Seder Olama timeline of Jewish history

Nebuchadnezzar II Nabû-kudurri-uṣur

The king of Babylon who destroyed the First Temple

A divergence of reckonings that must be named outright. His lifespan stands here by the academic count, like all the world material in this reference: 3119–3199 AM, that is 642–562 BCE. On that count he destroys the Temple in 3175 AM, while on the Jewish track the destruction stands at 3338 AM—by Seder Olam, which reckons the Persian period about a hundred and sixty-five years shorter than the academic one. So on the timeline his bar ends before the event he himself brought about. This is not an error but two different reckonings; the timeline has a "two chronologies" layer that shows both.

He appears in 2 Kings 24–25, in Jeremiah—who calls him "My servant"—and in the book of Daniel, where he dreams of the four kingdoms and loses his reason for seven years. Britannica gives the end of the reign as "c. 561", Wikipedia as 562: a difference of one year.

On the timeline

Sources

Tanakh

  • 2 Kings 24–25; Jeremiah; Daniel — the exile of Jehoiachin, the destruction of the Temple, the dream of the four kingdoms

Scholarship

  • Wikipedia, “Nebuchadnezzar II”; Britannica — the reign 605–562, with a one-year divergence at the end

Basis: documents and evidence.

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