²¹ because sometimes one who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave all to be enjoyed by another who did not toil for it. This also is vanity and a great evil.^(A)

¹⁷ So I hated life because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a chasing after wind.^(A)

¹⁸ I hated all my toil in which I had toiled under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to my successor,^(B)

Reign and Captivity of Jehoiakim

⁵ Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord his God.^{(A) 6} Against him King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came up and bound him with fetters to take him to Babylon.^{(B) 7} Nebuchadnezzar also carried some of the vessels of the house of the Lord to Babylon and put them in his palace in Babylon.^{(C) 8} Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim and the abominations that he did and what was found against him are written in the Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah, and his son Jehoiachin succeeded him.^(D)

Reign and Captivity of Jehoiachin

⁹ Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign; he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem. He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord.^{(E) 10} In the spring of the year King Nebuchadnezzar sent and brought him to Babylon, along with the precious vessels of the house of the Lord, and made his brother Zedekiah king over Judah and Jerusalem.^(F)

¹⁸ No Passover like it had been kept in Israel since the days of the prophet Samuel; none of the kings of Israel had kept such a Passover as was kept by Josiah, by the priests and the Levites, by all Judah and Israel who were present, and by the inhabitants of Jerusalem.^(A)

² He did what was right in the sight of the Lord and walked in the ways of his ancestor David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left.

² He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the abominable practices of the nations whom the Lord had driven out before the people of Israel.^{(A) 3} For he rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had pulled down and erected altars to the Baals, made sacred poles,^[a] worshiped all the host of heaven, and served them.^{(B) 4} He built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, “In Jerusalem shall my name be forever.”^{(C) 5} He built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord.^{(D) 6} He made his son pass through fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom, practiced soothsaying and augury and sorcery, and dealt with mediums and with wizards. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.^{(E) 7} The carved image of the idol that he had made he set in the house of God, of which God had said to David and to his son Solomon, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever;^{(F) 8} I will never again remove the feet of Israel from the land that I appointed for your ancestors, if only they will be careful to do all that I have commanded them, all the law, the statutes, and the ordinances given through Moses.”^{(G) 9} Manasseh misled Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that they did more evil than the nations whom the Lord had destroyed before the people of Israel.