10. In the springtime, King Nebuchadnezzar sent for him to be brought to Babylon, along with valuable equipment from the Lord’s temple. Then he made Zedekiah his uncle the next king of Judah and Jerusalem.
11. Zedekiah was 21 years old when he became king, and he ruled for eleven years in Jerusalem.
12. He did what was evil in the Lord his God’s eyes and didn’t submit before the prophet Jeremiah, who spoke for the Lord.
13. Moreover, he rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar, despite the solemn pledge Nebuchadnezzar had forced him to swear in God’s name. He became stubborn and refused to turn back to the Lord, Israel’s God.
14. All the leaders of the priests and the people also grew increasingly unfaithful, following all the detestable practices of the nations. They polluted the Lord’s temple that God had dedicated in Jerusalem.
15. Time and time again, the Lord, the God of their ancestors, sent word to them through his messengers because he had compassion on his people and his dwelling.
16. But they made fun of God’s messengers, treating God’s words with contempt and ridiculing God’s prophets to such an extent that there was no hope of warding off the Lord’s rising anger against his people.
17. So God brought the Babylonian king against them. The king killed their young men with the sword in their temple’s sanctuary, and showed no pity for young men or for virgins, for the old or for the feeble. God handed all of them over to him.
18. Then the king hauled everything off to Babylon, every item from God’s temple, both large and small, including the treasures of the Lord’s temple and those of the king and his officials.