In Accord With The Prophecies Of Jeremiah Nebuchadrezzar Besieges Jerusalem, Takes Zedekiah Prisoner And Exacts Vengeance On His Sons And On The Nobles Of Judah (Jeremiah 52:4-11).
‘And it came about 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 they built forts against it round about.
In the ninth year of Zedekiah's reign Nebuchadrezzar, the king of Babylon, came with all his army and encamped against Jerusalem, setting up siege forts around it. This would have resulted in the devastation of much of the land of Judah prior to, and during, the siege. Nebuchadnezzar had once and for all lost patience with Jerusalem and Judah (and as the Book of Daniel makes clear he suffered from a mental illness, and was probably a manic depressive).
Note the contrast with 2 Kings where Nebuchadrezzar's name was given as Nebuchadnezzar, a name also used elsewhere in Jeremiah. In Babylon he was called ‘Nabu-kudurri-usur' (‘Nabu has protected the succession rights'), but in the Greek he is called ‘Nabochodonosor'. So both forms are possible. The alteration here does, however, indicate that the passages were not cited without thought.
‘So the city was besieged unto the eleventh year of king Zedekiah.'
The siege continued over a period of nineteen months, although at one stage temporarily suspended as a result of the arrival of an Egyptian army (Jeremiah 37:5). It was clear to all that the city was doomed. It would have been crowded with refugees fleeing before the advancing troops so that food supplies would quickly diminish, even though partly supplemented at the time of Egypt's intervention.
‘In the fourth month, in the ninth day of the month, the famine was sore in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land.'
By July 587 BC, as a direct result of the siege, starvation had become a problem in the city, for there was no food for ‘the people of the land' who were now sheltering in Jerusalem. The city had been cut off from outside help for many months. For a vivid picture of the situation see Lamentations 2:12; Lamentations 4:4-5; Lamentations 4:9-10. Compare also 2 Kings 6:25-30.
‘Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled, and went forth out of 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 against the city round about) and they made their way toward the Arabah.
A breach was made in the wall. We may see this as having been made by the enemy on the grounds that the desperate attempt to escape was made by night, utilising a small postern gate (the main gates would be closely guarded) which would have been identifiable at the time. Had the breach been made by the people of Jerusalem the use of the gate would not have been necessary, unless the breach was intended as a diversion in order to let the king escape. And ‘all the men of war' (possibly the king's bodyguard), fled from Jerusalem, along with the king, who was making for the Jordan Rift Valley, the Arabah, possibly hoping to find refuge in Moab. They may have fought their way through the surrounding Chaldeans, having taken them by surprise, or they may have made use of their knowledge of the terrain in order to avoid them.
‘But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, and all his army was scattered from him.'
However, the movement of such a large number of men could hardly fail to be detected, and the escape may well therefore have involved some fighting, so that when the Chaldeans realised that there had been an escape they pursued after the king. The king's troops scattered to find refuge where they could. This may have been before the arrival of the Chaldeans in the hope was that this would aid the king's escape in that the Chaldeans would not know who to follow (but if so it failed), or it may have been as a result of the subsequent attack of the Chaldeans. In consequence he was captured in ‘the plains of Jericho', in the Jordan Rift Valley (the Arabah).
‘Then they took the king, and carried him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; and he gave judgment on him.'
Zedekiah was then taken to Riblah in the region of Hamath on the Orontes where Nebuchadrezzar was stationed, and there given a form of trial. But the result could hardly have been in doubt from Nebuchadrezzar's viewpoint. He had broken his oath of allegiance and was worthy of death.
‘And the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. He slew also all the princes of Judah in Riblah. And he put out the eyes of Zedekiah; and the king of Babylon bound him in fetters, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death.' '
Nebuchadrezzar's penalty was severe. All his sons were slain before his eyes and he was then blinded, leaving the last sight that he had experienced before becoming blind as that of his sons being killed. Then he was bound in fetters and carried off to Babylon to spend the remainder of his life in prison. He was probably spared, not as an act of mercy, but in order that he might serve as an example of Nebuchadrezzar's superiority. His rebellion, into which humanly speaking he had been forced by the anti-Assyrian party in Jerusalem, had cost him dear. From the divine point of view his evil behaviour had brought its own reward. But the adviser's did not get away scot free. A number of them were also executed.
The word for ‘prison' means ‘house of punishment' or ‘house of visitation' and may indicate a more severe regime than usual. LXX translates as though it referred to him grinding at the mill.
Note that ‘The king of Babylon' is ‘they' in 2 Kings, the responsibility is being personalised, and that ‘he slew also all the princes of Judah in Riblah' is an addition compared with the narrative in 2 Kings, stressing that the king's advisers also received punishment for the advice that they had given as Jeremiah had warned.
Nebuchadrezzar was not alone in such cruelty. Assur-bani-pal of Assyria boasted of how he put a king of Arabia in chains and bound him with the dogs, and caused him to be kept in one of the great gates of Nineveh, whilst Darius of Persia would later take a rebel king of Sagartia and cut off his nose and ears, and keep him chained to a door. Compare also Judges 1:6-7.