2 Chronicles 36

That’s 34 kilograms of gold. In ancient Hebrew measurement, the tribute was 100 talents of silver and one talent of gold. Neco apparently felt the nation owed him for the lives he lost in a battle he didn’t seem to want to fight with Judah—the Battle of Megiddo (see 2 Chronicles 35). It was Judah who attacked him as he traveled in peace, to reinforce the Assyrians as they fought Babylonians at the town of Carchemish, along the border of what is now Turkey and Syria. Babylonians won, to become the new dominant empire in the region, until Persians came along from what is now Iran. Assyrians and Babylonians were from what is now Iraq.

One reason people in Bible times might change another person’s name is to show them who’s boss, likely in this case. The name change is odd. “Eliakim” means El “God” iakim “makes it happen” or “establishes” or “lifts up.” “Jehoiakim” simply removes the El “God” and replaces the term with God’s name, Jeho (as in Jehovah), a form of “LORD,” or Yahweh (YAH way) in Hebrew.

This was a lost book or part of a collection of lost books apparently filled with more details about the Israelite kings of Israel and Judah. Some scholars say they consider those books lost books of the Bible.

The age of 18 shows up in one old Hebrew manuscript and some Greek and Syrian copies. Most Hebrew copies of the story say he was only eight years old.

Babylon’s second king was the most powerful in the empire’s history. He was Nebuchadnezzar—famous for tearing Jerusalem to the ground in 586 BC and deporting the Jewish survivors to Babylon as captives. He took them to what is now Iraq. He reigned over the Babylonian Empire for about 43 years, from 605-562 BC. Before destroying Jerusalem, he invaded other times and took captives, in what amounted to firing warning shots to get the people to accept their subjugation to his empire. But the people of Judah kept rebelling. So, he erased their country and scattered their citizens abroad.

Jeremiah said the Jews would serve Babylon for 70 years (Jeremiah 25:11). Seventy is a number that symbolized a lifetime, some Bible scholars say. The number also shows up in ancient Middle Eastern texts, which say 70 years is how long gods punish people. For those who take the number literally, they have to grapple with 20 missing years. Babylon leveled Jerusalem in 586 BC and Cyrus freed them to go home 50 years later. To reach 70, they would have to add the 20 years it took to rebuild the Jerusalem Temple. It was completed in the spring of 515 BC. So, Jews rebuilt the Temple 70 years after Babylonians destroyed the first Temple. Some scholars say this is the “70 years in Babylon” that the prophet Jeremiah was talking about in Jeremiah 25:11-12; 29:10.

The writer may be referring to October 539 BC, when Cyrus first entered Babylon’s capital as conqueror of the previous world superpower, the Babylonian Empire. Or the writer may have had in mind the following year, 538 BC, when Cyrus was formally recognized as king of a Persian Empire that included the former Babylonian Empire. But by that time, Cyrus had already ruled a smaller version of Persia for a decade or more.

Jeremiah was in Jerusalem when Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar captured the city in 586 BC and leveled it along with the Jewish Temple. There doesn’t seem to be anything in the surviving prophecies of Jeremiah that predict Cyrus would free the people Babylon had held as captives. Some scholars suggest Jeremiah 25:11-12 and 29:10. But those talk about a different topic, the fall of Babylon. Isaiah, however, does have some passages that might track with what the writer is describing: Isaiah 41:2, 25, 28; 45:1, 13. Especially 45:13.

A nine-inch-long clay cylinder from Cyrus’s time, about 538 BC, confirms that he freed Babylonian captives after he took control of the former Babylonian Empire. He didn’t simply free Jewish captives. He freed all political captives. The cylinder reports that he told them all to go home, rebuild their worship centers, and to say a prayer for him every day.