(10) And when the year was expired.--See margin. "At the return of the year" means in spring, when kings usually went forth to war. (2 Samuel 11:1; 1 Kings 20:22.) Kings gives a full account of the siege and surrender of Jerusalem, and the deportation to Babylon of the king and all his princes and men of war, by "the servants of Nebuchadnezzar."
Zedekiah his brother.--Zedekiah was uncle of Jehoiachin, being a son of Josiah, and brother of Jehoiakim. Perhaps "brother" is equivalent to "kinsman" here, as elsewhere. (Comp. 1 Chronicles 3:15, where Zedekiah appears as a son of Josiah; and 2 Kings 24:17.) The versions read "his father's brother"--a correction. Thenius thinks the word for "uncle" had become illegible in the MS. here used by the chronicler.
Verse 10. - When the year was expired; i.e. at the beginning of the new year, in spring (2 Chronicles 24:23). It appears, from 2 Kings 25:27-30, that the captivity of Jehoia-chin, which thus began, lasted thirty-seven years, till B.C. 561, past the end of Nebuchadnezzar's reign, and that he was thenceforward kindly treated by Evil-Merodach. Compare particularly with this verse the parallel in its vers. 10-16. Zedekiah his brother; i.e. not adopting the very generic usage of the terms of relationship, so common in Old Testament language, his uncle. His mother (Hamutal, ver. 18 of parallel) was the same with the mother of Jehoahaz. Ten years old evidently when Jehoiakim began his reign, he must have been thirteen years younger than his whole brother Je-hoahaz. Zedekiah's name was before Mat-taniah. The account of Zedekiah in the parallel (which see) is very much more full.
36:1-21 The ruin of Judah and Jerusalem came on by degrees. The methods God takes to call back sinners by his word, by ministers, by conscience, by providences, are all instances of his compassion toward them, and his unwillingness that any should perish. See here what woful havoc sin makes, and, as we value the comfort and continuance of our earthly blessings, let us keep that worm from the root of them. They had many times ploughed and sowed their land in the seventh year, when it should have rested, and now it lay unploughed and unsown for ten times seven years. God will be no loser in his glory at last, by the disobedience of men. If they refused to let the land rest, God would make it rest. What place, O God, shall thy justice spare, if Jerusalem has perished? If that delight of thine were cut off for wickedness, let us not be high-minded, but fear.
With the goodly vessels.--2 Chronicles 32:27. "Some of the vessels" had already been carried off (2 Chronicles 36:7). (See 2 Kings 24:13 and Jeremiah 27:18-22.)
Zedekiah his brother.--Zedekiah was uncle of Jehoiachin, being a son of Josiah, and brother of Jehoiakim. Perhaps "brother" is equivalent to "kinsman" here, as elsewhere. (Comp. 1 Chronicles 3:15, where Zedekiah appears as a son of Josiah; and 2 Kings 24:17.) The versions read "his father's brother"--a correction. Thenius thinks the word for "uncle" had become illegible in the MS. here used by the chronicler.