⁴ Then the city [wall] was broken into [and conquered]; all the men of war fled by night by way of the gate between the two walls by the king’s garden, though the ^[a]Chaldeans (Babylonians) were all around the city. And they went by way of the Arabah (the plain of the Jordan). ⁵ The army of the Chaldeans pursued the king and overtook him in the plains of Jericho. Then his entire army was dispersed from him. ⁶ So they seized the king (Zedekiah) and brought him to the king of Babylon at Riblah [on the Orontes River], and sentence was passed on him. ⁷ They slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, then put out the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him [hand and foot] with bronze fetters and brought him to Babylon.^(A)

Jerusalem Burned and Plundered

⁸ On the seventh day of the fifth month in the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, Nebuzaradan, captain of the bodyguard, a servant of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem. ⁹ He burned the house (temple) of the Lord, the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem; every great house he burned down. ¹⁰ All the army of the Chaldeans (Babylonians) who were with the captain of the bodyguard tore down the walls around Jerusalem.

¹⁹ Then they burned the house of God and tore down the wall of Jerusalem, and burned all its fortified buildings with fire, and destroyed all its valuable articles.