J.J. Blunt's Undesigned Scriptural Coincidences
AN ARGUMENT FOR THE VERACITY OF THE HOLY BIBLE
Introduction
Part One:
The Books of Moses
Part Two:
The Historical Scriptures
Part Three:
The Prophetical Scripture
Part Four:
The Gospels and Acts
Appendix:
The Gospels, Acts
and Josephus

VII. WHO WAS THE QUEEN?

We next come to the writings of Jeremiah, which do not, however, supply many arguments of the kind I am collecting, nor perhaps any so persuasive in their character as some which I have produced from Isaiah. Still there are several which at least deserve to be brought before my readers.

In the midst of a denunciation of evils to come upon Jerusalem for her wickedness, which we find in the thirteenth chapter of Jeremiah,—a denunciation for the most part expressed in general terms, and in a manner not conveying any very exact allusions,—we read at the eighteenth verse, “Say unto the King and to the Queen, Humble yourselves, sit down: for your principalities shall come down, even the crown of your glory.” Jeremiah does not here tell us the name either of the king or the queen referred to; but as the queens of Israel do not figure prominently in the history of that nation, except where there is something peculiar in their characters or condition to bring them out, it may be thought there was something of the kind in this instance: and accordingly we have mention made in the twenty-fourth chapter of the second Book of Kings of an invasion of the Chaldeans, attended by circumstances corresponding to what we might expect from this exclamation of Jeremiah. It was the second of the three invasions which occurred at that time within a few years of one another, to which I allude [2 Kings 24:1. 10; 25:1.] ; an invasion made by the servants of Nebuchadnezzar, followed by Nebuchadnezzar himself in person. On this occasion it is said, that “Jehoiachin the king of Judah, went out to the king of Babylon, he, and his mother, and his servants, and his princes, and his officers: and the king of Babylon took him in the eighth year of his reign” (v. 12): and again, “And he carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, and the king’s mother, and the king’s wives, and his officers, and the mighty of the land, those carried he into captivity from Jerusalem to Babylon.” (v. 15.)

As Jehoiachin was at that time only eighteen years old, and had reigned no more than three months (v. 8), the queen dowager was no doubt still a person of consequence, possibly his adviser, at any rate an influential person as yet, so short a period having elapsed since the death of her husband the last king; and thus an object of pity to the prophet, and one that called for express notice and remark.