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Zedekiah ( ; born Mattaniah; 618 BC – after 586 BC) was the twentieth and final King of Judah (or puppet) before the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon.
After the siege of Jerusalem in 597 BC, Nebuchadnezzar II deposed king Jeconiah and installed his uncle Mattaniah instead, changing his name to Zedekiah (). The prophet Jeremiah was his counselor, yet he did not heed the prophet and his epitaph is "he did evil in the sight of the Lord" (; ).
William F. Albright dates the start of Zedekiah's reign to 598 BC, while Edwin R. Thiele gives the start in 597 BC.Edwin Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, (1st ed.; New York: Macmillan, 1951; 2d ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965; 3rd ed.; Grand Rapids: Zondervan/Kregel, 1983). , 9780825438257, 217. On that reckoning, Zedekiah was born in c. 617 BC or 618 BC, being twenty-one on becoming king. Zedekiah's reign ended with the siege and fall of Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar II, which has been dated to 587 or 586 BC.
After the Babylonians defeated the Egyptians at the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar II besieged Jerusalem. Jehoiakim changed allegiances to avoid the destruction of Jerusalem. He paid tribute from the treasury, some artifacts from the temple, and some of the royal family and nobility were taken as hostages. The subsequent failure of the Babylonian invasion into Egypt undermined Babylonian control of the area, and after three years, Jehoiakim switched allegiance back to the Egyptians and ceased paying the tribute to Babylon. Because of this, Nebuchadnezzar II invaded Judah again in 599 BC, and again laid siege to Jerusalem. In 598 BC, Jehoiakim died during the siege and was succeeded by his son Jeconiah (also known as Jehoiachin). Jerusalem fell within three months. Jeconiah was deposed by Nebuchadnezzar, who installed Zedekiah, Jeconiah's uncle, in his place.2 Chronicles 36:9-10 The Oxford History of the Biblical World, ed. by Michael D Coogan. Published by Oxford University Press, 1999. pg 350
The seventh year: In the month Kislev the king of Akkad mustered his army and marched to Hattu. He encamped against the city of Judah and on the second day of the month Adar he captured the city and seized its king. A king of his own choice he appointed in the city and taking the vast tribute he brought it into Babylon.
The kingdom was at that time a tributary to Nebuchadnezzar II. Despite the strong remonstrances of Jeremiah, Baruch ben Neriah and other family and advisors—and ignoring the example of his older brother Jehoiakim—Zedekiah entered into an alliance with Pharaoh Apries of Egypt and revolted against Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar responded by invading Judah (). Nebuchadnezzar began a siege of Jerusalem in December 589 BC. During this siege "every worst woe befell the city, which drank the cup of God's fury to the dregs" (; , ).
After laying siege to the city for about thirty months, Nebuchadnezzar finally succeeded in capturing Jerusalem in 586 BC. Zedekiah and his followers attempted to escape, making their way out of the city, but were captured on the Tell es-Sultan and taken to Riblah. There, Zedekiah saw his sons put to death. Then his eye-gouging and he was loaded with chains and carried captive to Babylon (; ; ; ; ; ), where he remained a prisoner until he died.
After the fall of Jerusalem, Nebuchadnezzar sent Nebuzaradan to destroy the city. It was plundered and razed to the ground, and Solomon's Temple was destroyed. Only a small number of vinedressers and Animal husbandry were permitted to remain in the land ().The sages also explain proverbs 24:30 as follows: I passed by the field of a lazy man, This is Ahaz. And the vineyard of a senseless man, this is Manashe. And behold, it was all overgrown with thorns, this is Amon. And its surface was covered with Nettle, this is Jehoiakim. And its stone wall was broken down, this is a reference to Zedekiah, in whose days the temple was destroyed.
Previously, when Jeremiah had been imprisoned in the house of Jonathan the secretary in suspicion that he was defecting to the Babylonians, Zedekiah secretly questioned him and asked if there was any word from God, to which Jeremiah responded that there was, that Zedekiah will be captured by Nebuchadnezzar. Jeremiah pleads that he will die if he is sent back to Jonathan's house so Zedekiah transferred him to the court of the guard and ordered that a loaf of bread be given to him daily. Zedekiah refuses his officials' pleas to execute Jeremiah for his prophecies and instead lets them do what they want with Jeremiah, that is throwing him into a cistern belonging to Zedekiah's son Malchiah. Ebed-melech, a servant, heard this and went to Zedekiah (who was at the Benjamin Gate) to tell him that Jeremiah would die if he wasn't saved from the pit. Zedekiah commanded Ebed-melech to take thirty-men to lift Jeremiah from the cistern. Jeremiah then warns Zedekiah again that he shall be spared if he obeys God and surrenders to Babylon, but if he doesn't Jerusalem will be destroyed and he will not escape from Nebuchadnezzar.
On hearing this news, all the Jews in Moab, Ammon, Edom, and Aram-Damascus returned to Judah (). However, the subsequent assassination of Gedaliah led most of the population of Judah to flee to Egypt for safety (, ) In Egypt, they settled in Migdol, Tahpanhes, Noph, and Pathros. ().
Historically there has been considerable controversy over the date when Jerusalem was captured the second time and Zedekiah's reign came to an end. There is no dispute about the month: it was the summer month of Tammuz (Jeremiah 52:6). The problem has been to determine the year. It was noted above that Albright preferred 587 BC and Thiele advocated 586 BC, and this division among scholars has persisted until the present time. If Zedekiah's years are by accession counting, whereby the year he came to the throne was considered his "zero" year and his first full year in office, 597/596, was counted as year one, Zedekiah's eleventh year, the year the city fell, would be 587/586. Since Judean regnal years were measured from Tishrei in the fall, this would place the end of his reign and the capture of the city in the summer of 586 BC. Accession counting was the rule for most, but not all, of the kings of Judah, whereas "non-accession" counting was the rule for most, but not all, of the kings of Israel.Leslie McFall, "A Translation Guide to the Chronological Data in Kings and Chronicles," Bibliotheca Sacra 148 (1991) 45.[2]
The publication of the Babylonian Chronicles in 1956 yielded evidence that the years of Zedekiah were measured in a non-accession sense. According to this method, 598/597 BC—the year Zedekiah was installed by Nebuchadnezzar according to Judah's Tishrei-based calendar—is considered to be "year one" of Zedekiah's reign. Therefore, the fall of Jerusalem in his eleventh year would have been in year 588/587 BC, i.e. in the summer of 587 BC.
The Babylonian Chronicles allow the fairly precise dating of the capture of Jeconiah and the start of Zedekiah's reign, and they also give the accession year of Nebuchadnezzar's successor Amel-Marduk (Evil Merodach) as 562/561 BC, which was the 37th year of Jeconiah's captivity according to 2 Kings 25:27. These Babylonian records related to Jeconiah's reign are consistent with the fall of the city in 587 but not in 586, thus supporting Albright's date. Nevertheless, scholars who assume that Zedekiah's reign should be calculated by accession reckoning continue to adhere to the 586 date.
Shallum succeeded Josiah as king of Judah, under the name Jehoahaz., Shallum was succeeded by Eliakim, under the name Jehoiakim. Jehoiakim was succeeded by his own son Jeconiah.
Nebuchadnezzar II deposed Jeconiah and installed his uncle Mattaniah on the throne, under the name Zedekiah. Zedekiah was the last king of Judah before the kingdom was conquered by Babylon and the people exiled.
| + !Year !Film !Actor | ||
| 1998 | Jeremiah | Vincent Regan |
| 2012 | Herzl Tobey | |
| 2013 | The Bible (Episode 5: "Survival") | Samuel Collings |
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