Zedekiah is currently the king of Judah, placed on the throne as a vassal king of the nation of Babylon. The rightful king, Jehoiachin, was deposed by King Nebuchadnezzar when Nebuchadnezzar took Jehoiachin and his family and many others as captives to Babylon. Zedekiah is Jehoiachin's uncle and the Bible tells us that Zedekiah, like several of his predecessors, did evil in the eyes of the Lord. He does evil in the eyes of the king of Babylon as well, for several years after swearing his allegiance to Nebuchadnezzar, he joined a coalition of nations (including the Egyptians and the Phoenicians) against him, despite being warned by the Lord's prophets that this would mean disaster.
The author of 2 Chronicles tells us that the Lord tried to get the king and the people to change their ways. The Babylonians had already carried off several thousand of the citizens of Jerusalem in an earlier conflict but the idolatrous king and those who were likeminded refused to listen. As we were told in our last study session: "The Lord, the God of their ancestors, sent word to them through His messengers again and again, because He had pity on His people and on His dwelling place. But they mocked God's messengers, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets until the wrath of the Lord was aroused against His people and there was no remedy." (2 Chronicles 36:15-16)
When we arrive at the books of the prophets we will find the people of Jerusalem putting their confidence in the fact that the Lord's temple was in their midst. They will not believe that the Lord is going to allow the city and the temple to be destroyed. The temple, however, means nothing to the Lord if He means nothing to the people. The prophet Jeremiah will speak out against the false prophets who are promising everyone that the Lord will protect the city for the sake of His temple. In Jeremiah 7 the prophet brings against the people a specific list of sins that the Lord accuses them of committing. Upon the authority of the Lord, the prophet will announce that unless the people repent of these sins there will be no deliverance from the nation of Babylon. But repentance doesn't happen, at least not in the majority of hearts, and the consequences fall on the city.
"So in the ninth year of Zedekiah's reign, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Jerusalem with his whole army. He encamped outside the city and built siege works all around it. The city was kept under siege until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah." (2 Kings 25:1-2) Nebuchadnezzar previously attempted to invade the nation of Egypt but the Egyptians mounted a successful defense, which is what caused the Egyptians and the Phoenicians and several smaller nations to believe that if they joined together they could prevent Babylon from becoming the major world power of the era. Zedekiah king of Judah, like these other kings, believed that he might get out from under Babylonian authority and rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, refusing to pay the required tribute and sending envoys to Pharaoh Hophra in Egypt to make an alliance with him and to ask for his help. Hophra did march out with a large army, the news of which alarmed Nebuchadnezzar enough to leave off an earlier campaign against Jerusalem in order to push back the Egyptians. He was successful at this and Hophra was obliged to retreat; thereafter the king of Egypt made no further attempts to aid the king of Judah. Now Nebuchadnezzar is back and is laying siege to Jerusalem and this time there will be no reprieve.
"By the ninth day of the fourth month the famine in the city had become so severe that there was no food for the people to eat. Then the city wall was broken through, and the whole army fled at night through the gate between the two walls near the king's garden, though the Babylonians were surrounding the city. They fled toward the Arabah, but the Babylonian army pursued the king and overtook him in the plains of Jericho. All his soldiers were separated from him and scattered, and he was captured." (2 Kings 25:3-6a) Siege is intended to cause severe deprivations for the people trapped inside a city. The hoped-for result is that starving bellies will lead to the surrender of the city to the enemy army. This way no battle has to be fought, for heavy casualties among the attacking army cannot be avoided when taking a city by force. Scaling walls or breaking through walls means facing down armed men on the other side. In Zedekiah's case, instead of surrendering when there's nothing left to eat, he decides to make a hole in the wall that's big enough for him to crawl through and escape with his soldiers. The reason he is able to break through the wall by night is because the Babylonians didn't lay siege to a city by building a wall all around it (thus preventing all possibility of anyone emerging) but by building several ramps with watchtowers on them. This helped them to spot anyone trying to come out of the city and they would often allow average citizens to flee a city under siege since their primary interest was in having the city's king and top officials surrender to them. They had little interest in stopping starving peasants who were running for the hills.
Zedekiah and his men, no doubt disguised as average citizens, stealthily manage to break through the wall in the dark of night without alerting the Babylonians at first. But as soon as the enemy soldiers realize what's happening, they take off after the king and his men, catching up with them in the plains of Jericho. At that time, Zedekiah's men abandon him just as he abandoned the people of Jerusalem. He is brought to trial before Nebuchadnezzar at Riblah. "He was taken to the king of Babylon at Riblah, where sentence was pronounced on him. They killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. Then they put out his eyes, bound him with bronze shackles and took him to Babylon." (2 Kings 25:6b-7) The last thing the king sees is his sons dying right in front of him.
In the book of Ezekiel we will learn that a prophecy was spoken against King Zedekiah and that the prophecy was fulfilled right here in Kings 25. "The prince among them will put his things on his shoulder at dusk and leave, and a hole will be dug in the wall for him to go through. He will cover his face so that he cannot see the land. I will spread My net for him, and he will be caught in My snare; I will bring him to Babylonia, the land of the Chaldeans, but he will not see it, and there he will die. I will scatter to the winds all those around him---his staff and all his troops---and I will pursue them with drawn sword." (Ezekiel 12:12-14)
Zedekiah, king of Judah, will never see the land of Babylon to which he is taken captive. He will never see the land of Judah again either. The man who eschewed the Lord in favor of idols will never return from a land of idolatry.
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