Zedekiah

From New World Encyclopedia
Jeremiah confronts the king (possibly Zedekiah).

Zedekiah (Hebrew: צִדְקִיָּהוּ, Tzidkiyahu; Greek: ζεδεκιας, Zedekias) was the last king of Judah. He was a son of King Josiah and the younger brother of King Jehoahaz, but did become king until after Jehoiachim and Jehoiachin had succeeded to the throne before him. In Hebrew, his name means "YHWH (my) righteousness." William F. Albright dates the reign of Zedekiah to 597-587 B.C.E., while E. R. Thiele to 597-586 B.C.E.

Zedekiah became king after his predecessors had unsuccessfully rebelled against Babylon. His original name was Mattaniah, but when Nebuchadnezzar II placed him on the throne as the successor to Jehoiachin, his name was changed to Zedekiah. The prophet Jeremiah urged him not to resist the Babylonians, but Zedekiah eventually listen to the words of other prophets and advisers. He thus provoked a second siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, resulting in his own capture, the death of his sons, and the destruction of his kingdom. His demise sealed the doom of the nation of Judah and marked the second phase of the Babylonian exile of the Jews.

Background

A crisis had faced the Kingdom of Judah since the end of the reign of King Josiah in the late seventh century CE. Josiah is characterized by the Bible as the greatest king since David, yet he was killed in battle against Pharaoh Necco II at the battle of Meggido. The biblical writers would later blame his demise on the sins of his predecessor, King Manasseh, which were seen as so great that God had already determined to send the Jews into exile into Babylon.

Josiah had been killed in an effort to confront Egyptian forces who aimed to defeat the armies of the rising Babylonian Empire, and defeat placed Judah under Egyptian control. Jehoahaz, the second son of Josiah, reigned for only three months, after which he was dethroned by Necho II and exiled to Egypt. Josiah's eldest son, known by the throne name of Jehoiakim, replaced him, ruling at Necho's pleasure. However, whenNebuchadrezzar II of Babylon defeated Egypt at Carchemish in 604, Jehoiakim became the vassal of Babylon.

Jehoiakim eventually rebelled against Nebuchadrezzar and died in 598 B.C.E. during a Babylonian siege of Jerusalem. His son Jehoiachin, succeeded him. The prophet Jeremiah, who counseled a policy of non-resistance toward Babylon, had been a bitter opponent of his father, and strongly denounced Jehoiachin as well.

Nebuchadnezzar II's forces soon captured Jerusalem, removing Jehoiachin from office and taking in chains to Babylon. Most of the royal household and those officials of Judah who had joined the rebellion against Babylon were forced into exile, along with many other leading citizens. The prophet Jeremiah, who had urged cooperation with the Babylonians, was allowed to remain, and Zedekiah—Jehoiachin's uncle—was identified as a suitable replacement as king under Babylonian supervision.

Reign

Kings of Judah

Jeremiah predicts the doom of his fellow prophet Hananiah

Zedekiah was only three years older than Jehoiachin, ascending the throne at the age of 21. Nebuchadnezzer required an oath of fealty from him, which he made in the name of Israel's God (2 Chronicles 36:13). Zedekiah was initially cooperative, lifting the restrictions the previous administration had imposed against the prophet Jeremiah, who was seen as a Babylonian symphathizer.

However, in Zedekiah's fourth year as king, talk of independence from Babylonian vassalage began to circulate once again. Jeremiah dramatically appeared in the marketplace with a wooden yoke around his neck urging a policy of continued submission. The Temple-affiliated prophet Hananiah, however, prophesied against Jeremiah:

"This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: 'I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two years I will bring back to this place all the articles of the Lord's house that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon removed from here and took to Babylon.'" (28:2-3)

Hananiah then grabbed the yoke from Jeremiah's shoulders and broke it. Jeremiah the withdrew to consider, and later countered with a prophecy of his own predicting Hananiah's doom within the same two-year period. Jeremiah had come to view Nebuchadnezzar as God's "servant" (Jer. 25:9), who had the mission of executing divine judgment on Judah because of her sins. He thus urged a policy of non-resistance to the Babylonians even wrote those who had been taken into exile to to pray for the Babylonian king and settle more or less permanently into life there (Jer. 29).

Rebellion

File:Jeremiah-Dungeon.jpg
Soldiers lower Jeremiah into an empty cistern.

Zedekiah was the son of King Josiah, the man the Bible calls Judah's greatest king since David. He was thus understandably swayed by the patriotic call of Hananiah and others urging to throw off the Babylonian yoke. He thus decided to support the rebellion against Nebuchadnezzar, entering into an alliance with Pharaoh Hophra, king of Egypt. This brought up Nebuchadnezzar, "with all his host" (2 Kings 25:1), in a new siege ofJerusalem.

Jeremiah confronted Zedekiah directly warning that resistance against Babylon constituted rebellion against God and would bring disaster. The distant voice of the prophet Ezekiel was added to this warning from Babylonian exile, but in the current political climate—with other prophets claiming just the opposite— the independence-minded king refused to listen. When the Babylonians temporarily lifted their siege to deal with Zedekiah's Egyptian allies, Jeremiah left Jerusalem on business in the nearby land of Benjamin and was arrested on the pretext of being a deserter. Being by palace guards, he was placed in a dungeon, but was soon released at Zedekiah's command but remained confined within the palace court. The prophet, however, stubbornly refused to keep silence, predicting Jerusalem's imminent doom and affecting the morale of the soldiers, leading the king's officers to silence him by imprisoning him in an empty cistern, where he nearly died.

During this siege, which began 589 B.C.E. and lasted about 18 months, "every worst woe befell the devoted city, which drank the cup of God's fury to the dregs" (2 Kings 25:3; Lamentations 4:4-9).

In the eleventh year of Zedekiah's reign, Nebuchadnezzar succeeded in conquering Jerusalem. The city was plundered and reduced to ruins. Zedekiah and his followers attempted to escape, making their way out of the city, but were captured on the plains of Jericho, and were taken to Riblah.

There, after seeing his own sons put to death, Zedekiah's own eyes were put out. Place in chains, he was then carried captive to Babylon, where he remained a prisoner to the day of his death.

After the fall of Jerusalem, the Babylonian general Nebuzaraddan was sent to carry out its complete destruction. The city was razed to the ground, and the Temple of Jerusalem, the crucial center of Judah's religious life, was utterly destroyed.

Legacy

After the destruction of Jerusalem, the Babylonians established a new capital of Judea in Mizpah, appoint the pro-Babylonian administrator Gedaliah as governor. Jeremiah had remained captive in the Jerusalem palace prison until his liberation by the Babylonians, who honored him as a man of God and allowed him to choose his place of residence. He chose to move to the new capital in Mizpah. Gedaliah, however, was soon assassinated as a Babyonian collaborator, and his succeedor, Johanan, rejected Jeremiah's counsels and fled to Egypt, apparently taking the prophet with him.

As for Zedekiah himself, since his sons were killed by the Babylonians, he left no heir. It would be through another branch of his father Josiah's lineage that the Davidic line would be continued, and in whom the Jewish hope of the coming Messiah, son of David, would be kept alive. The direct result of Zedekiah's rebellion against Babylon was that Jerusalem was taken, plundered, and burned. Its leading population was deported to Babylon as captives and the Jewish kingdom perished. His demise, and that of the Kingdom of Judah, marked the beginning of the Baylonian exile of the Jews.

Notes


References
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This entry incorporates text from the public domain Easton's Bible Dictionary, originally published in 1897.


House of David
Cadet Branch of the Tribe of Judah
Regnal Titles


Preceded by:
Jeconiah
King of Judah
597 B.C.E. – 586 B.C.E.
Judah conquered by
Nebuchadrezzar II of Babylon
Leader of the House of David Succeeded by: Shealtiel

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