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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 King 25:1 - 25:1
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Siege and conquest of Jerusalem; Zedekiah taken prisoner and led away to Babel (cf. Jer 52:4-11 and Jer 39:1-7). - 2Ki 25:1. In the ninth year of the reign of Zedekiah, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar marched with all his forces against Jerusalem and commenced the siege (cf. Jer 39:1), after he had taken all the rest of the fortified cities of the land, with the exception of Lachish and Azekah, which were besieged at the same time as Jerusalem (Jer 34:7). On the very same day the commencement of the siege of Jerusalem was revealed to the prophet Ezekiel in his exile (Eze 24:1). “And they built against it (the city) siege-towers round about.” דָּיֵק, which only occurs here and in Jeremiah (Jer 52:4) and Ezekiel (Eze 4:2; Eze 17:17; Eze 21:27; Eze 26:8), does not mean either a line of circumvallation (J. D. Mich., Hitzig), or the outermost enclosure constructed of palisades (Thenius, whose assertion that דָּיֵק is always mentioned as the first work of the besiegers is refuted by Eze 17:17 and Eze 21:27), but a watch, and that in a collective sense: watch-towers or siege-towers (cf. Ges. thes. p. 330, and Hävernick on Eze 4:2).
2Ki 25:2
“And the city was besieged till the eleventh year of king Zedekiah,” in which the northern wall of the city was broken through on the ninth day of the fourth month (2Ki 25:3). That Jerusalem could sustain a siege of this duration, namely eighteen months, shows what the strength of the fortifications must have been. Moreover the siege was interrupted for a short time, when the approach of the Egyptian king Hophra compelled the Chaldaeans to march to meet him and drive him back, which they appear to have succeeded in doing without a battle (cf. Jer 37:5., Eze 17:7).
2Ki 25:3-4
Trusting partly to the help of the Egyptians and partly to the strength of Jerusalem, Zedekiah paid no attention to the repeated entreaties of Jeremiah, that he would save himself with his capital and people from the destruction which was otherwise inevitable, by submitting, to the Chaldaeans (cf. Jer 38:17, Jer 38:18), but allowed things to reach their worst, until the famine became so intense, that inhuman horrors were perpetrated (cf. Lam 2:20-21; Lam 4:9-10), and eventually a breach was made in the city wall on the ninth day of the fourth month. The statement of the month is omitted in our text, where the words הָֽרְבִיעִי בַּחֹרֶשׁ (Jer 52:6, cf. Jer 39:2) have fallen out before בְּתִשְׁעָה (2Ki 25:3, commencement) through the oversight of a copyist. The overwhelming extent of the famine is mentioned, not “because the people were thereby rendered quite unfit to offer any further resistance” (Seb. Schm.), but as a proof of the truth of the prophetic announcements (Lev 26:29; Deu 28:53-57; Jer 15:2; Jer 27:13; Eze 4:16-17). הָאָרֶץ עַם are the common people in Jerusalem, or the citizens of the capital. From the more minute account of the entrance of the enemy into the city in Jer 39:3-5 we learn that the Chaldaeans made a breach in the northern or outer wall of the lower city, i.e., the second wall, built by Hezekiah and Manasseh (2Ch 32:5; 2Ch 33:14), and forced their way into the lower city (הַמִּשְׁנֶה, 2Ki 22:14), so that their generals took their stand at the gate of the centre, which was in the wall that separated the lower city from the upper city upon Zion, and formed the passage from the one to the other. When Zedekiah saw them here, he fled by night with the soldiers out of the city, through the gate between the two walls at or above the king's garden, on the road to the plain of the Jordan, while the Chaldaeans were round about the city. In 2Ki 25:4 a faulty text has come down to us. In the clause הַמִּלְחָמָה וְכָל־אַנְשֵׁי the verb יִבְרְחוּ is omitted, if not even more, namely הָעִיר מִן וַיֵּצְֽאוּ יִבְרְחוּ, “fled and went out of the city.” And if we compare Jer 39:4, it is evident that before הם וְכָל־אַנְשֵׁיstill more has dropped out, not merely הַמֶּלֶךְ, which must have stood in the text, since according to 2Ki 25:5 the king was among the fugitives; but most probably the whole clause יְהוּדָה מֶלֶךְ צִדְקִיָּהוּ רָאָם כַּאֲשֶׁר וַיְהִי, since the words הם וְכָל־אַנְשֵׁי have no real connection with what precedes, and cannot form a circumstantial clause so far as the sense is concerned. The “gate between the two walls, which (was) at or over (עַל) the king's garden,” was a gate at the mouth of the Tyropoeon, that is to say, at the south-eastern corner of the city of Zion; for, according to Neh 3:15, the king's garden was at the pool of Siloah, i.e., at the mouth of the Tyropoeon (see Rob. Pal. ii. 142). By this defile, therefore, the approach to the city was barred by a double wall, the inner one running from Zion to the Ophel, whilst the outer one, at some distance off, connected the Zion wall with the outer surrounding wall of the Ophel, and most probably enclosed the king's garden. The subject to וַיֵּלֶךְ is הַמֶּלֶךְ, which has dropped out before הם וְכָל־אַנְשֵׁי. הָעֲרָבָה is the lowland valley on both sides of the Jordan (see at Deu 1:1).
2Ki 25:5
As the Chaldaeans were encamped around the city, the flight was immediately discovered. The Chaldaean army pursued him, and overtook him in the steppes of Jericho, whilst his own army was dispersed, all of which Ezekiel had foreseen in the Spirit (Eze 12:3.). יְרֵחֹו עַרְבֹות are that portion of the plain of the Jordan which formed the country round Jericho (see at Jos 4:13).
2Ki 25:6
Zedekiah having been seized by the Chaldaeans, was taken to the king of Babel in the Chaldaean headquarters at Riblah (see at 2Ki 23:33), and was there put upon his trial. According to 2Ki 25:1, Nebuchadnezzar had commenced the siege of Jerusalem in person; but afterwards, possibly not till after the Egyptians who came to relieve the besieged city had been repulsed, he transferred the continuance of the siege, which was a prolonged one, to his generals, and retired to Riblah, to conduct the operations of the whole campaign from thence. אֶת־פל מִשְׁפָּט דִּבֶּר, to conduct judicial proceedings with any one, i.e., to hear and judge him. For this Jeremiah constantly uses the plural מִשְׁפָּטִםִ, not only in Jer 52:9 and Jer 39:5, but also in Jer 1:16 and Jer 4:12.
2Ki 25:7
The punishment pronounced upon Zedekiah was the merited reward of the breach of his oath, and his hardening himself against the counsel of the Lord which was announced to him by Jeremiah during the siege, that he should save not only his own life, but also Jerusalem from destruction, by a voluntary submission to the Chaldaeans, whereas by obstinate resistance he would bring an ignominious destruction upon himself, his family, the city, and the whole people (Jer 38:17., Jer 32:5; Jer 34:3.). His sons, who, though not mentioned in 2Ki 25:4, had fled with him and had been taken, and (according to Jer 52:10 and Jer 39:6) all the nobles (princes) of Judah, sc. those who had fled with the king, were slain before his eyes. He himself was then blinded, and led away to Babel, chained with double chains of brass, and kept a prisoner there till his death (Jer 52:11); so that, as Ezekiel (Eze 12:13) had prophesied, he came to Babel, but did not see the land, and died there. Blinding by pricking out the eyes was a common punishment for princes among the Babylonians and Persians (cf. Herod. vii. 18, and Brisson, de region Pers. princip. p. 589). נְחֻשְׁתַּיִם, double brazen chains, are brazen fetters for the hands and feet. Samson was treated in the same manner by the Philistines (Jdg 16:21).