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The Message Bible MSG
1 Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.
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Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he started out as king. He was king in Jerusalem for eleven years. His mother's name was Hamutal, the daughter of Jeremiah. Her hometown was Libnah.
2 And he did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, according to all that Jehoiakim had done.
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As far as God was concerned, Zedekiah was just one more evil king, a carbon copy of Jehoiakim.
3 For because of the anger of the LORD things came to the point in Jerusalem and Judah that he cast them out from his presence. And Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.
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The source of all this doom to Jerusalem and Judah was God's anger. God turned his back on them as an act of judgment.
4 And in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth day of the month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came with all his army against Jerusalem, and laid siege to it. And they built siegeworks all around it.
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Nebuchadnezzar set out for Jerusalem with a full army. He set up camp and sealed off the city by building siege mounds around it.
5 So the city was besieged till the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.
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He arrived on the ninth year and tenth month of Zedekiah's reign. The city was under siege for nineteen months (until the eleventh year of Zedekiah).
6 On the ninth day of the fourth month the famine was so severe in the city that there was no food for the people of the land.
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By the fourth month of Zedekiah's eleventh year, on the ninth day of the month, the famine was so bad that there wasn't so much as a crumb of bread for anyone.
7 Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled and went out from the city by night by the way of a gate between the two walls, by the king's garden, while the Chaldeans were around the city. And they went in the direction of the Arabah.
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Then the Babylonians broke through the city walls. Under cover of the night darkness, the entire Judean army fled through an opening in the wall (it was the gate between the two walls above the King's Garden). They slipped through the lines of the Babylonians who surrounded the city and headed for the Jordan into the Arabah Valley,
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.
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but the Babylonians were in full pursuit. They caught up with them in the Plains of Jericho. But by then Zedekiah's army had deserted and was scattered.
9 Then they captured the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he passed sentence on him.
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The Babylonians captured Zedekiah and marched him off to the king of Babylon at Riblah in Hamath, who tried and sentenced him on the spot.
10 The king of Babylon slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and also slaughtered all the officials of Judah at Riblah.
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The king of Babylon then killed Zedekiah's sons right before his eyes. The summary murder of his sons was the last thing Zedekiah saw, for they then blinded him. The king of Babylon followed that up by killing all the officials of Judah.
11 He put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him in chains, and the king of Babylon took him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death.
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Securely handcuffed, Zedekiah was hauled off to Babylon. The king of Babylon threw him in prison, where he stayed until the day he died.
12 In the fifth month, on the tenth day of the month--that was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon--Nebuzaradan the captain of the bodyguard, who served the king of Babylon, entered Jerusalem.
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In the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon on the seventh day of the fifth month, Nebuzaradan, the king of Babylon's chief deputy, arrived in Jerusalem.
13 And he burned the house of the LORD, and the king's house and all the houses of Jerusalem; every great house he burned down.
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He burned the Temple of God to the ground, went on to the royal palace, and then finished off the city. He burned the whole place down.
14 And all the army of the Chaldeans, who were with the captain of the guard, broke down all the walls around Jerusalem.
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He put the Babylonian troops he had with him to work knocking down the city walls.
15 And Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive some of the poorest of the people and the rest of the people who were left in the city and the deserters who had deserted to the king of Babylon, together with the rest of the artisans.
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Finally, he rounded up everyone left in the city, including those who had earlier deserted to the king of Babylon, and took them off into exile.
16 But Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left some of the poorest of the land to be vinedressers and plowmen.
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He left a few poor dirt farmers behind to tend the vineyards and what was left of the fields.
17 And the pillars of bronze that were in the house of the LORD, and the stands and the bronze sea that were in the house of the LORD, the Chaldeans broke in pieces, and carried all the bronze to Babylon.
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The Babylonians broke up the bronze pillars, the bronze washstands, and the huge bronze basin (the Sea) that were in the Temple of God, and hauled the bronze off to Babylon.
18 And they took away the pots and the shovels and the snuffers and the basins and the dishes for incense and all the vessels of bronze used in the temple service;
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They also took the various bronze-crafted liturgical accessories, as well as the gold and silver censers and sprinkling bowls, used in the services of Temple worship.
19 also the small bowls and the fire pans and the basins and the pots and the lampstands and the dishes for incense and the bowls for drink offerings. What was of gold the captain of the guard took away as gold, and what was of silver, as silver.
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The king's deputy didn't miss a thing. He took every scrap of precious metal he could find.
20 As for the two pillars, the one sea, the twelve bronze bulls that were under the sea, and the stands, which Solomon the king had made for the house of the LORD, the bronze of all these things was beyond weight.
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The amount of bronze they got from the two pillars, the Sea, the twelve bronze bulls that supported the Sea, and the ten washstands that Solomon had made for the Temple of God was enormous. They couldn't weigh it all!
21 As for the pillars, the height of the one pillar was eighteen cubits,its circumference was twelve cubits, and its thickness was four fingers, and it was hollow.
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Each pillar stood twenty-seven feet high with a circumference of eighteen feet. The pillars were hollow, the bronze a little less than an inch thick.
22 On it was a capital of bronze. The height of the one capital was five cubits. A network and pomegranates, all of bronze, were around the capital. And the second pillar had the same, with pomegranates.
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Each pillar was topped with an ornate capital of bronze pomegranates and filigree, which added another seven and a half feet to its height.
23 There were ninety-six pomegranates on the sides; all the pomegranates were a hundred upon the network all around.
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There were ninety-six pomegranates evenly spaced - in all, a hundred pomegranates worked into the filigree.
24 And the captain of the guard took Seraiah the chief priest, and Zephaniah the second priest, and the three keepers of the threshold;
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The king's deputy took a number of special prisoners: Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the associate priest, three wardens,
25 and from the city he took an officer who had been in command of the men of war, and seven men of the king's council, who were found in the city; and the secretary of the commander of the army who mustered the people of the land; and sixty men of the people of the land, who were found in the midst of the city.
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the chief remaining army officer, seven of the king's counselors who happened to be in the city, the chief recruiting officer for the army, and sixty men of standing from among the people who were still there.
26 And Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah.
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Nebuzaradan the king's deputy marched them all off to the king of Babylon at Riblah.
27 And the king of Babylon struck them down, and put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah was taken into exile out of its land.
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And there at Riblah, in the land of Hamath, the king of Babylon killed the lot of them in cold blood. Judah went into exile, orphaned from her land.
28 This is the number of the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year, 3,023 Judeans;
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3,023 men of Judah were taken into exile by Nebuchadnezzar in the seventh year of his reign.
29 in the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar he carried away captive from Jerusalem 832 persons;
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832 from Jerusalem were taken in the eighteenth year of his reign.
30 in the twenty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive of the Judeans 745 persons; all the persons were 4,600.
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745 men from Judah were taken off by Nebuzaradan, the king's chief deputy, in Nebuchadnezzar's twenty-third year. The total number of exiles was 4,600.
31 And in the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-fifth day of the month, Evil-merodach king of Babylon, in the year that he became king, graciously freedJehoiachin king of Judah and brought him out of prison.
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When Jehoiachin king of Judah had been in exile for thirty-seven years, Evil-Merodach became king in Babylon and let Jehoiachin out of prison. This release took place on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month.
32 And he spoke kindly to him, and gave him a seat above the seats of the kings who were with him in Babylon.
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The king treated him most courteously and gave him preferential treatment beyond anything experienced by the political prisoners held in Babylon.
33 So Jehoiachin put off his prison garments. And every day of his life he dined regularly at the king's table,
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Jehoiachin took off his prison garb and from then on ate his meals in company with the king.
34 and for his allowance, a regular allowance was given him by the king according to his daily need, until the day of his death, as long as he lived.
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The king provided everything he needed to live comfortably for the rest of his life.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.