2 Kings 25

Revised Geneva Translation

25 And in the ninth year of his reign, the tenth month, tenth day of the month, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and all his army, came against Jerusalem, and camped against it. And they built a siege wall against it, all around.

² So the city was besieged until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.

³ And on the ninth day of the month, the famine was severe in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land.

⁴ Then the city was broken up. And all the men of war fled by night, by way of the gate between two walls that was by the king’s garden. Now the Chaldeans were by the city, all around. And the king went by way of the wilderness.

⁵ But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king and took him in the deserts of Jericho. And all his army was scattered from him.

⁶ Then they took the king and carried him up to the king of Babylon, to Riblah, where they gave judgment upon him.

⁷ And they killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him in chains, and carried him to Babylon.

⁸ And in the fifth month, on the seventh day of the month (which was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon), Nebuzaradan, chief steward and servant of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem

⁹ and burnt the House of the LORD, and the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem. And he burnt all the great houses with fire.

¹⁰ And all the army of the Chaldeans who were with the chief steward, broke down the walls of Jerusalem, all around.

¹¹ And the rest of the people who were left in the city, and those who had fled and fallen to the king of Babylon with the remnant of the multitude, chief steward Nebuzaradan carried away captive.

¹² But the chief steward left of the poor of the land to dress the vines, and to till the land.

¹³ Also, the Chaldeans broke the pillars of bronze that were in the House of the LORD, and the bases, and the bronze sea that was in the House of the LORD and carried the bronze from them to Babylon.

¹⁴ They also took away the pots and the shovels and the instruments of music and the incense dishes and all the vessels of bronze in which they ministered.

¹⁵ And the chief steward took away the ash pans and the basins, that were of gold and silver,

¹⁶ with the two pillars, one sea and the bases, which Solomon had made for the House of the LORD. The bronze from all these vessels was without weight.

¹⁷ The height of one pillar was eighteen cubits. And its chapiter was bronze. And the height of the chapiter (with network) was three cubits, with pomegranates upon the chapiters, all around, all of bronze. And the second pillar was the same, with the network.

¹⁸ And the chief steward took Seraiah, the High Priest, and Zephaniah the second priest, and the three keepers of the Door.

¹⁹ And he took a eunuch out of the city, who had the oversight of the men of war, and five of the men from the city who were in the king’s presence, and Sopher (captain of the army), who mustered the people of the land, and sixty men of the people of the land who were found in the city.

²⁰ And Nebuzaradan, the chief steward, took them and brought them to the king of Babylon, to Riblah.

²¹ And the king of Babylon struck them and killed them at Riblah, in the land of Hamath. So, Judah was carried away captive, out of his own land.

²² However, people remained in the land of Judah whom Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, left alone. And he made Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, ruler over them.

²³ Then, when all the captains of the army and their men heard that the king of Babylon had made Gedaliah governor, they came to Gedaliah, to Mizpah. They were: Ishmael, the son of Nethaniah and Johanan, the son of Careah, and Seraiah, the son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah, the son of Maachathi, they and their men.

²⁴ And Gedaliah swore to them, and to their men, and said to them, “Do not fear to be the servants of the Chaldeans. Dwell in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and you shall be well.”

²⁵ But in the seventh month, Ishmael, the son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, of the king’s seed, came, and ten men with him. And he struck Gedaliah and he died, and so did he the Jews and the Chaldeans who were with him at Mizpah.

²⁶ Then all the people, both small and great, and the captains of the army, arose and came to Egypt. For they were afraid of the Chaldeans.

²⁷ Nevertheless, in the thirty-seventh year after Jehoiachin, king of Judah, was carried away, in the twelfth month, the twenty-seventh day of the month, Evil-Merodach, king of Babylon, in the year that he began to reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin, king of Judah, out of the prison

²⁸ and spoke kindly to him and set his throne above the throne of the kings who were with him in Babylon

²⁹ and changed his prison garments. And he continually ate bread before him, all the days of his life.

³⁰ And his portion was a continual portion, given to him by the king, every day a certain amount, all the days of his life.