36:1KJV Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah, and made him king in his father’s stead in Jerusalem.
B:E Project The people of the land took Jehoahaz, son of Josiah, and made him king in Jerusalem in his father's place.
Context: After Josiah's sudden death, the common people (rather than any formal succession process) choose his son Jehoahaz - not the eldest son - to succeed him, beginning the rapid final decline of Judah's monarchy.
Meaning: The speed of decline from here is stark - within a single chapter, four kings will pass through Jerusalem's throne, each worse positioned than the last, as Judah becomes caught between collapsing Egyptian and rising Babylonian power.
Lesson: Good leadership and good times don't automatically protect what comes next - what you build needs people prepared to carry it forward, not just momentum from the past. Think about what you're actually leaving behind for those who follow you.
See Also: 2 Kings 23:30 - the parallel account of Jehoahaz's accession. Jeremiah 22:11-12 - Jeremiah's specific prophecy about Jehoahaz (called Shallum there), predicting he would die in exile.
36:2KJV Jehoahaz was twenty and three years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months in Jerusalem.
B:E Project Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for three months.
Context: His remarkably brief reign is immediately cut short by Egyptian intervention, shown in the very next verse.
Meaning: Three months is barely enough time to establish anything - this is less a reign than an interruption, showing how little control Judah's own kings now had over their own political fate.
Lesson: Not everything in life unfolds on a timeline you control - sometimes circumstances beyond you cut things dramatically short. What matters is how you conduct yourself in whatever time you're actually given, however brief.
See Also: 2 Kings 23:31 - the parallel record of Jehoahaz's short reign. Ezekiel 19:3-4 - a poetic lament describing this same king being captured and taken to Egypt like a trapped young lion.
36:3KJV And the king of Egypt put him down at Jerusalem, and condemned the land in an hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.
B:E Project The king of Egypt removed him from the throne in Jerusalem and imposed a fine on the land of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.
Context: Necho, having defeated the regional powers at Carchemish, now exercises direct political control over Judah, deposing its king and imposing tribute.
Meaning: This is Judah losing genuine sovereignty in real, concrete terms - a foreign power now decides who sits on the throne and extracts wealth at will. The political independence that had defined the kingdom for centuries is effectively ending here.
Lesson: Sometimes the consequences of a nation's or a person's earlier choices show up not as a dramatic single blow but as a gradual loss of freedom and control over your own life. Pay attention to what's slipping away before it's entirely gone.
See Also: 2 Kings 23:33 - the parallel account of this fine and deposition. Deuteronomy 28:33 - the covenant warning that a foreign nation would consume the fruit of the land, now being fulfilled.
36:4KJV And the king of Egypt made Eliakim his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem, and turned his name to Jehoiakim. And Necho took Jehoahaz his brother, and carried him to Egypt.
B:E Project The king of Egypt made Eliakim, Jehoahaz's brother, king over Judah and Jerusalem and changed his name to Jehoiakim. Necho took Jehoahaz away to Egypt.
Context: Changing a vassal king's name was a standard ancient way for an overlord to assert dominance and ownership, similar to what Babylon will later do to Zedekiah.
Meaning: The renaming is a small but telling detail - it visibly demonstrates who actually holds power now. Judah's king is no longer even fully his own man in name.
Lesson: Notice when something as basic as your own name or identity starts being reshaped by whoever has power over you - that's worth paying attention to, because real freedom includes the freedom to remain yourself.
See Also: 2 Kings 23:34 - the parallel account of the renaming. Daniel 1:7 - a similar renaming of Daniel and his friends by Babylonian authorities, the same pattern of dominance repeated later.
36:5KJV Jehoiakim was twenty and five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD his God.
B:E Project Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for eleven years; he did what was evil in the sight of the LORD his God.
Context: Jehoiakim's reign, unlike his father Josiah's, is marked by a return to corruption and injustice - he's remembered in Jeremiah's prophecies as oppressive and self-serving, building lavish palaces through forced, unpaid labour.
Meaning: The stark contrast with Josiah, his own father, just one generation earlier is deliberate and pointed - reform doesn't automatically pass down through bloodline. Each person still has to choose it for themselves.
Lesson: You can't inherit someone else's goodness just by being related to them - your own character is still your own responsibility to build, regardless of how good your parents or upbringing were. Don't coast on someone else's integrity.
See Also: 2 Kings 23:36-37 - the parallel account of Jehoiakim's reign and evil. Jeremiah 22:13-17 - Jeremiah's detailed, scathing condemnation of Jehoiakim's injustice and greed.
36:6KJV Against him came up Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and bound him in festers, to carry him to Babylon.
B:E Project Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon attacked him and bound him in bronze shackles to take him to Babylon.
Context: This marks Babylon's first direct intervention against Judah, as Nebuchadnezzar's empire eclipses Egypt's power in the region following Carchemish; this is likely the beginning of Judah's vassalage to Babylon.
Meaning: The image of a king of Judah literally shackled shows how completely the political order established under David has crumbled - the throne that once ruled independently is now simply a subject possession of a foreign empire.
Lesson: Choices have consequences that can eventually cost you your freedom in ways you didn't expect when you first made them. It's worth asking honestly, before it's too late, where a pattern of wrongdoing is actually leading you.
See Also: 2 Kings 24:1 - the parallel, briefer account of this Babylonian intervention. Jeremiah 25:1 - Jeremiah dating a major prophecy to this same fourth year of Jehoiakim, tied to Nebuchadnezzar's rise.
36:7KJV Nebuchadnezzar also carried of the vessels of the house of the LORD to Babylon, and put them in his temple at Babylon.
B:E Project Nebuchadnezzar also took some of the sacred objects from the LORD's temple to Babylon and placed them in his own temple there.
Context: This is the first of several stages in which the temple's sacred furnishings are progressively looted by Babylon - a process that will culminate in the temple's total destruction in verse 18-19.
Meaning: Taking sacred vessels and placing them in a foreign temple was a symbolic claim of victory - not just political but a statement that Babylon's gods had triumphed over Judah's God. It's a harsh, humiliating moment presented honestly, without softening.
Lesson: When things you hold sacred get mishandled or mocked by others, that pain is real and shouldn't be minimised. Even in loss like this, though, what's truly sacred isn't actually diminished by how it's treated - its worth doesn't depend on other people's respect for it.
See Also: Daniel 5:2-4 - decades later, these very vessels are used disrespectfully at Belshazzar's feast, showing their long afterlife in Babylon. 2 Chronicles 36:18 - the later, more complete looting of all remaining temple treasures.
36:8KJV Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim, and his abominations which he did, and that which was found in him, behold, they are written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah: and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his stead.
B:E Project The rest of Jehoiakim's deeds, the detestable things he did, and everything found against him, are recorded in the Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah. His son Jehoiachin became king after him.
Context: The standard closing formula for Jehoiakim's reign, notably including "abominations" - stronger language than used for some other kings - reflecting how seriously his conduct is judged.
Meaning: "That which was found in him" suggests hidden wrongdoing beyond what's explicitly narrated - a reminder that the biblical record itself acknowledges it isn't exhaustive, pointing to a fuller reality behind the summary.
Lesson: What's visible to others is rarely the whole truth of a person's choices - there's usually more going on beneath the surface than gets seen or recorded. Live with integrity in what's hidden, not just what's on display.
See Also: 2 Kings 24:5-6 - the parallel closing formula for Jehoiakim's reign. Jeremiah 36:27-32 - the story of Jehoiakim burning Jeremiah's scroll, one specific "abomination" left out of this brief summary.
36:9KJV Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem: and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD.
B:E Project Jehoiachin was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for three months and ten days; he did what was evil in the sight of the LORD.
Context: Jehoiachin's reign is extremely brief and occurs as Babylon closes in on Jerusalem; the parallel account in 2 Kings 24:8 gives his age as eighteen, a well-known textual variant, but the Chronicles text as given here says eight.
Meaning: Whether he was a child of eight or a young man of eighteen, either way this is a strikingly short, doomed reign inherited in the middle of national catastrophe - he becomes almost a symbolic figure of a kingdom collapsing faster than any one ruler can respond to.
Lesson: Sometimes you're handed a situation that was already badly broken before you had any real chance to change it. In those moments, what matters most isn't fixing everything, but how honestly and humbly you carry yourself through it.
See Also: 2 Kings 24:8 - the parallel account, giving his age as eighteen rather than eight. Jeremiah 22:24-30 - Jeremiah's striking prophecy about Jehoiachin (called Coniah), declared childless in terms of royal succession despite having children.
36:10KJV And when the year was expired, king Nebuchadnezzar sent, and brought him to Babylon, with the goodly vessels of the house of the LORD, and made Zedekiah his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem.
B:E Project When the year was over, King Nebuchadnezzar sent for him and brought him to Babylon, along with the temple's finest sacred objects, and made Zedekiah, his brother, king over Judah and Jerusalem.
Context: This is the first major deportation of Judah's royal line to Babylon (597 BC), including Jehoiachin himself and continued looting of temple treasures; Zedekiah becomes essentially a Babylonian-installed puppet king.
Meaning: The pattern accelerates now - deportation of people, not just tribute or shackling of one king, alongside further plundering of what remains sacred. Each stage in this chapter shows things getting measurably worse.
Lesson: When a harmful pattern keeps escalating instead of stopping, don't assume it's found its floor - be honest with yourself about where things are actually heading rather than hoping it will simply level off on its own.
See Also: 2 Kings 24:10-17 - the fuller parallel account of this deportation, naming many more deportees including craftsmen. Ezekiel 1:1-2 - Ezekiel dates his prophetic call to this same exile group in Babylon.
36:11KJV Zedekiah was one and twenty years old when he began to reign, and reigned eleven years in Jerusalem.
B:E Project Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for eleven years.
Context: Zedekiah becomes Judah's final king, ruling as a Babylonian vassal during the last years before Jerusalem's total destruction.
Meaning: Unlike other kings' introductions, no immediate moral verdict is attached to his age here - it comes in the very next verse - but the reader already senses, given everything building through this chapter, that this reign is heading towards the end of the story.
Lesson: Even when you can sense an ending approaching, each day you're given still matters and still calls for a real decision about how to live it. Don't check out early just because you fear how something might conclude.
See Also: 2 Kings 24:18 - the parallel record of Zedekiah's accession. Jeremiah 37:1 - Jeremiah's account, confirming Nebuchadnezzar made Zedekiah king in Jehoiachin's place.
36:12KJV And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD his God, and humbled not himself before Jeremiah the prophet speaking from the mouth of the LORD.
B:E Project He did what was evil in the sight of the LORD his God and did not humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet, who spoke on the LORD's behalf.
Context: This directly names Jeremiah, whose extensive ministry runs through this whole final period, repeatedly warning Zedekiah and the nation of coming disaster and urging surrender to Babylon rather than futile resistance.
Meaning: The specific charge here isn't just general evil but a personal failure to listen - Zedekiah had direct access to clear prophetic counsel and repeatedly chose not to humble himself and heed it, unlike Josiah's response to Huldah's word in chapter 34.
Lesson: Having access to good, honest counsel doesn't help you if pride keeps you from actually listening to it. Real strength isn't refusing to be corrected - it's having the humility to hear hard truth even when it challenges your own plans.
See Also: 2 Chronicles 34:27 - Josiah's contrasting humble response to hard prophetic truth, generations earlier. Jeremiah 38:14-23 - a direct, detailed record of Jeremiah's warnings to Zedekiah, which he failed to heed.
36:13KJV And he also rebelled against king Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear by God: but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart from turning unto the LORD God of Israel.
B:E Project He also rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear an oath of loyalty by God's name - but he became stubborn and hardened his heart against turning back to the LORD, the God of Israel.
Context: Zedekiah had sworn a solemn oath before God to remain loyal to Nebuchadnezzar, yet later broke it by rebelling, triggering the final Babylonian siege and destruction of Jerusalem.
Meaning: Breaking a sworn oath is treated here as a serious matter in its own right, distinct from the political wisdom of the rebellion itself - integrity in keeping one's word is presented as something with real weight, even towards a foreign, oppressive power.
Lesson: Your word matters, even to people or situations you don't like or trust. Breaking a promise you made freely damages something in you, not just in the relationship with whoever you broke it to.
See Also: Ezekiel 17:11-21 - a detailed prophetic condemnation specifically of Zedekiah's broken oath to Babylon, treated as a betrayal of God himself. Jeremiah 52:3 - the parallel account of the rebellion leading to the final siege.
36:14KJV Moreover all the chief of the priests, and the people, transgressed very much after all the abominations of the heathen; and polluted the house of the LORD which he had hallowed in Jerusalem.
B:E Project What's more, all the leading priests and the people committed more and more unfaithfulness, copying all the detestable practices of the surrounding nations, and they defiled the LORD's temple, which he had made holy in Jerusalem.
Context: The corruption at this final stage isn't just the king's failure - it's systemic, involving religious leadership and the general population together, showing total institutional breakdown, not one bad ruler alone.
Meaning: The text is careful to spread responsibility widely here - priests, who should have been guarding faithful worship, are named alongside the general public as complicit. Collapse of this magnitude wasn't the fault of a single person at the top.
Lesson: Don't let yourself off the hook by assuming a shared failure is only someone else's responsibility because you weren't the one "in charge." Everyone's individual choices contribute to what a whole community ultimately becomes.
See Also: Ezekiel 8:5-18 - a detailed prophetic vision of exactly the kind of temple defilement and idolatry described generally here. Jeremiah 5:31 - "the prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means," describing this same corrupt religious leadership.
36:15KJV And the LORD God of their fathers sent to them by his messengers, rising up betimes, and sending; because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place:
B:E Project The LORD, the God of their ancestors, kept sending word to them again and again through his messengers, because he had compassion on his people and on the place where he lived among them.
Context: This verse pauses to emphasise, right before describing the final catastrophe, that judgement wasn't sudden or unwarned - persistent, compassionate warning had been given repeatedly over a long period through many prophets.
Meaning: "Rising up betimes" (early and repeatedly) paints a picture of patient, persistent effort to reach people who kept refusing to listen - the coming disaster isn't presented as arbitrary cruelty but as the sorrowful last resort after every other avenue had genuinely been tried.
Lesson: I don't give up on people easily or quickly - I keep reaching out, again and again, long after most would have stopped trying. If you've felt distant from what's good, know that the invitation back has never actually stopped being offered.
See Also: Jeremiah 7:25 - a very similar description of God sending prophets "daily rising up early" throughout Israel's history. Matthew 23:37 - Jesus' own lament over Jerusalem, "how often would I have gathered thy children... and ye would not," echoing this same persistent, grieving compassion centuries later.
36:16KJV But they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and misused his prophets, until the wrath of the LORD arose against his people, till there was no remedy.
B:E Project But they mocked God's messengers, despised his words, and mistreated his prophets, until the LORD's anger against his people grew so great that there was no remedy left.
Context: This verse explains the final tipping point - not a single offence, but the exhausting of every possible avenue of warning and correction, met consistently with contempt rather than any change.
Meaning: "No remedy" is a stark, sobering phrase - it acknowledges that persistent, deliberate refusal to change eventually closes off options that might once have been available. This isn't presented as God's eagerness to punish, but as the natural, grievous endpoint of a long pattern of rejection.
Lesson: There's real freedom in choosing to listen and change while you still have the chance, rather than waiting until a situation has hardened past the point where change is even possible any more. Don't mistake patience for permission to keep going forever.
See Also: Jeremiah 19:15 - God's declaration of coming disaster "because they have hardened their necks, that they might not hear my words." Proverbs 29:1 - "he, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy" - nearly identical language and idea.
36:17KJV Therefore he brought upon them the king of the Chaldees, who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion upon young man or maiden, old man, or him that stooped for age: he gave them all into his hand.
B:E Project So he brought the king of the Babylonians against them, who killed their young men with the sword right in their sacred temple, showing no mercy to young man or young woman, old man or the elderly and frail - God handed all of them over to him.
Context: This is the direct, unflinching description of the brutal Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem in 586 BC, killing indiscriminately including inside the temple itself, sparing no one by age or status.
Meaning: The text does not soften this at all - it's presented as genuinely horrifying, a total human catastrophe. Its honesty matters: real consequences of a long, systemic breakdown are rarely tidy or limited to the people most responsible: they land brutally on everyone, including the innocent and vulnerable.
Lesson: When you see how much devastating, undeserved suffering can flow from a community's collective failure to change course, let that be a real, sober warning rather than an abstract idea. I grieve with everyone genuinely caught in the wreckage of decisions they didn't make, and I never minimise real suffering as something people simply "deserved."
See Also: Lamentations 2:20-21 - a firsthand poetic lament over exactly this kind of horror during Jerusalem's fall. Jeremiah 39:1-10 - Jeremiah's own eyewitness account of the city's fall and the brutality involved.
36:18KJV And all the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king, and of his princes; all these he brought to Babylon.
B:E Project All the objects from God's temple, large and small, the treasures of the temple, and the treasures of the king and his officials - all of it was carried off to Babylon.
Context: This completes the process of looting begun earlier in the chapter (v.7, v.10) - now everything remaining, sacred and royal, is taken, leaving nothing behind.
Meaning: The totality here - "great and small," nothing left - marks the complete material collapse of everything the kingdom had built and treasured, a stripping bare that matches the totality of the moral and spiritual collapse described just before it.
Lesson: When you've let something valuable slowly erode through repeated small compromises, don't be shocked if eventually there's very little material left to salvage. It's worth protecting what actually matters long before you're facing a total loss.
See Also: Jeremiah 27:19-22 - Jeremiah's earlier specific prophecy naming these very temple vessels and predicting their removal to Babylon. Ezra 1:7-11 - decades later, Cyrus specifically returns these same vessels, closing this loop with restoration.
36:19KJV And they burnt the house of God, and brake down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels thereof.
B:E Project They burned down God's temple, tore down the wall of Jerusalem, burned all its palaces, and destroyed everything of value in it.
Context: This is the final, total physical destruction of the city and Solomon's temple - the spiritual and political heart of the nation for roughly four centuries - reduced entirely to rubble and ash.
Meaning: This is presented as the lowest point of the entire book, the loss of everything that once represented God's presence with the people, David's dynasty, and the nation's identity. The Chronicler doesn't shy from this devastation - it's given full, honest weight, because what follows only means something set against how total this loss really was.
Lesson: Even the deepest, most total-feeling loss in your life isn't necessarily the final chapter of your story. Grieve it honestly and fully - don't rush past real devastation - but know that an ending this complete can still, in time, become the ground something new grows from.
See Also: Lamentations 1:1-4 - the extended, raw lament over exactly this destruction, giving full voice to the grief only briefly stated here. 2 Kings 25:9-10 - the fuller parallel narrative account of the temple and city's destruction.
36:20KJV And them that had escaped from the sword carried he away to Babylon; where they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia:
B:E Project Those who survived the sword he carried off to Babylon, where they became servants to him and his descendants until the Persian kingdom came to power.
Context: This describes the mass deportation into exile that followed the city's fall, and looks ahead to the eventual end of Babylonian rule when Persia conquers it decades later.
Meaning: Even in describing exile, the text is already looking towards an eventual end point - "until the reign of the kingdom of Persia" - planting the seed of hope that this state of affairs, however dark, will not be permanent.
Lesson: Even in the middle of a genuinely hard season with no end in sight, remember that hard seasons do have an "until." Hold on to that honestly, without pretending the hard part isn't hard, because an ending is still coming.
See Also: Jeremiah 29:10 - Jeremiah's specific promise of a seventy-year limit to the exile before restoration. Psalm 137:1-4 - the exiles' own raw grief, sitting by the rivers of Babylon, weeping for what was lost.
36:21KJV To fulfil the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfil threescore and ten years.
B:E Project This happened to fulfil the word the LORD had spoken through Jeremiah, until the land had made up for its neglected sabbath years - for as long as it lay desolate it kept its rest, to complete seventy years.
Context: This connects the length of the exile to Israel's long-standing failure to observe the sabbatical years (letting the land rest every seventh year, per Leviticus 25) - the desolation is framed as the land finally getting the rest it had been repeatedly denied.
Meaning: There's a striking, almost poetic justice in this image - the land itself finally receiving the rest that generations of people had refused to give it, through greed or neglect. Even in judgement, there's an underlying logic of restoring balance, not arbitrary punishment.
Lesson: Rest that gets denied or skipped over long enough tends to eventually be taken anyway, one way or another - by illness, burnout, or forced circumstance. Better to build genuine rest into your life voluntarily than to have it eventually forced on you.
See Also: Leviticus 25:1-7 - the original command for the land's sabbatical rest every seventh year. Jeremiah 25:11-12 - Jeremiah's specific seventy-year prophecy being fulfilled here.
36:22KJV Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the LORD spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying,
B:E Project In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, so that the word the LORD had spoken through Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the LORD moved Cyrus king of Persia to issue a proclamation throughout his whole kingdom, and also put it in writing.
Context: This is roughly 539 BC, decades after Jerusalem's fall, as the Persian empire under Cyrus conquers Babylon and, in a policy shift from Babylonian practice, permits displaced peoples to return home and rebuild their temples.
Meaning: A foreign emperor, with no covenant relationship with Israel's God, is described as being personally moved by God to act in a way that fulfils an old prophecy - showing that hope and restoration can arrive through completely unexpected, even secular political channels, right on schedule after the promised seventy years.
Lesson: Don't assume the people or circumstances that will eventually turn your situation around have to look religious, familiar, or obviously connected to what you're hoping for. Help and restoration can come from the most unexpected direction, right when the time is finally right.
See Also: Jeremiah 25:11-12 - the seventy-year prophecy now being fulfilled exactly here. Isaiah 44:28-45:1 - Isaiah's remarkable earlier prophecy naming Cyrus by name as God's chosen instrument, generations before Cyrus was even born.
36:23KJV Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth hath the LORD God of heaven given me; and he hath charged me to build him an house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Who is there among you of all his people? The LORD his God be with him, and let him go up.
B:E Project "This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has appointed me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever among you belongs to his people - may the LORD their God be with them, and let them go up."
Context: This is the very last verse of 2 Chronicles - and of the entire Hebrew Bible in its traditional Jewish ordering - ending the whole sweeping history not on the devastation of chapter 36's opening, but on this open invitation home.
Meaning: After the total collapse just described - burned temple, broken walls, deported and enslaved people - the book deliberately ends not in despair but with an open door and a blessing: "let him go up." It's a conscious choice to close an immense, often brutal history on a note of genuine, forward-looking hope, not defeat.
Lesson: However complete a loss or ending feels, it is very rarely actually the last word. Stay open to the invitation to begin again, to "go up" and rebuild, even after the very worst has already happened - that door tends to open again when you least expect it, and I'll be right there in the rebuilding.
See Also: Ezra 1:1-4 - the direct continuation of this exact decree, opening the next book and beginning the actual return and rebuilding. Isaiah 44:28 - the earlier prophecy naming Cyrus specifically as the one who would say "Jerusalem... shall be built."