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, from Libnah.
2 He did evil in the sight of the LORD, just as Jehoiakim had done.
3 For it was on account of the anger of the LORD that this happened in Jerusalem and Judah, until he had thrown them out from his presence. Then Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.
4 In the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth of the month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came against Jerusalem, he and all his army; they camped against it and built a siege wall around it.
5 The city remained under siege until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.
6 In the fourth month, on the ninth of the month, the famine grew strong in the city, and there was no bread for the people of the land.
7 Then the city was broken into, and all the fighting men fled and left the city by night by way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king's garden, while the Chaldeans were around the city; and they went along the road to the Arabah.
8 The Chaldean army pursued the king and caught up with Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, and all his army scattered from him.
9 They took the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he pronounced judgments upon him.
10 The king of Babylon slaughtered Zedekiah's sons before his eyes, and he slaughtered all the officials of Judah as well at Riblah.
11 Zedekiah's eyes he blinded, and he bound him with bronze fetters; and the king of Babylon brought him to Babylon and put him in the house of custody until the day of his death.
12 In the fifth month, on the tenth of the month, that is, the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard, who stood before the king of Babylon, came into Jerusalem.
13 He burned the house of the LORD and the house of the king, and all the houses of Jerusalem, every great house, he burned with fire.
14 And the whole Chaldean army that was with the captain of the guard tore down all the walls around Jerusalem.
15 Some of the poor of the people and the rest of the people left in the city, the deserters who had fallen away to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the craftsmen, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried into exile.
16 But some of the poor of the land Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left behind as vinedressers and plowmen.
17 The bronze pillars that were in the house of the LORD, the stands, and the bronze sea in the house of the LORD the Chaldeans broke up, and they carried all their bronze to Babylon.
18 And the pots, the shovels, the snuffers, the basins, the ladles and all the bronze vessels used in the service they took.
19 The captain of the guard also took the small bowls, the firepans, the basins, the pots, the lampstands, the ladles and the libation bowls, what was of gold for its gold and what was of silver for its silver.
20 The two pillars, the one sea, and the twelve bronze bulls beneath the stands, which King Solomon had made for the house of the LORD: there was no weighing the bronze of all these vessels.
21 As for the pillars, eighteen cubits was the height of one pillar, a cord of twelve cubits went around it, and its thickness was four fingers; it was hollow.
22 A capital of bronze was on it; the height of the one capital was five cubits, with latticework and pomegranates on the capital all around, all of bronze; and the second pillar was like these, with pomegranates.
23 There were ninety-six pomegranates on the sides; all the pomegranates on the latticework all around numbered a hundred.
24 The captain of the guard took Seraiah the head priest and Zephaniah the second priest and the three keepers of the threshold;
25 and from the city he took one eunuch who was over the fighting men, seven men of those who saw the king's face who were found in the city, the scribe 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 inside the city.
26 Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard took them and led them to the king of Babylon at Riblah.
27 The king of Babylon struck them and put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah went into exile from its land.
28 This is the people whom Nebuchadnezzar exiled: in the seventh year, three thousand twenty-three Jews;
29 in the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar, from Jerusalem, eight hundred thirty-two souls;
30 in the twenty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard exiled seven hundred forty-five Jews. All the souls were four thousand six hundred.
31 In the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-fifth of the month, Evil-merodach king of Babylon, in the year he became king, lifted the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah and brought him out of the prison house.
32 He spoke good things with him and set his throne above the thrones of the kings who were with him in Babylon.
33 And he changed his prison clothes, and he ate bread before him regularly all the days of his life.
34 As for his allowance, a continual allowance was given him by the king of Babylon, each day's portion in its day, until the day of his death, all the days of his life.