2 Chronicles 36:1-14

Jehoahaz King of Judah, Jehoiakim King of Judah, Jehoiachin King of Judah, Zedekiah King of Judah: 2 Chronicles 36:1–14✞

Background

Before getting into the passage it’s worth covering some background and history, which is an important backdrop to the events happening in this chapter.

In prior years, leading up to Chapter 36, the dominant power in the world had been Assyria. The Assyrians were the ones who conquered the northern nation of Israel and they’d been on the verge of conquering Judah as well, though they never did (through God’s intervention). Somewhere in this time frame, however, before the reign of Josiah (though I’m not sure how long before), the Babylonians have started to rise in power, threatening the dominance of the Assyrians. (Incidentally, just in case all of this history isn’t confusing enough, some versions of the Bible call the Babylonians the Chaldeans, and call the Assyrians the Arameans.)

After the death of the Assyrian ruler Ashurbanipal, around 630B.C., Assyria’s power began to diminish, and Egypt starts to gain in power as an ally of Assyria. This leads to the battle mentioned in the last chapter, between Assyria and Egypt on one side, and Babylon and the Medes on the other, which took place in 609B.C. in Megiddo. I believe this is the end of Assyria as a world power.

I don’t know if he’s the king for the entire period I just described, but by the time Chapter 36 begins, the king of Babylon is a man named Nebuchadnezzar. Also, of interest to Christian/Jewish readers, the prophet Jeremiah is active in this time frame. (And probably some other prophets, as well.)

That’s enough background, but some more world events will continue to creep into the discussions of the following kings; I’ll do my best to highlight the stuff I’m getting from other sources vs. the stuff that’s coming from the parallel passages in 2 Kings vs. the stuff that’s right here in the text of Chapter 36.

Passage

This chapter tells of the fall of Judah to Babylon, against the backdrop mentioned above. There are four kings mentioned, but the author(s) seem to be treating it all like one single descent into Judah’s defeat as a nation, rather than four separate kingships. (Especially given the short nature of some of them!)

I’ll cover the lead up to the defeat in this post (on verses 1–14), and then the actual fall of Jerusalem in the next (on verses 15–23).

The text doesn’t give much information on any of these kings—some are just literal placeholders, reigning for a few months—so I’ll ignore the NIV section headings in this case and just cover each king in order. The description of most kings in the books of Kings and Chronicles always includes whether they did evil or did good in the eyes of the LORD, but in this case they all did evil.

Jehoahaz

Only reigns for three months.

Josiah’s son Jehoahaz is made king when his father dies (as outlined in the previous passage). In the previous passage Necho, the king of Egypt, hadn’t really seemed to care one way or the other that Josiah and Judah were fighting against him, but now he makes Judah pay: he removes Jehoahaz from the throne and make his brother Eliakim king.

The parallel passage in 2 Kings 23:31–35✞ mentions that Jehoahaz is carried off to Egypt as a prisoner, where he eventually dies.

Jehoiakim

Jehoiakim reigns for eleven years.

“But wait,” you might be thinking, “who is this Jehoiakim? I thought Necho made Eliakim king?” And yes, he did – but deciding on behalf of Judah who their next king should be wasn’t enough, Necho also decided to give Eliakim a new name, renaming him to Jehoiakim. This is a show of power from Necho: Judah is so fully under his control that he can not only appoint a king on their behalf, he can even change that king’s name. This was a humiliating moment for Judah.

Normally, when we see these kinds of name changes in the Bible, the names have some meaning; there’s a significance to the rename. In this case I don’t see any footnotes to tell me what the names mean, but I assume “Eliakim” has something to do with God—regardless of the fact that Eliakim/Jehoiakim doesn’t actually obey God—and “Jehoiakim” has something to do with some other gods. It’s a pattern I’ve seen elsewhere, but just an assumption.

Some more history/context: during Jehoiakim’s reign the Babylonians invade Judah as part of their attempt to fully subdue Egypt (which doesn’t seem to have been as soundly defeated as Assyria was during the battle in the last chapter), since Judah happens to be between the two nations. As a result of this invasion, Jehoiakim switches his allegiance from Egypt to Babylon – for a while. We’re told in the parallel passage in 2 Kings 24 that Jehoiakim is Nebuchadnezzar’s vassal for three years, after which he switches his allegiance back to Egypt!

So, in verses 6–7✞ of this passage, Nebuchadnezzar captures Jehoiakim and brings him in captivity back to Babylon, leaving Jehoiakim’s son Jehoiachin as king of [what’s left of] Judah.

Jehoiachin

I’m unclear about some of the events between the reigns of Jehoiakim and Jehoiachin. Going back to the historical context—as well as the text of Kings/Chronicles—it seems that Nebuchadnezzar partially withdrew from Judah, then came back to put Jerusalem under siege again, but I’m not clear how those events overlap with the end of Jehoiakim’s reign and the beginning of Jehoiachin’s.

Regardless, Jehoiachin only reigns for “three months and ten days” (verse 9✞), before Jerusalem surrenders to Nebuchadnezzar in 597B.C., and Jehoiachin is brought to Babylon in captivity. This is a “surrender,” not a total defeat, but that’s coming…

The parallel passage in 2 Kings 24:14✞ tells us that about 10,000 of Judah’s elite are also taken captive to Babylon, leaving only the poorest of the land behind. (The ESV Study Bible notes indicate that the prophet Ezekiel is one of the people who is taken into captivity at this time, so he’s in Babylon when his ministry begins.)

Zedekiah

Zedekiah, Jehoiachin’s uncle, has the dubious distinction of being Judah’s last king. He has about ten years of relief from the Babylonians, but eventually rebels against them, at which point they come back to lay siege to Jerusalem for a couple of years, with the city finally falling for good in 587 or 586B.C.

The reason for Zedekiah’s rebellion is unclear to me; in verse 13✞ it says this:

He also rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him take an oath in God’s name. He became stiff-necked and hardened his heart and would not turn to the LORD, the God of Israel.

The first part of this almost makes it sound like Zedekiah is doing the right thing: “it’s sinful to take an oath in the name of God!” he seems to be saying. And yet, the very next sentence tells us this can’t be the case, since he obstinately refuses to turn to God. So I don’t know what the passage means when it talks about Nebuchadnezzar making him take an oath in God’s name, or if/how that plays into Zedekiah rebelling.

Regardless, this is the end of the nation of Judah, as we’ll see in the next passage. Much of the territory of Judah is already in the hands of the Babylonians, but the fall of Jerusalem means the fall of the nation as a whole.

Thoughts

The main thing that jumps out at me for these kings is the way they obstinately refuse to obey God, and yet, at the same time, don’t seem able to discern the current political moment. It would be one thing if they were ignoring God for political expediency—though still sinful—but in this case they seem to be making decisions that are bad spiritually and politically at the same time. Why would Jehoiakim switch his allegiance from Babylon to Egypt? Isn’t it clear to him which nation is the stronger and which is the weaker? I think it’s fair to see God’s hand in this.

Along those lines, reading this passage in retrospect is an exercise in minor frustration. “Why would he do that? Why would he trust in them? Why…” Of course, it’s easy to do so in retrospect, and I’m not the type of person to be able to read the current political moment myself, so the lesson I take is to trust God, and leave everything else up to Him. If I make a “stupid” mistake because I’m following God, I’m fine with that; I’ll leave it up to Him to orchestrate events as He pleases. If I make a stupid mistake because I’m not following Him, however, that’s on me!