2 Kings 24:1

¹The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah (this was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon),

¹In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it.

⁹behold, I will send and take all the families of the north,” says the LORD, “and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against its inhabitants, and against all these nations around. I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.

⁶Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against him, and bound him in fetters to carry him to Babylon. ⁷Nebuchadnezzar also carried some of the vessels of the LORD’s house to Babylon, and put them in his temple at Babylon. ⁸Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and his abominations which he did, and that which was found in him, behold, they are written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah; and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his place.

⁹Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem. He did that which was evil in the LORD’s sight. ¹⁰At the return of the year, King Nebuchadnezzar sent and brought him to Babylon, with the valuable vessels of the LORD’s house, and made Zedekiah his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem.

¹¹Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. ¹²He did that which was evil in the LORD his God’s sight. He didn’t humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet speaking from the LORD’s mouth. ¹³He also rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear by God; but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart against turning to the LORD, the God of Israel. ¹⁴Moreover all the chiefs of the priests and the people trespassed very greatly after all the abominations of the nations; and they polluted the LORD’s house which he had made holy in Jerusalem.

¹⁵The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place; ¹⁶but they mocked the messengers of God, despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until the LORD’s wrath arose against his people, until there was no remedy.

¹⁷Therefore he brought on them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or infirm. He gave them all into his hand. ¹⁸All the vessels of God’s house, great and small, and the treasures of the LORD’s house, and the treasures of the king and of his princes, all these he brought to Babylon. ¹⁹They burned God’s house, broke down the wall of Jerusalem, burned all its palaces with fire, and destroyed all of its valuable vessels. ²⁰He carried those who had escaped from the sword away to Babylon, and they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia, ²¹to fulfill the LORD’s word by Jeremiah’s mouth, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. As long as it lay desolate, it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.

⁵Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years.

²Of Egypt: concerning the army of Pharaoh Necoh king of Egypt, which was by the river Euphrates in Carchemish, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon struck in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah.