The destruction of Judah and Jerusalem is here coming on by degrees. God so ordered it to show that he has no pleasure in the ruin of sinners, but had rather they would turn and live, and therefore gives them both time and inducement to repent and waits to be gracious. The history of these reigns was more largely recorded in the last three chapters of the second of Kings. 1. Jehoahaz was set up by the people (Ch2 36:1), but in one quarter of a year was deposed by Pharaoh-necho, and carried a prisoner to Egypt, and the land fined for setting him up, Ch2 36:2-4. Of this young prince we hear no more. Had he trodden in the steps of his father's piety he might have reigned long and prospered; but we are told in the Kings that he did evil in the sight of the Lord, and therefore his triumphing was short and his joy but for a moment. 2. Jehoiakim was set up by the king of Egypt, an old enemy to their land, gave what king he pleased to the kingdom and what name he pleased to the king! Ch2 36:4. He made Eliakim king, and called him Jehoiakim, in token of his authority over him. Jehoiakim did that which was evil (Ch2 36:5), nay, we read of the abominations which he did (Ch2 36:8); he was very wild and wicked. Idolatries generally go under the name of abominations. We hear no more of the king of Egypt, but the king of Babylon came up against him (Ch2 36:6), seized him, and bound him with a design to carry him to Babylon; but, it seems, he either changed his mind, and suffered him to reign as his vassal, or death released the prisoner before he was carried away. However the best and most valuable vessels of the temple were now carried away and made use of in Nebuchadnezzar's temple in Babylon (Ch2 36:7); for, we may suppose, no temple in the world was so richly furnished as that of Jerusalem. The sin of Judah was that they had brought the idols of the heathen into God's temple; and now their punishment was that the vessels of the temple were carried away to the service of the gods of the nations. If men will profane God's institutions by their sins, it is just with God to suffer them to be profaned by their enemies. These were the vessels which the false prophets flattered the people with hopes of the return of, Jer 27:16. But Jeremiah told them that the rest should go after them (Jer 27:21, Jer 27:22), and they did so. But, as the carrying away of these vessels to Babylon began the calamity of Jerusalem, so Belshazzar's daring profanation of them there filled the measure of the iniquity of Babylon; for, when he drank wine in them to the honour of his gods, the handwriting on the wall presented him with his doom, Dan 5:3, etc. In the reference to the book of the Kings concerning this Jehoiakim mention is made of that which was found in him (Ch2 36:8), which seems to be meant of the treachery that was found in him towards the king of Babylon; but some of the Jewish writers understand it of certain private marks or signatures found in his dead body, in honour of his idol, such cuttings as God had forbidden, Lev 19:28. 3. Jehoiachin, or Jeconiah, the son of Jehoiakim, attempted to reign in his stead, and reigned long enough to show his evil inclination; but, after three months and ten days, the king of Babylon sent and fetched him away captive, with more of the goodly vessels of the temple. He is here said to be eight years old, but in Kings he is said to be eighteen when he began to reign, so that this seems to be a mistake of the transcriber, unless we suppose that his father took him at eight years old to join with him in the government, as some think.

Came up Nebuchadnezzar - See the notes on Kg2 24:1.

Archbishop Usher believes that Jehoiakim remained three years after this tributary to the Chaldeans, and that it is from this period that the seventy years' captivity, predicted by Jeremiah, is to be reckoned.

Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah,.... Of whose reign, and of the three following, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah, and the account of them, from hence to the end of Ch2 36:13, what needs explanation or reconciliation; see Gill on Kg2 23:31, Kg2 23:32, Kg2 23:33, Kg2 23:34, Kg2 23:35, Kg2 23:36, Kg2 23:37, Kg2 24:5, Kg2 24:6, Kg2 24:8, Kg2 24:10, Kg2 24:17, Kg2 24:18

2 Chronicles 36:14

ch2 36:14

ch2 36:14

ch2 36:14Moreover, the chief of the priests, and of the people, transgressed very much after all the abominations of the Heathens,.... The priests, and even the chief of them, who should have instructed the people in the duties of religion, and retained them in the pure worship of God, these were the ringleaders of idolatry, who led the people to commit all the idolatries of the Heathens round about them; and of the people, all ranks and degrees of them were corrupted with them; this was their case in several of the preceding reigns, and now a little before the destruction of them:

and polluted the house of the Lord, which he had hallowed in Jerusalem; the temple dedicated to his worship there; this they defiled, by setting up idols in it.

Against him came up Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon--This refers to the first expedition of Nebuchadnezzar against Palestine, in the lifetime of his father Nabopolassar, who, being old and infirm, adopted his son as joint sovereign and despatched him, with the command of his army, against the Egyptian invaders of his empire. Nebuchadnezzar defeated them at Carchemish, drove them out of Asia, and reduced all the provinces west of the Euphrates to obedience--among the rest the kingdom of Jehoiakim, who became a vassal of the Assyrian empire (Kg2 24:1). Jehoiakim at the end of three years threw off the yoke, being probably instigated to revolt by the solicitations of the king of Egypt, who planned a new expedition against Carchemish. But he was completely vanquished by the Babylonian king, who stripped him of all his possessions between the Euphrates and the Nile (Kg2 24:7). Then marching against the Egyptian's ally in Judah, he took Jerusalem, carried away a portion of the sacred vessels of the temple, perhaps in lieu of the unpaid tribute, and deposited them in the temple of his god, Belus, at Babylon (Dan 1:2; Dan 5:2). Though Jehoiakim had been taken prisoner (and it was designed at first to transport him in chains to Babylon), he was allowed to remain in his tributary kingdom. But having given not long after some new offense, Jerusalem was besieged by a host of Assyrian dependents. In a sally against them Jehoiakim was killed (see on Kg2 24:2-7; also Jer 22:18-19; Jer 36:30).