signates by the name of Shallum', being dated from the Nisan, would expire with the Thamuz, B. C. 609 : at which time it is possible Necho might be on his return. The first year of Jehoiakim will consequently bear date nominally from Nisan, B. C. 609, but truly from Thamuz, B. C. 609. In support of this conclusion there are various presumptive proofs. I. Jeremiah xxxvi. 1. we have mention of the fourth of Jehoiakim; and, 9. 22. directly after, of the fifth, and of the ninth month. The whole subject-matter of the chapter is so connected as to lead to the inference that the command to write the roll was given to Jeremiah, at the very end of the fourth of Jehoiakim3 ; and consequently that the fourth of Jehoiakim did truly expire not long before the ninth month in the sacred year. II. The reason of the thing must imply that Jeremiah xxxvi. is a later prophecy than Jeremiah xxv. Now Jeremiah i. 2. and xxv. 1. 3. from the thirteenth of Josiah, to this time in the fourth of Jehoiakim, there were twenty-two years, and part of a twentythird. The thirteenth of Josiah began nominally with the Nisan, truly with the Tisri, B. C. 628. From Nisan, B.C. 628, the twenty-second year was complete Nisan, B. C. 606: and from Tisri, B.C. 628, it was so in Tisri, B. C. 606. If Jeremiah follows the former date, the prophecy was delivered after Nisan, B.C. 606; if the latter, after Tisri, B. C. 606: but in either case in the fourth of Jehoiakim; from which it seems the most probable inference that the fourth of Jehoiakim began between Nisan and Tisri, B.C. 606: and, consequently, his first between Nisan and Tisri, B.C. 609. Hence, as his predecessor reigned three months, to all appearance immediately before him, it seems s Vide xxxvi. 1, 2, 6. 8, 9. xlv. i. r Jerem. xxii. 11. equally obvious that his reign ended and Jehoiakim's began at an equal distance from both those months *. Hence 1 of Jehoiakim. Nisan B. C. 609–608. Now that Jehoiakim did not reign eleven years complete appears from this; that the fourth of Jehoiakim was the first of Nebuchadnezzart-and the three months, ten days, of Jehoiachint came within the eighth. Now these synchronisms would hold good if the first of Nebuchadnezzar began about Nisan B. C. 606: (for that would be truly in the third of Jehoiakim medio or exeunte; and nine months or six of the fourth of Jehoiakim would still come within the first of Nebuchadnezzar :) and the death of Jehoiakim took place in the ninth or tenth month of the Jewish year, at the very end of B. C. 599: for then the last three months of the eighth of Nebuchadnezzar, or the first three months of B. C. 598, would be the three months of the reign of Jehoiachin. firmed as follows: And this conclusion And this conclusion may be con I. There is a fitness in placing the death of Jehoiakim in the ninth month of the Jewish year, because it was in that month" that he committed the crime which drew down upon him the sentence, fulfilled in the manner of his death. II. From 2 Kings xxv. 1, 2, 3, it is evident that the reign of Zedekiah began between the tenth and the fourth months in the Jewish year. Jeremiah xxviii. 1. also, allusion occurs to his fourth year and the fifth month, and xxviii. 17, to the same year and the seventh month. III. The prophet Ezekiel was one of those who appear to have been carried into captivity along with Jehoiachin: the date; at least, which he invariably follows in all his predictions is the date of this captivity: vide i. 1, 2. viii. 1. xx. 1. xxiv. 1. xxvi. 1. xxix. 1. 17. xxx. 20. xxxi. 1. xxxii. 1.17. xxxiii. 21. * xl. 1: in all * With regard to the date exhibited in this verse, vide Dissertation xviii. vol. ii. page 140, 141. If there is any exception to the rule in question, it is furnished apparently by the first verse of the first chapter itself: Now it came to pass in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, in the fifth day of the month. If this verse labours under no corruption of the numbers, the next verse shews that the thirtieth year, and fifth month, synchronised with the fifth of Jehoiachin's captivity, and the same month: that is, with B.C. 594. and the month Ab in the sacred year. In order to synchronise with this time B. C. 594, the thirtieth year must be referred to some corresponding time B. C. 623. Now B. C. 623. was apparently the eighteenth of Josiah; in which year (2 Kings xxii. 3. xxiii. 2, 3. 23. 2 Chron. xxxiv. 8. 29-33. xxxv. 19.) he renewed the Mosaic covenant, and celebrated the Passover, as there recorded. I say, apparently; for the eighteenth of Josiah did truly begin Tisri, B. C. 623, and expire Tisri, B. C. 622: which is too late for the apxn of the thirtieth year in question. If that thirtieth year was just complete, Ab, B. C. 594, it must have begun, Ab, B. C. 624, which would be in the sixteenth of Josiah exeunte : if it was just begun, Ab, B. C. 594, it must have begun, Ab, B. C. 623, in the seventeenth of Josiah exeunte: but in no case can it bear date in the eighteenth of Josiah, except as referred to its nominal ȧpxǹ, Nisan, B. C. 623. It may perhaps be so referred, * Jeremiah xxxvi. 9. 22. 29, 30. xxii. 18, 19. Hence, which instances while the years are referred to the date of Jehoiachin's captivity, the months are the months of the sacred year. On this account, it seems impossible to doubt that the first month of the sacred year, and the first month of the captivity, began and proceeded together*. If so, the last month of the sacred year synchronised with the last month of the reign of Jehoiachin; and Jehoiachin began to reign B. C. 598, ineunte, and was made captive in the third month of the same year, in the eighth of Nebuchadnezzar. The first year of Zedekiah and the ninth of Nebuchadnezzar would thus begin and proceed together, from Nisan, B. C. 598. if the text is to be considered sound, according to the opinion of Usher; though I should rather understand it, even in that case, of the age of Ezekiel when he was called to the prophetical office. Jerome (Operum i. 647, 648. Præfatio in Ezek.) so refers it: though elsewhere, (iii. 699. ad principium, in Ezek. i.) he refers it to the twelfth of Josias, quando inventus est liber Deuteronomii in Templo Dei. But the occurrence of this date here is a manifest anomaly, compared with the rule which prevails every where else and if there were any reason to doubt about the integrity of the text, then I should consider it by no means unlikely that the mention of the thirtieth year here arose out of the allusion to the sixth year, viii. I. There might be some cause to conclude from viii. 4. x. 15. 20. 22. xi. 24, 25. that the vision, which begins to be recorded viii. 1, was directly consecutive upon that recorded i. 1. Hence had Ezekiel originally written, It came to pass in the fourth month, in the fifth day of the month, without any mention of the year, some scribe might suppose it was the fourth month of the sixth year and make a marginal annotation accordingly. If this once got into the text, its corruption into the thirtieth would be a still easier process. I propose this opinion, however, as a mere conjecture: but it is some confirmation of it that Ezekiel mentions another year, verse 2, which is also referred to the same date as every other note of time subsequently; and therefore it is not likely that he would mention a different one, and such an one as has nothing afterwards to resemble it, in the verse immediately before. *This conclusion is further deducible from the testimony of 2 Chron. xxxvi. 10, "And when the year was expired," &c. understood, according to its most probable construction, of the sacred year. For hence it would follow demonstratively, that with the end of the reign of Jehoiachin, one sacred year expired, and with his captivity, another began. 1 of Zedekiah. 9 of Nebuchadnezzar. Nisan B. C. 598-597. 10 ...... 11 ...... 18 589-588. 588-587. Vide Jeremiah xxxii. 1. and lii. 12. But the temple and Jerusalem were destroyed in the fifth month of the sacred year, Ab, B. C. 588: and consequently, soon after the beginning of the eleventh of Zedekiah, and of the nineteenth of Nebuchadnezzar. The true date of the destruction of Jerusalem then was Ab, B. C. 588: and the fourteenth year from that destruction complete would be Ab, B. C. 574. The true date of Ezekiel's or Jehoiachin's captivity was Nisan, B. C. 598: and the twenty-fifth year from that date began, in the fourteenth from the other, Nisan, B. C. 574: which is the synchronism specified at Ezekiel xl. 1. Having thus established the fact that the date of the destruction of Jerusalem was truly the fifth month in the sacred year, B. C. 588, I shall pause for the sake of the following observations. The testimony of Jeremiah has rendered it certain that the fourth of Jehoiakim, which began Thamuz or Tisri, B. C. 606, began in the first of Nebuchadnezzar: and the captivity of Jehoiachin, Adar, B. C. 598, took place at the end of his eighth. On this principle the first of Nebuchadnezzar, according to Jeremiah, is dated from Nisan, B. C. 606, and began in the third of Jehoiakim medio or exeunte. Now from the third of Jehoiakim it is that Daniel dates the commencement of his own captivitys: that is, the invasion of Judæa by Nebuchadnezzar, which ended in Daniel's captivity, was made in the third of Jehoiakim. If Nebuchadnezzar went up against Jerusalem between Nisan and Thamuz or Tisri, B. C. 606, he would do this in the third of Jehoiakim; and if the s i. I. |