Nebuchadnezzar: The King Driven From Men

An emperor in the era of the divided kingdom

Nebuchadnezzar is the king of Babylon whose name runs through the closing chapters of Israel's monarchy and into the court narratives of Daniel. The Hebrew preserves his name under two spellings, נְבוּכַדְרֶאצַּר and נְבוּכַדְנֶצַּר. According to Ussher, Annals of the World (1650), he reigned 605 BC to 562 BC, placing him in the era of the divided kingdom. His footprint in Scripture is unusually large for a foreign ruler: eighty-eight verses across thirty-seven passages, beginning at 2 Kings 24:1 and running through Daniel. Jeremiah names him most often, thirty-seven times, then Daniel twenty-nine, 2 Kings six, Ezra five, Ezekiel four, 2 Chronicles four, with single mentions in 1 Chronicles, Nehemiah and Esther. One child is named for him: Belshazzar (Daniel 5:2; Daniel 5:11; Daniel 5:18).

The king at the walls

He first appears at 2 Kings 24:1, and the scene that follows is a siege. "At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up to Jerusalem, and the city was besieged. Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to the city while his servants were besieging it," (2 Kings 24:10-11). He did not merely send an army; he came himself.

The chronicler records an approach with the same outcome: "Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against him, and bound him in fetters to carry him to Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar also carried some of the vessels of Yahweh's house to Babylon, and put them in his temple at Babylon" (2 Chronicles 36:6-7). Two things went east: a bound king and the vessels of Yahweh's house, taken out of one temple and set down in another. Those vessels surface again at Ezra 1:7. Further mentions of his hand on the city and its aftermath stand at 2 Chronicles 36:10, 2 Chronicles 36:13, 2 Kings 25:1, 2 Kings 25:8 and 2 Kings 25:22. Both 1 Chronicles 6:15 and Esther 2:6 reach back to the carrying away that happened under him.

The count of the carried away

Jeremiah does not generalise; he counts. "This is the number of the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year, three thousand twenty-three Jews; in the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar, he carried away captive from Jerusalem eight hundred thirty-two persons; in the twenty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive of the Jews seven hundred forty-five people: all the people were four thousand six hundred" (Jeremiah 52:28-30). Three separate waves, dated by the years of his own reign, with one total at the end. Ezekiel also speaks of his campaigns at Ezekiel 26:7, Ezekiel 29:18-19 and Ezekiel 30:10.

The image on the plain of Dura

"Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was sixty cubits, and its width six cubits. He set it up in the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon. Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent to gather together the local governors, the deputies, and the governors, the judges, the treasurers, the counselors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, to come to the dedication of the image which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up" (Daniel 3:1-3). The whole administrative machinery of an empire was assembled for one purpose: to bow.

Three men did not, and his reaction is recorded without softening. "Then Nebuchadnezzar in rage and fury commanded that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego be brought. Then these men were brought before the king. Nebuchadnezzar answered them, 'Is it on purpose, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you don't serve my god, nor worship the golden image which I have set up?'" (Daniel 3:13-14). The chapter continues to name him at Daniel 3:5, Daniel 3:7, Daniel 3:9, Daniel 3:16, Daniel 3:19, Daniel 3:24, Daniel 3:26 and Daniel 3:28. He is named earlier at Daniel 1:1, Daniel 1:18, Daniel 2:1, Daniel 2:28 and Daniel 2:46.

Driven from men

Daniel 4 names him at 4:1, 4:4, 4:18, 4:28 and 4:31, and then reports what came upon him. "This was fulfilled the same hour on Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from men, and ate grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of the sky, until his hair had grown like eagles' feathers, and his nails like birds' claws. At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes to heaven, and my understanding returned to me, and I blessed the Most High" (Daniel 4:33-34). The man who summoned the provinces to a golden image is last seen in that chapter with his eyes lifted and his understanding returned. His own words close it at Daniel 4:37.

Where the text accuses him

Scripture does not clean him up. He besieged Jerusalem and came to the city himself (2 Kings 24:10-11). He bound a king in fetters and emptied the house of Yahweh of its vessels into his own temple (2 Chronicles 36:6-7). He deported four thousand six hundred people in three waves (Jeremiah 52:28-30). He built an image sixty cubits high and gathered an empire to its dedication (Daniel 3:1-3), and when three men would not serve his god he answered in rage and fury (Daniel 3:13-14). What happened to him in Daniel 4:33 is not told as bad luck but as something fulfilled upon him.

What we are not told

Scripture does not name his parents. The record is also thinner in shape than its size suggests: the longest continuous run of verses about him anywhere is three, and most of the thirty-seven mentions in Jeremiah are single verses. No New Testament reference to Nebuchadnezzar is listed here, so no line is drawn from him forward.