Jeremiah 52:4–14

^4*and so Nebuchadnezzar came with all his army and attacked Jerusalem on the tenth day of the tenth month of the ninth year of Zedekiah’s reign. They set up camp outside the city, built siege walls round it, ⁵and kept it under siege until Zedekiah’s eleventh year. ⁶On the ninth day of the fourth month of that same year, when the famine was so bad that the people had nothing left to eat, ^7*the city walls were broken through. Although the Babylonians were surrounding the city, all the soldiers escaped during the night. They left by way of the royal garden, went through the gateway connecting the two walls, and fled in the direction of the Jordan Valley. ⁸But the Babylonian army pursued King Zedekiah, captured him in the plains near Jericho, and all his soldiers deserted him. ⁹Zedekiah was taken to King Nebuchadnezzar, who was in the city of Riblah in the territory of Hamath, and there Nebuchadnezzar passed sentence on him. ¹⁰At Riblah he put Zedekiah’s sons to death while Zedekiah was looking on and he also had the officials of Judah executed. ^11*After that, he had Zedekiah’s eyes put out and had him placed in chains and taken to Babylon. Zedekiah remained in prison in Babylon until the day he died.

The Destruction of the Temple

¹²On the tenth day of the fifth month of the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia, Nebuzaradan, adviser to the king and commander of his army, entered Jerusalem. ^13*He burnt down the Temple, the palace, and the houses of all the important people in Jerusalem; ¹⁴and his soldiers tore down the city walls.