What if Zedekiah had Repented?
Zedekiah was the last king of the Jewish nation. He was twenty-one years old when Nebuchadnezzer set him up to replace his brother. You could say, it was inevitable that he would lose the kingdom since a foreigner set him up as regent. Nebuchadnezzer had already come through and taken the previous king Jehoiachin/Jehoiakim, his mother, his servants and ten thousand smiths and craftsmen, leaving a nation with only “the poorest sort of people in the land” and a puppet government. (2 Kings 24:11-14) However, if their fate was indiputable, Jeremiah wouldn’t have been sent along with “many prophets” to call Zedekiah’s people to repentance. (1 Ne 1:4)
If Zedekiah had repented, his palace would not have been burned. If Zedekiah had repented, the temple would have remained. He wouldn’t have been forced to watch his children die and then have his own eyes put out. (2 Kings 25:7, 9) He reigned eleven years so that was how long he had to decide whether or not to listen to the prophet Jeremiah.
I remember myself at twenty-one and I was a little headstrong. However, by the time I was thirty-two years old, with a spouse and children, I was much more focused on the safety and wellbeing of my family. Zedekiah lost it all.
Through Jeremiah, God gave Zedekiah and his people two choices, “the way of life or the way of death” (Jer 21:8) Zedekiah chose death.
What would Zedekiah and his people have done that was so bad that he and his people would be destroyed? Jeremiah gives us a picture of the state of things:
They were committing adultery with their neighbors’ wives (Jer 29:23)
They wrote letters replacing the priests with new priests and putting those who prophesied evil in prison (Jer 29:25-26)
They set their abominations in the temple (Jer 32:34, 2 Chron 36:14)
They killed innocent people (probably children) in human sacrifices to the idol Molech (Jer 32:35, 2 Kings 24:4, Ezek 16:20-21)
Jehoiakim killed the prophet Urijah (Jer 26:20-23) and tradition states that Zedekiah’s people eventually killed Jeremiah also.
What does repentance look like on a national level - Zedekiah’s scope of influence? One idea is that the religious education system needed some improvements. (Jer 32:33) In religious education, the beliefs and values are passed on to the next generation. I think about the government’s oversight and approval of building projects. It appears that someone (presumably in government) had allowed the building of “high place[s] in every street” (Ezek 16:31). These could have been removed by the government. In addition, something really should have been done about the bad things going on in the temple. In this society, the people in charge were obviously corrupt. The king has a unique authority in the prosecution of corrupt individuals.
You could argue that repentance is really a personal matter and I would agree. So if the government was corrupt at the highest levels, what were the average ordinary citizens thinking about Jeremiah. Well, when Nebuchanezzer came and took Zedekiah to Babylon, he left a few people to harvest the grapes. These were farmers with Gedaliah as their leader (Jer 40). Johanan a captain of the forces warns Gedaliah of a coup but he ignores it (Jer 40:16) Gedaliah is killed by Ishmael an Ammonite hitman who is chased off but not captured by Johanan.
Captain Johanan and some of the Jewish leaders ask Jeremiah to pray for divine guidance. They are told not to be afraid of the king of Babylon. Rather than listen to Jeremiah they decide to go to Egypt for safety, saying “Thou speakest falsely, The Lord our God hath not sent thee to say, ‘Go not into Egypt.’” (Jer 43:2) Even though they think Jeremiah is lying, they take him with them. This shows that the common people didn’t believe the prophet Jeremiah.
While in Egypt Jeremiah then talks to the local Jewish population living in exile. He warns them that they will all die if they stay in Egypt. They refuse to believe him also. (Jer 44:16) Usually ex-pats are a little removed from the local politics and tend to think independently but in this case, everyone seems to reject Jeremiah.
Repentance on a personal level meant that everyone from the least to the greatest was going to have to re-think their internal measuring stick that they used to determine right from wrong and truth from error. At what level did they doubt? Were they unsure of monotheism - the idea that there is only one God? Did they doubt the promises of God to their fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? Did the ten commandments seem out-dated?
According to Matthew Henry’s Commentary on Jer 34:8-22, King Zedekiah and his people made a half-hearted attempt at repentance by releasing their slaves. “A Jew should not be held in servitude above seven years. This law they and their fathers had broken. And when there was some hope that the [Babylonian] siege was raised, they forced the servants they had released into their services again. Those who think to cheat God by dissembled repentance and partial reformation, put the greatest cheat upon their own souls. This shows that liberty to sin, is really only liberty to have the sorest judgments. It is just with God to disappoint expectations of mercy, when we disappoint the expectations of duty. And when reformation springs only from terror, it is seldom lasting. Solemn vows thus entered into, profane the ordinances of God; and the most forward to bind themselves by appeals to God, are commonly most ready to break them. Let us look to our hearts, that our repentance may be real, and take care that the law of God regulates our conduct. source
According to Jeremiah, there were some people who were still true to the counsel their father’s had given them. Jeremiah tells about the Rechabites to contrast the actions of the Israelites who had left the patriarchal way and become a theocracy. Here is Matthew Henry’s commentary on the Rechabites: Jer 35:1-11 “Jonadab was famous for wisdom and piety. He lived nearly 300 years before, 2 Kings 10:15. Jonadab charged his posterity not to drink wine. He also appointed them to dwell in tents, or movable dwelling: this would teach them not to think of settling any where in this world. To keep low, would be the way to continue long in the land where they were strangers. Humility and contentment are always the best policy, and men's surest protection. Also, that they might not run into unlawful pleasures, they were to deny themselves even lawful delights. The consideration that we are strangers and pilgrims should oblige us to abstain from all fleshly lusts…Jonadab’s posterity observed these rules strictly…The trial of the Rechabites' constancy was for a sign; it made the disobedience of the Jews to God the more marked.” source
Repentance requires change. Often it means denying ourselves something we want (a fleshly lust) in order to act in obedience and piety to God’s commandments. Repentance includes learning the right way and also doing it. It is not simply believing that the prophet can ask God for advice as Johanan did but also accepting the advice as prophetic. Many people believe in God but will not bend their will to do what he requires of them. This kind of belief is merely a smoke screen to hide their true intentions.
Today, Jeremiah’s prophecies about the destruction of Babylon may seem ancient and irrelevant but what Jeremiah saw is yet to be fulfilled. The remnant of Israel is gathering. In Jeremiah’s day, Babylon won. In the last days, Babylon will fall. Many things that Jeremiah and his contemporaries saw have yet to be fulfilled. Now is the time to repent and believe the prophet Jeremiah. It is also time to learn the right way as taught by the living prophet Russell M Nelson and do it. I testify that these words are true.