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they mock me. But Jeremiah said, they shall not deliver thee. Obey, I beseech thee, the voice of Jehovah, which I speak unto thee: so it shall be well unto thee, and thy soul shall live. But if thou refuse to go forth, this is the word that Jehovah hath shewed me: and, behold, all the women that are left in the king of Judah's house, shall be brought forth to the king of Babylon's princes, and those women shall say, thy friends have set thee on, and have prevailed against thee: thy feet are sunk in the mire, and they are turned away back. So they shall bring out all thy wives and thy children to the Chaldeans: and thou shalt not escape out of their hand, but shalt be taken by the hand of the king of Babylon, and thou shalt cause this city to be burned with fire.*

Zedekiah observed his oath to Jeremiah, but neither attended to the admonition of Jehovah, nor delivered the prophet out of custody, for he remained in the court of the prison until Jerusalem was taken.†

In the eleventh year of Zedekiah's reign, and about a year after Nebuchadnezzar had returned to the siege; the famine having become sore, and the people being without bread; the city was broken up and all the men of war fled, and went forth out of the city by night, by the way of the gate‡ between the two walls, which was by the king's garden; (now the

* Jer. xxxviii. 14-23.

+ Jer xxxviii. 24-28.

Or postern door.

"And the prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the twilight, and shall go forth; and they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby: he shall cover his face, that he see not the ground with his eyes." Ezek. xii. 12. “And when the city was taken about midnight, and the enemies' generals were entered into the temple, and when Zedekiah was sensible of it, he took his wives and his children, and his captains, and his friends, and with them fled out of the city through the fortified ditch, and through the desert.** Joseph. ii. 65.

Chaldeans were by the city round about:) and they went by the way of the plain. But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him. Then they took the king, and carried him up unto the king of Babylon, to Riblab, in the land of Hamath; where he gave judgment upon him. And the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes: he slew also all the princes of Judah in Riblah.* Then he put out the eyes of Zedekiah;† and the king of Babylon bound him in chains, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death.‡

66

* Antioch, in Syria.

+ Probably with the intention of rendering him incapable of reascending the throne." Burder, O. L. 614. Where see many instances of this horrid cruelty being practised by potentates, and how it was performed. Josephus says Nebuchadnezzar first reproached him personally with ingratitude. Vol. ii. 65.

Jer. xxxix. 1-7. lii. 5. 11. 2 Kings, xxv. 2-7. My net also will I spread upon him, and he shall be taken in my snare; and I will bring him to Babylon to the land of the Chaldeans; yet shall he not see it, though he shall die there. Ezek. xii. 13. Jeremiah had foretold (xxxii. 4. and xxxiv 3.) that Zedekiah should not escape out of the hand of the king of Babylon, but should surely be taken, and delivered into his hand; and that his eyes should behold the eyes of the king of Babylon, and that he should speak with him mouth to mouth, and that he should go to Babylon; whereas Ezekiel, whose prophecy had been transmitted from Babylon, had so far concurred with Jeremiah, as to declare (xii. 13.) that Zedekiah should be carried to Babylon, but should not see it though he should die there. Josephus relates that it was this apparent discrepancy, for such it really was, viz.; that he should be carried to Babylon, see the king face to face, and eye to eye, and yet not see Babylon itself, which induced the misguided monarch to disbelieve both, and thus rush to his ruin: and it is remarkable how both prophecies were literally fulfilled. Nebuchadnezzar did not conduct the siege in person, but remained in the city of Riblah, where Zedekiah was taken to him, and where he saw him face to face, and eye to eye; and where, also, after reproaching him with his ingratitude and rebellion, he ordered his eyes

As on the final destruction of the kingdom of Israel,* so now on that of Judah, God condescended to justify his ways to man-for the sacred writer adds, Zedekiah humbled not himself before Jeremiah, the prophet, speaking from the mouth of Jehovah. And he also rebelled against king Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear by God: but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart from turning unto Jehovah, God of Israel. Moreover all the chief of the priests, and the people, transgressed very much after all the abominations of the heathen; and polluted the house of Jehovah, which he had hallowed in Jerusalem. And Jehovah, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up betimes, and sending; because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place: but they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and misused his prophets, until the wrath of Jehovah arose against his people, till there was no remedy.† Therefore, he brought upon them

to be put out and after that city, however, he never saw.

Zedekiah was sent to Babylon, which Joseph. ii. 61-65. Jer, lii. 9—11. * See post.

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† Amongst other express commandments of Jehovah, which the rebellious Jews had repeatedly and successively violated, was that which enjoined the observance of the sabbatical year; When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto Jehovah. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years shalt thou prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof. But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the Lord; thou shalt neither sow thy field nor prune thy vineyard. That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed; for it is a year of rest unto the land. And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for the stranger that sojourneth with thee; and for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat." Lev. xxv. 2-8.

The mind of Omniscience, however, was well aware that this com

the king of the Chaldees, who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion

mand would be disobeyed; but that the people might be left without excuse, he pointedly alluded to the breach of it as one of those offences which he would remedy by absolute force, if reiterated remonstrances and all other measures should fail; for shortly afterwards he orders Moses to declare to them, "I will bring the land into desolation, and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it. Then shall the land enjoy her sabbaths as long as it lieth desolate, and ye be in your enemies' land; even then shall the land rest and enjoy her sabbaths. As long as it lieth desolate it shall rest, because it did not rest in your sabbaths, when you dwelt upon it. The land also shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her sabbaths while she lieth desolate without them. Lev. xxvi. 34, 35. 43."

It is worthy of remark that the duration of the captivity was regulated and determined expressly with reference to the fulfilment of this denunciation. It was to endure seventy years, Jer. xxix. 10.; it did endure seventy years, Dan. ix. 2.; and the reason for that particular period is expressly stated, "To fulfil the word of Jehovah by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths; for as long as she tay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfil three score and ten years." 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21. With such an illustrious scheme and fulfilment of prophecy before him, how ought the infidel to hide his head! And how ought the sabbath breaker of every kind, and the violater of the laws of a holy God, to tremble at his wrath!

The learned Dean Prideaux thus ingeniously illustrates the subject still further. The Jews arrived in Judea in March and April, Anno 535 before Christ. As soon as they came thither they dispersed themselves according to their tribes, and betook themselves to rebuild their houses, and again manure their lands, after they (that is, the lands) had now, from the destruction of Jerusalem and the flight of the remainder of the people into Egypt, on the death of Gedaliah, lain desolate and uncultivated fifty-two years, according to the number of the sabbatical years which they had neglected to observe; for according to the Mosaical law they ought to have left their lands fallow every seventh year. But amongst other commandments of God, this also they had rejected, and, therefore, God made the land lie desolate, without inhabitants or cultivation, till it had enjoyed the full number of its sabbaths that it had been deprived

upon young man or maiden, old man, or him that stooped for age: he gave them all into his hand.*

The daughter of Sion being thus abandoned to the fury of her enemies, the conqueror sent Nebuzaradan, the captain of his guard, to execute the judgments of God; and he burnt the temple and the palace, and all the houses in Jerusalem with fire;‡ and brake down all the walls of the city, and carried away to Babylon all the precious ornaments§

of. Prid. i. 179. See also Gray's Key, 109., and Keith's Evidence from Prophecy, p. 121., where that learned writer shews the present desolation and sterility of the land of Palestine, to be a continuous fulfilment of the prophecy, and punishment for the breach of the command; but which invaluable work the editor had not seen when he wrote the preceding note.

* 2 Chron. xxxvi. 12-17. "Not because God approved him, who yet was the minister of his justice, but because God would by his just judgment punish this people; for Nebuchadnezzar was led by ambition and vain-glory, whereunto were joined fury and cruelty. Therefore, his work was condemnable, notwithstanding it was just and holy on God's part, who used this wicked instrument to declare his justice." BARKER. Napoleon Buonaparte was another instrument used by the Almighty to accomplish his own purposes; and when the work, which God had appointed him to do, was accomplished, as he had done in the case of Nebuchadnezzar, he discarded the wicked instrument. The Babylonian was driven out amongst the beasts of the field, and the Corsican chained to a barren rock. The heart of the former, we may hope, was penetrated by repentance and contrition, (Dan. iv. 34.); but the latter died as he lived, most probably," without God in the world."

The fire must have continued raging three whole days. Compare BARKER.

2 Kings, xxv. 8. with Jer. lii. 12. "In the first year of the 48th Olympiad, 424 years after the erection by Solomon, and 590 years before Christ. A. CLARKE. § It appears very remarkable, and perhaps a circumstance which has not been noticed by even some careful readers of the Old Testament, that no mention is any where made what eventually became of the ark of the covenant and the cherubims thereon; that holy symbol of Jehovah wherein were deposited the tables of the law, and

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