(Redirected from Jehoiachin)'Ykhanya' (, , meaning "
God will fortify (his people)", ''see
Theophory in the Bible'';
Greek: ιεχονιας, ; trad. English: '''Jeconiah', Coniah, Jechonia''), also known as 'Yhoyakhin' (, ; trad. English: '''Jehoiachin'''), was king of
Judah, the son of
King Jehoiakim and
Nehushta the daughter of
Elnathan of Jerusalem. He was a contemporary of the Prophet
Jeremiah.
Both
William F. Albright and
E. R. Thiele date Jeconiah's reign to
598 BC. He began to reign in
Jerusalem at the age of eighteen (according to the
Books of Kings, according to most of the Hebrew Manuscripts of the
Books of Chronicles his age was eight), upon the death of his father, Jehoiakim. His children included
Assir and
Salathiel.
After reigning for three months and ten days, he was removed from office by the
Babylonians, and
Zedekiah replaced him as king in Jerusalem (''
2 Chronicles'' 36:9). Jeconiah, with his household, many of the rulers of Judah, and many craftsmen, were exiled to Babylon and imprisoned by
Nebuchadnezzar II.
Cuneiform records dated to
592 BC mention Jeconiah ("''Ia-'-ú-kinu''") and his five sons as recipients of food rations in
Babylon. He was still called king while in captivity.
In the thirty-seventh year of his captivity (
562 BC), he was removed from prison by
Amel-Marduk,
King of Babylon.
The beginning of the
Gospel of Matthew claims that Jeconiah's father was King
Josiah ("Josiah became the father of Jechoniah and his brothers at the time of the Babylonian exile." (Matthew 1:11)
During the excavations around 1900 found
Robert Koldewey in the south castle of
Babylon administrative documents, which describe food rations for Jojachin and five of his sons (1.Chronika 3:16 - 18). 1933 succeeded to decipher it for the first time the cuneiform script on such a board. Altogether four different receipts are received, in which king Jojachin is mentioned. Such a cuneiform script board is publicly issued in the
Pergamon Museum to
Berlin.
Links
★
Jehoiachin in Babylonia Discussion of the Babylonian evidence