even though Necho had successfully defended his land in the face of the Babylonian campaign of 601 B.C., the Egyptians did not have sufficient power to challenge Nebuchadnezzar's hegemony over Syria-Palestine. All the territories between the River of Egypt and the Euphrates to which Pharaoh had laid claim after his campaign of 609 B.C. the Babylonians now controlled (2 Kings 23:7).

[673] Jehoiachin has two other names: Jeconiah (1 Chronicles 3:16-17; Jeremiah 27:20 etc.) and Coniah (Jeremiah 22:24; Jeremiah 22:28 etc.). The two longer forms both mean Yahweh will establish; the shorter form means Yahweh establishes.