2 Chronicles (Part II, cont'd): Exile!

About 13 years after Josiah leads the great Passover celebration, he sets out against King Neco of Egypt, who is leading a fight on the Euphrates. Neco sends envoys to Josiah to inquire why Josiah is challenging him. Neco is not coming after Josiah, after all, but following God’s command to hurry and attack the house with which Neco is at war. Josiah is warned: “Cease opposing God, who is with me, so that he will not destroy you.” But Josiah fails to heed the warning. As a result, he is killed by archers. According to the notes, this represents divine retribution because Josiah disobeyed God’s word, as revealed by Neco. Seems a little harsh—Josiah has done much good, but, because he doesn’t recognize God’s word being spoken through a foreign king (king of a land that had oppressed the Israelites, no less), down he goes.

Anyway, Josiah is followed by Jehoahaz, his son. He reigns only three months before the king of Egypt (the same king through whom God spoke to Josiah!) deposes him. The Egyptian king makes “his [Jehoahaz’s] brother Eliakin king over Judah and Jerusalem,” changing his name to Jehoiakim. “But Neco took his brother Jehoahaz and carried him to Egypt.” Jehoiakim does what is evil, and King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon comes up against him. The Babylonian king carries both Jehoiakim and some of the vessels from the house of the Lord to Babylon.

Jehoiakim is succeeded by his son Jehoiachin, who is only eight years old. He reigns three and one-third months, and, despite his age and brief reign, manages to do evil in the sight of the Lord. His reign ends when Nebuchadnezzar sends for him and more precious vessels to be brought back to Babylon.

Jehoiakim is replaced by Zedekiah, who does evil and rebels against Nebuchadnezzar. “All the leading priests and the people also were exceedingly unfaithful.” God continues to send them prophets, but the people “kept mocking the messengers, despising His words, and scoffing at His prophets, until the wrath of the Lord against his people became so great that there was no remedy.” So He sends the Chaldeans against them. The Chaldeans kill their youths, burn down the house of God, break down the wall of Jerusalem, etc. The Chaldean king takes those who had escaped death into exile in Babylon (why not in his own land?), and they become his servants.

2 Chronicles ends with King Cyrus of Persia, “in fulfillment of the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah," declaring liberty for the exiles: “The Lord … has charged me to build Him a house at Jerusalem … Whoever is among you of all His people, may the Lord his God be with him! Let him go up.”

On to Ezra.