II Kings 24:12

Then Jehoiachin went out to the king of Babylon to yield himself up to him, because he perceived the impossibility of holding the city any longer against the besiegers, and probably hoped to secure the favour of Nebuchadnezzar, and perhaps to retain the throne as his vassal by a voluntary submission. Nebuchadnezzar, however, did not show favour any more, as he had done to Jehoiakim at the first taking of Jerusalem, but treated Jehoiachin as a rebel, made him prisoner, and led him away to Babylon, along with his mother, his wives (Kg2 24:15), his princes and his chamberlains, as Jeremiah had prophesied (Jer 22:24.), in the eighth year of his (Nebuchadnezzar's) reign. The reference to the king's mother in Kg2 24:12 and Kg2 24:15 is not to be explained on the ground that she still acted as guardian over the king, who was not yet of age (J. D. Mich.), but from the influential position which she occupied in the kingdom as הגּבירה (Jer 29:2 : see at Kg1 14:21). The eighth year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar is reckoned from the time when his father had transferred to him the chief command over the army to make war upon Necho, according to which his first year coincides with the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jer 25:1). As Nebuchadnezzar acted as king, so far as the Jews were concerned, from that time forward, although he conducted the war by command of his father, this is always reckoned as the point of time at which his reign commenced, both in our books and also in Jeremiah (cf. Kg2 25:8; Jer 32:1). According to this calculation, his reign lasted forty-four years, viz., the eight years of Jehoiakim and the thirty-six years of Jehoiachin's imprisonment, as is evident from Kg2 25:27.

Things are here ripening for, and hastening towards, the utter destruction of Jerusalem. We left Jehoiakim on the throne, placed there by the king of Egypt: now here we have, I. The troubles of his reign, how he was brought into subjection by the king of Babylon, and severely chastised for attempting to shake off the yoke (Kg2 24:1-6), and how Egypt also was conquered by Nebuchadnezzar (Kg2 24:7). II. The desolations of his son's reign, which continued but three months; and then he and all his great men, being forced to surrender at discretion, were carried captives to Babylon (Kg2 24:8-16). III. The preparatives of the next reign (which was the last of all) for the utter ruin of Jerusalem, which the next chapter will give us an account of (Kg2 24:17-20).