Zedekiah: The Last King Who Asked Jeremiah in Secret

Who he was

Zedekiah was a king of Judah, of the tribe of Judah, living in the era of the divided kingdom, an era placed at around 975 BC to 586 BC on Ussher's chronology (1650). He was a son of Josiah, and his mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah (2 Kings 24:18). His brothers named in Scripture are Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim and Shallum (1 Chronicles 3:15). He appears in fifty-three verses across four books, first in 2 Kings 24:17, and most heavily in Jeremiah, where forty-five of those verses stand. Five are in 2 Kings, two in 2 Chronicles, one in 1 Chronicles.

A king made and renamed

His reign did not begin with his own name. "The king of Babylon made Mattaniah, Jehoiachin's father's brother, king in his place, and changed his name to Zedekiah. Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem" (2 Kings 24:17-18). The Chronicler tells it the same way: "At the return of the year, king Nebuchadnezzar sent and brought him to Babylon, with the valuable vessels of Yahweh's house, and made Zedekiah his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem. Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem" (2 Chronicles 36:10-11). A throne given by a foreign king, and a name given with it. Everything that follows happens inside that arrangement. See also 2 Kings 24:20 and Jeremiah 52:1; 52:3.

A name in Jeremiah's dates and errands

Across much of Jeremiah, Zedekiah is not a speaker but a fixed point: his reign anchors the prophet's oracles, and his servants carry his messages. His name stands a single verse at a time in Jeremiah 1:3; 21:1; 21:3; 21:7; 24:8; 27:3; 27:12; 28:1; 29:3; 32:1; 34:2; 34:4; 34:6; 34:8; 34:21; 37:1; 37:3; 37:21; 38:5; 38:19; 38:24; 44:30; 49:34; 51:59; 52:5 and 52:8. These are references only, and they are worth reading in their own place. What they show at a glance is a king whose years the prophet counts and whose court keeps sending to the prophet.

The king who imprisoned the man he questioned

The scenes that do open up are strange and revealing. Zedekiah shut Jeremiah up for his message: "Why do you prophesy, and say, 'Yahweh says, "Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will take it; and Zedekiah king of Judah won't escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans, but will surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, and will speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes will see his eyes"'" (Jeremiah 32:3-5).

And yet he kept coming back. "Then Zedekiah the king sent, and had him brought out. The king asked him secretly in his house, 'Is there any word from Yahweh?' Jeremiah said, 'There is.' He also said, 'You will be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon.' Moreover Jeremiah said to king Zedekiah, 'How have I sinned against you, against your servants, or against this people, that you have put me in prison?'" (Jeremiah 37:17-18). The question goes unanswered in the text. The king wanted the word of Yahweh and kept its messenger in prison at the same time.

The third entry of Yahweh's house saw the clearest offer. Zedekiah swore, "As Yahweh lives, who made us this soul, I will not put you to death, neither will I give you into the hand of these men who seek your life." Then came the terms: "If you will go out to the king of Babylon's princes, then your soul will live, and this city will not be burned with fire. You will live, along with your house" (Jeremiah 38:14-17). Jeremiah had already named the king's weakness before he spoke: "If I give you counsel, you will not listen to me."

What he chose, and what it cost

He did not go out. The siege came (Jeremiah 39:1-2; 2 Kings 25:2), and then the flight: "When Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, then they fled, and went out of the city by night, by the way of the king's garden, through the gate between the two walls; and he went out toward the Arabah. But the army of the Chaldeans pursued them, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. When they had taken him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; and he pronounced judgment on him. Then the king of Babylon killed Zedekiah's sons in Riblah before his eyes. The king of Babylon also killed all the nobles of Judah. Moreover he put out Zedekiah's eyes and bound him in fetters, to carry him to Babylon" (Jeremiah 39:4-7; see also Jeremiah 52:10-11 and 2 Kings 25:7).

The last thing his eyes saw was the death of his sons. The word he had heard in secret and refused met him in daylight, exactly as it had been spoken to him: that he would not escape, that he would speak with the king of Babylon mouth to mouth, that his eyes would see his eyes (Jeremiah 32:3-5).

Where the failure lies

Scripture does not let him off. He imprisoned the prophet whose word he could not stop wanting (Jeremiah 37:17-18; 32:3-5). He swore an oath in the name of Yahweh to protect Jeremiah's life and then did not act on the counsel he had sworn to hear (Jeremiah 38:14-17). He was offered his own life, his household and a city not burned with fire, and he did not go out. The fall of Jerusalem in Jeremiah 39 is told as the outcome of that refusal, and 2 Kings 24:20 sets his reign under the same verdict.

What we are not told

No child of Zedekiah is named anywhere in Scripture. His sons are reported killed in Jeremiah 39:6, but they remain nameless. No New Testament reference to him is carried here, so no line is drawn from him beyond the books in which he stands. What Scripture leaves open, we leave open.