2 Kings 25:27

RELEASE OF JEHOIACHIN FROM PRISON, 2 Kings 25:27-30.

27. Seven and thirtieth year So identified was the captivity of Jehoiachin with that of the great mass of the Jewish exiles that its beginning formed a chronological epoch in their history. Compare Ezra 1:2. It was in Nebuchadnezzar’s eighth year that Jehoiachin was made captive, (2 Kings 24:12,) and these thirty-seven years added would bring it to his forty-fifth year; but he had recently died, and a new king was on the throne, so that Nebuchadnezzar’s reign, according to these Scriptures, must have been forty-four years long. According to Ptolemy’s Canon and Josephus, it was forty-three years; but this slight difference is explained by the fact that the Scripture writer reckons his reign from the time he took command of the army of Babylon, a year, or, perhaps, a little more, before his father’s death. See note on 2 Kings 24:1.

Seven and twentieth day According to Jeremiah, five and twentieth.

Evil-merodach was son and successor of Nebuchadnezzar. According to Berosus, “he governed public affairs after an illegal and impure manner, and had a plot laid against him by Neriglissar, his sister’s husband, and was slain by him when he had reigned but two years.” JOSEPHUS, Cont. Apion, 1:20. And this is about all that is known of him. The rabbies have a tradition that he contracted a friendship for Jehoiachin in prison, whither he himself had been cast by his father for a public offence.

In the year that he began to reign He “seems to have wished to signalize the beginning of his reign by an act of kindness to the Jews.” Rawlinson suggests “that the marvellous events of his father’s life, which are recorded in the book of Daniel, had made a deep impression upon him, and that he was thence inclined to favour the persons, and perhaps the religion, of the Jews.”

Lift up the head… out of prison An expression that evidently originated in the fact that a prisoner would naturally have his head bowed down under the weight of his sorrow and despondency, and liberation would cause him to lift up his head with gladness and comfort.