Chapter 1 _{39 Five and twenty years old was Joacim when he was made king in the land of Judea and Jerusalem; and he did evil before the Lord.40 Wherefore against him Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon came up, and bound him with a chain of brass, and carried him into Babylon.41 Nabuchodonosor also took of the holy vessels of the Lord, and carried them away, and set them in his own temple at Babylon.42 But those things that are recorded of him, and of his uncleaness and impiety, are written in the chronicles of the kings.43 And Joacim his son reigned in his stead: he was made king being eighteen years old;44 And reigned but three months and ten days in Jerusalem; and did evil before the Lord.45 So after a year Nabuchodonosor sent and caused him to be brought into Babylon with the holy vessels of the Lord;46 And made Zedechias king of Judea and Jerusalem, when he was one and twenty years old; and he reigned eleven years:47 And he did evil also in the sight of the Lord, and cared not for the words that were spoken unto him by the prophet Jeremy from the mouth of the Lord.48 And after that king Nabuchodonosor had made him to swear by the name of the Lord, he forswore himself, and rebelled; and hardening his neck, his heart, he transgressed the laws of the Lord God of Israel.49 The governors also of the people and of the priests did many things against the laws, and passed all the pollutions of all nations, and defiled the temple of the Lord, which was sanctified in Jerusalem.50 Nevertheless the God of their fathers sent by his messenger to call them back, because he spared them and his tabernacle also.51 But they had his messengers in derision; and, look, when the Lord spake unto them, they made a sport of his prophets:52 So far forth, that he, being wroth with his people for their great ungodliness, commanded the kings of the Chaldees to come up against them;53 Who slew their young men with the sword, yea, even within the compass of their holy temple, and spared neither young man nor maid, old man nor child, among them; for he delivered all into their hands.54 And they took all the holy vessels of the Lord, both great and small, with the vessels of the ark of God, and the king's treasures, and carried them away into Babylon.55 As for the house of the Lord, they burnt it, and brake down the walls of Jerusalem, and set fire upon her towers:56 And as for her glorious things, they never ceased till they had consumed and brought them all to nought: and the people that were not slain with the sword he carried unto Babylon:57 Who became servants to him and his children, till the Persians reigned, to fulfil the word of the Lord spoken by the mouth of Jeremy:}