Daily Devotions
Jeremiah
"They fled and went out of the city by night"
Text: Jeremiah 39:4
“THE PRINCES OF BABYLON”
The Babylonian princes represented the powerful army of the Chaldeans. They had conquered Jerusalem and symbolically they sat in “the Middle Gate”.
“Then all the princes of the king of Babylon came in and sat in the Middle Gate:
Nergal-Sharezer, Samgar-Nebo, Sarsechim, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sarezer, Rabmag,
with the rest of the princes of the king of Babylon.
So it was, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them,
that they fled and went out of the city by night,
by way of the king’s garden, by the gate between the two walls.
And he went out by way of the plain.”
Jeremiah 39:3-4
1. “Then all the princes of the king of Babylon came in and sat in the Middle Gate:
Nergal-Sharezer, Samgar-Nebo, Sarsechim, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sarezer, Rabmag,
with the rest of the princes of the king of Babylon”
a) The princes of the king of Babylon.
b) Six of the more prominent princes were named.
c) There were other princes.
d) These were not necessarily the sons of the king of Babylon.
e) The word “prince” denotes a person of very high rank.
f) The “Middle Gate” was an old fortress that dated back to the days of King Hezekiah.
i) It was a formidable fortress once upon a time.
ii) But it was captured by the Babylonians.
2. “So it was, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them,
that they fled and went out of the city by night, by way of the king’s garden,
by the gate between the two walls. And he went out by way of the plain”
a) King Zedekiah and his men of war saw them at the Middle Gate.
They knew that they had lost the city.
b) Their decision was to flee the city.
c) They had planned their escape.
i) They would flee by night.
ii) They would flee by the gate that was between two walls.
iii) Zedekiah hoped to escape over the plains.
iv) He had “forgotten” Jeremiah’s word to surrender to the Babylonians.