Babylon besieges Jerusalem
2 Kings 25:1–3; Jeremiah 32; 37–39; 52:4–6
When Zedekiah rebelled, Nebuchadnezzar's army surrounded Jerusalem; during the eighteen-month siege Jeremiah was imprisoned and thrown into a muddy cistern, yet bought a field as a sign that Judah had a future.
“Ah Lord Yahweh! Behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm. There is nothing too hard for you.”
Jeremiah 32:17 (World English Bible)
Jeremiah told Zedekiah to surrender to Babylon and live. The officials called him a traitor and lowered him into a cistern, where he sank in the mud until an Ethiopian servant, Ebed-melech, rescued him.
In the middle of the siege, God told Jeremiah to buy his cousin's field at Anathoth and preserve the deed in a clay jar: houses and fields would again be bought in this land. In these same chapters Jeremiah promised a new covenant written on the heart (Jeremiah 31:31–34), which Hebrews 8 applies to Christ.
Places
JerusalemEgyptBabylonChaldeaJerichoArabahHamathAnathothRiblahBenjamin Gate
Dating notes
The siege began on the 10th day of the 10th month of Zedekiah's 9th year (2 Kings 25:1), which Ussher computes as 30 January 590 BC (Julian).