595BC – Judah goes into Slavery to Babylon

2 Chronicles 36:11-21. King Zedekiah of Judah and some of the people of Judah were taken captive as slaves to Babylon in 595BC. Many of the very poor were left behind to till or work the ground as farmers.

The exiles were taken at three different times by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. Years were 605BC, 595BC and 586BC.

In 586BC Jerusalem was totally destroyed and it was Nebuchadnezzar’s Third Capture of Jerusalem.

As God had told them, they were away for seventy years, as the land made up for the lost yearly Sabbath rests.

Background Reading:

Judah goes into Slavery

Zedekiah 20th King of Judah [586BC]

36:11 Zedekiah was 21 years old when he became king, and he reigned for eleven years in Jerusalem. 12 He practiced what the LORD his God considered to be evil and never humbled himself before Jeremiah the prophet who spoke for the LORD. 13 Zedekiah rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear allegiance in the name of God. Instead, he stiffened his resolve, and hardened his heart, and would not return to the LORD God of Israel.

Nebuchadnezzar’s Third Capture of Jerusalem

14 Meanwhile, all the officials who supervised the priests and the people remained unfaithful, following the detestable example of the surrounding nations. They polluted the LORD’s Temple that he had consecrated in Jerusalem. 15 The LORD God of their ancestors pleaded with them time and again through his messengers, because he had compassion on his people and on the place of his residence, 16 but they mocked God’s messengers, despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until there was no remedy for the wrath of the LORD that arose to punish his people. 17 Therefore he brought up the king of the Chaldeans against them, who executed their young men in the holy Temple, showing no compassion on young man or young virgin, adult men or the aged. God gave them all into the king’s control, 18 who took back to Babylon every article in God’s Temple, whether large or small, including the treasuries of the LORD’s Temple, the king’s assets, and those of his officers. 19 After this, they set fire to God’s Temple, demolished the wall around Jerusalem, burned all of its fortified buildings, and destroyed everything of value. 20 Nebuchadnezzar carried off to Babylon those who survived the executions, and they served him and his descendants until the kingdom of Persia came to power. 21 All of this fulfilled what the LORD had predicted through Jeremiah. And so the land enjoyed its Sabbaths, and the length of the land’s desolation lasted until a 70-year long Sabbath had been completed.
2 Chronicles 36:11-21
Further readings 2 Kings 24:17-25:30 and Jeremiah 52:1-34.


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