Jeremiah 52:1-8

1 Zedekiah [was] one and twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name [was] Hamutal, the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

2 And he did [that which was] evil in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that Jehoiakim had done.

3 For 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.

4 And it came to pass in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth [day] of the month, [that] Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and encamped against it, and built forts against it on every side.

5 So the city was besieged to the eleventh year of king Zedekiah.

6 And in the fourth month, in 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.

7 Then the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled, and went forth from the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which [was] by the king's garden; (now the Chaldeans [were] by the city on all sides:) and they went by the way of the plain.

8 But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him.

Jeremiah 52:1-8 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH 52

This chapter contains the history of the besieging, taking, and destroying of Jerusalem; the moving cause of it, the wicked reign of Zedekiah, Jer 52:1-3; the instruments of it, the king of Babylon and his army, which besieged and took it, Jer 52:4-7; into whose hands the king of Judah, his sons, and the princes of Judah, fell; and were very barbarously and cruelly used by them, Jer 52:8-11. Then follows an account of the burning of the temple, the king's palace, and the houses in Jerusalem, and the breaking down of the walls of it, Jer 52:12-14; and of those that were carried captive, and of those that were left in the land by Nebuzaradan, Jer 52:15,16; and of the several vessels and valuable things in the temple, of gold, silver, and brass, it was plundered of, and carried to Babylon, Jer 52:17-23; and of the murder of several persons of dignity and character, Jer 52:24-27; and of the number of those that were carried captive at three different times, Jer 52:28-30; and the chapter is concluded with the exaltation of Jehoiachin king of Judah, and of the good treatment he met with from the king of Babylon to the day of his death, Jer 52:31-34.