2 Kings 24

1 While Jehoiakim was ruling [Judah, the army of] King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon invaded Judah. [They defeated the Judean army, and as a result, ] Jehoiakim was required to pay a lot of tribute/taxes to King Nebuchadnezzar. But after three years, Jehoiakim rebelled.

In his days, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up and Jehoiakim was his servant for three years; then he took up arms against him.

2 Then Yahweh sent raiders from Babylonia and Syria, and from the Moab and Ammon people-groups, to attack the people of Judah and get rid of them, just as Yahweh had told his prophets to warn the people would happen.

And the Lord sent against him bands of the Chaldaeans and of the Edomites and of the Moabites and of the children of Ammon; sending them against Judah for its destruction, as he had said by his servants the prophets.

3 These things happened to the people of Judah according to what Yahweh commanded. [He had decided] to get rid of the people of Judah because of the many sins that King Manasseh [had committed].

Only by the word of the Lord did this fate come on Judah, to take them away from before his face; because of the sins of Manasseh and all the evil he did;

4 Manasseh had even caused many innocent people in Jerusalem to be killed, and Yahweh would not forgive that.

And because of the death of those who had done no wrong, for he made Jerusalem full of the blood of the upright; and the Lord had no forgiveness for it.

5 The other things that happened while Jehoiakim was king, and all the things that he did, are written in the scroll called ‘The History of the Kings of Judah’.

Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and all he did, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Judah?

6 When Jehoiakim died, his son Jehoiachin became the king.

So Jehoiakim went to rest with his fathers; and Jehoiachin his son became king in his place.

7 [The army of] the king of Babylon [defeated the army of Egypt, and] took control of all the area that the Egyptians formerly controlled, from the brook [at the border] of Egypt [in the south] to the Euphrates River [in the north]. So [the army of] the king of Egypt did not return [to attack Judah] again.

And the king of Egypt did not come out of his land again, for the king of Babylon had taken all his country, from the stream of Egypt to the river Euphrates.

8 Jehoiachin was 18 years old when he became the king of Judah. His mother’s name was Nehushta; she was the daughter of a man from Jerusalem named Elnathan. Jehoiachin ruled in Jerusalem for [only] three months.

Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king, he was ruling in Jerusalem for three months, and his mother's name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem.

9 Jehoiachin did many things that Yahweh considered to be evil, just as his father had done.

He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as his father had done.

10 [While Jehoiachin was king, ] some officers of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came [along with the whole Babylonian army] to Jerusalem, and they surrounded the city.

At that time the armies of Nebuchadnezzar came up to Jerusalem and the town was shut in on every side.

11 While they were doing that, Nebuchadnezzar himself came to the city.

And Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came there, while his servants were shutting in the town;

12 Then King Jehoiachin and his mother and his advisors and important officers and palace officials all surrendered to the Babylonian army. These thngs happened when Nebuchadnezzar had been king for eight years. He arrested Jehoiachin and took him to Babylon.

Then Jehoiachin, king of Judah, went out to the king of Babylon, with his mother and his servants and his chiefs and his unsexed servants; and in the eighth year of his rule the king of Babylon took him.

13 Just as Yahweh had said would happen, Nebuchadnezzar’s [soldiers] took [to Babylon] all the valuable things from Yahweh’s temple and from the king’s palace. They cut apart all the gold items that King Solomon had put in the temple.

And he took away all the stored wealth of the Lord's house, and the goods from the king's store-house, cutting up all the gold vessels which Solomon, king of Israel, had made in the house of the Lord, as the Lord had said.

14 They took from Jerusalem [to Babylon] 10,000 people, including the important officials and the best soldiers and the people who made and repaired things that were made of metal. Only the very poor people were left in Judah.

And he took away all the people of Jerusalem and all the chiefs and all the men of war, ten thousand prisoners; and all the expert workmen and the metal-workers; only the poorest sort of the people of the land were not taken away.

15 Nebuchadnezzar’s soldiers also took to Babylon Jehoiachin’s wives and officials, his mother, and [all] the important people.

He took Jehoiachin a prisoner to Babylon, with his mother and his wives and his unsexed servants and the great men of the land; he took them all as prisoners from Jerusalem to Babylon.

16 They also took to Babylon 7,000 of the best soldiers and 1,000 men who knew how to make and repair things that are made from metal. All of these people whom they took were strong and able to fight in wars.

And all the men of war, seven thousand of them, and a thousand expert workmen and metal-workers, all of them strong and able to take up arms, the king of Babylon took away as prisoners into Babylon.

17 Then the king of Babylon appointed Jehoiachin’s uncle, Mattaniah, to be the king [of Judah], and he changed Mattaniah’s name to Zedekiah.

And the king of Babylon made Mattaniah, his father's brother, king in place of Jehoiachin, changing his name to Zedekiah.

18 When Zedekiah was twenty-one years old, he became king, and he ruled in Jerusalem for eleven years. His mother’s name was Hamutal; she was the daughter of a man named Jeremiah from Libnah [town].

Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he was king in Jerusalem for eleven years; his mother's name was Hamutal, daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

19 But Zedekiah did many things that Yahweh considered to be evil, just as Jehoiakim had done.

He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as Jehoiakim had done.

20 Yahweh was very angry. So (and finally/after he had been patient a long time) he expelled the people of Jerusalem and [the other places in] Judah and sent them to Babylon. [That is what happened when] Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

And because of the wrath of the Lord, this came about in Jerusalem and Judah, till he had sent them all away from before him: and Zedekiah took up arms against the king of Babylon.