Jerusalem Falls and the Temple Burns

2 Kings 25:1-21

It happened that in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth of the month, Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem. He encamped against it and built siege works against it all around. So the city came under siege until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah. In the ninth month, the famine became severe in the city, and there was no food for the people of the land. Then the city was breached, and all of the men of war entered by night by way of the gate between the wall which was by the garden of the king, and the Chaldeans were against the city all around, so he left by the way of the Arabah. But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king, and they overtook him in the Arabah of Jericho, and all of his army scattered from him. So they captured the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah, and they passed sentence on him. They slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes; then they blinded the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him in bronze fetters and brought him to Babylon. In the fifth month, on the seventh of the month, that is, the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan, a commander of the imperial guard, a servant of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem. He burned the temple of Yahweh, the palace of the king, and all of the houses of Jerusalem; every large house he burned with fire. And all the army of the Chaldeans who were with the commander of the imperial guard tore down the walls of Jerusalem all around. The remainder of the people left in the city, the deserters who had deserted to the king of Babylon, and the remainder of the multitude, Nebuzaradan the commander of the imperial guard deported. But the poor of the land the commander of the imperial guard left for the vineyards and for tilling. The bronze pillars that were in the temple of Yahweh, and the water carts, and the bronze sea that was in the temple of Yahweh, the Chaldeans broke into pieces and carried their bronze to Babylon. The pots, the shovels, the snuffers, the dishes, and the vessels of bronze with which they served there, they took. The firepans and the basins, whatever was gold, the commander of the imperial guard took for the gold and whatever was silver, for the silver. The two pillars, the one sea, and the water cart that Solomon had made for the temple of Yahweh, there was no weighing to the bronze of all of these vessels. The height of the one pillar was eighteen cubits; a bronze capital was on it, with the height of the capital being three cubits. The latticework and pomegranates on the capital all around were bronze, and likewise on the latticework for the second pillar. Then the commander of the imperial guard took Seraiah the chief priest, Zephaniah the second priest, and three of the threshold keepers. From the city he took one court official who was chief officer over the men of war, five men from the king’s council who were found in the city, the secretary of the commander of the army who mustered the people of the land, and sixty men from the people of the land being found in the city. Nebuzaradan commander of the imperial guard took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah. Then the king of Babylon struck them down and killed them at Riblah in the land of Hamath; thus Judah was removed from its land.

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Lamentations 2:1-19

How, in his anger, the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion in a cloud! He has thrown down from heavens to earth the splendor of Israel, and he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger. The Lord has devoured; he has not shown mercy to all the dwellings of Jacob; he has broken down in his wrath the fortifications of the daughter of Judah; he has leveled to the ground, he has dishonored the kingdom and its commanders. He has cut down in fierce anger all the might of Israel; he has withdrawn his right hand from the faces of the enemy, and he has burned in Jacob like a flaming fire, it has consumed all around. He has bent his bow like an enemy; he has set his right hand like a foe, and he has slain all the treasures of the eye; in the tent of the daughter of Zion, he has poured out his anger like fire. The Lord has become like an enemy; he has destroyed Israel; he has destroyed all its citadel fortresses; he has ruined all its fortifications and multiplied lamentation and mourning in the daughter of Judah. He has broken down his dwelling place like the garden; he has ruined his appointed feasts; Yahweh has made them forget in Zion festival and Sabbath, and he has despised in his anger king and priest. The Lord has rejected his altar; he has rejected his sanctuary; he has delivered into the hands of the enemy the walls of its citadel fortresses. They have cried out in the house of Yahweh like a day of an appointed feast. Yahweh has planned to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion. He measured with a line; he has not restrained his hand from destroying; he caused rampart and wall to mourn; together they have languished away. Her gates have sunk into the earth; he has ruined and broken her bars, her kings and its princes are among the nations; there is no more law. Also, her prophets have not found a revelation from Yahweh. They sit on the ground, the elders of the daughter of Zion are silent. They cast dust on their head, they have put on sackcloth; the young women of Jerusalem have bowed their head down to the ground. My eyes have spent all their tears; my stomach is in torment, my heart is poured out on the earth because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, because child and babe faint in the public squares of a city. To their mothers they say, “Where is the bread and wine?” as they faint like the wounded in the public squares of a city, as their life is being poured out onto the bosom of their mothers. What can I say for you? What can I compare to you, O daughter of Jerusalem? To what can I liken you so that I can comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion? For your destruction is as vast as the sea; who can heal you? Your prophets had a vision for you, false and worthless; they have not exposed your sin, to restore your fortune; they have seen oracles for you, false and misleading. They clap hands over you, all who pass along the way; they hiss and they shake their head, at the daughter of Jerusalem. Is this the city of which it is said, “A perfection of beauty, a joy for all the earth?” They have opened their mouths against you, all your enemies. They hiss and gnash a tooth, and they say, “We have destroyed her ! Surely this is the day we have hoped for; we have found it , we have seen it !” Yahweh has done what he has planned; he has fulfilled his promise that he ordained from the days of old; he has demolished and not shown mercy; he has made an enemy rejoice over you, he has exalted the might of your foes. Their heart cried to the Lord, “O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears stream down like a river; day and night, do not give yourself relief, do not give your eyes rest. “Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the night watches; pour out your heart like water, before the face of the Lord. Lift to him your hands, for the life of your children, who faint in starvation, at the head of all streets.”

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