Hezekiah - for 29 years
Manasseh - for 55 years
Amon - for 2 years
Josiah - for 31 years
Jehoahaz - for 3 months
Jehoiakim - for 11 years
Jehoiachin, also called Jekhoniah, his son - for 3 months
Mattaniah, also called Zedekiah - for 11 years
In total, 432 years.
After this, the Babylonian captivity of the Jews and the abandonment of their country lasted for 70 years, which came to an end in the 65th Olympiad [520-517 B.C.] , in the second year of Dareius the king of the Persians, as the Holy Scriptures say.
Clemens agrees with our account, when he writes in the first book of his Miscellany as follows [ Stromata, 1'21 ]: "The captivity lasted for seventy years, and ended in the second year of Darius Hystaspes, who had become king of the Persians, Assyrians, and Egyptians; in whose reign, as I said above, Haggai and Zechariah and the angel of the twelve [Malachi] prophesied. And the high priest was Joshua the son of Josedec." That is what Clemens says.
More evidence that there was a period of 70 years from the destruction of the temple until the second year of Dareius is provided by the prophet Zechariah, who said in the second year of Dareius [Zechariah 1:12] : "Almighty Lord, how long will you not pity Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, which you have despised? This is the seventieth year."
But the acute observer may say: "But why is it said at the beginning of the book of Ezra [Ezra 1:1], that in the first year of Cyrus the king of the Persians, to fulfil the word of God which was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, the Lord aroused the spirit of Cyrus the king of the Persians, and he gave an order throughout his kingdom in a written decree." And then, adding what follows in that book, [p123] he will show that it refers to the release of the Jews, and how Cyrus ordered the temple to be rebuilt. From this you would assume that the 70 years of the captivity came to an end in the reign of Cyrus, and not in the reign of Dareius.
To this I reply, that the words of the prophets refer to two different periods of 70 years. The one is reckoned from the destruction of the temple, and came to an end in the second year of Dareius, as the statement of Zechariah makes clear. The second is from the enslavement of the Jews, up until the capture of Babylon and the destruction of the kingdom of the Chaldaeans. This is reckoned from the time of the prophecy, and came to an end in the reign of Cyrus, and not in the reign of the Dareius, in accordance with the word of Jeremiah, in which he foretells what will happen [Jeremiah 29:10]: "Thus says the Lord. When the 70th year has been completed, I will come to you, and I will fulfil my promise to you, that I will lead you back to this place." And again, he prophesies as follows [Jeremiah 25:11-12]: "All this land will be deserted and ruined, and they will serve the king of the Babylonians amongst the foreigners; and the Lord says about that nation, and about the land of the Chaldaeans, that I will bring them to ruin."
All this was fulfilled in the reign of Cyrus, by counting the years, not from the destruction of the temple, but earlier, from the second year of Jehoiakim, king of the Jews, because it was in this year that Nebuchadnezzar the king of the Babylonians first enslaved the Jews; or even earlier, from when the prophet Jeremiah first began to prophesy. From that time, there were 40 years until the siege of Jerusalem and the burning of the temple, and 70 years until the first year of the reign of Cyrus. The one period of 70 years lasted from the beginning of Jeremiah's prophecy until the reign of Cyrus; but there were 30 years from the destruction of the temple until the reign of Cyrus, and [the other period of] 70 years was completed in the second year of the reign of Dareius. The temple was restored in the eighth year of Dareius.
From that time onwards, the Jews remained without their own kings. They had their own high priests as leaders, but were subject first to the kings of the Assyrians, then to the kings of the Persians, and after them to the Macedonians who ruled after Alexander, up until the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, who as king of Syria forced the Jews to adopt Greek customs. At that time, Mattathias the son of Asamonaeus, who was a priest at Jerusalem, his son Judas, who [p125] was surnamed Maccabaeus, and their successors re-established the Jewish state, and ruled it continuously until the time of Augustus.
In Augustus' time, Herodes was the first foreigner to become king of the Jews, with the support of the Romans; during his reign, our Saviour Jesus Christ was born. This was the fulfilment of the prophecy spoken by Moses [Genesis 49:10]: "The sceptre will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his". These are the words of the prophecy.
But the total length of time, from Solomon and the first building of the temple until the second year of Dareius and the rebuilding of the temple, is 502 years. And from Moses and the exodus from Egypt until Solomon and the first building of the temple, is 480 years. And from the first year of Abraham until the exodus, is 505 years. And from the flood until the first year of Abraham, is 942 years. And from Adam to the flood, is 2242 years. So the overall total, from Adam until the second year of Dareius and the second building of [the temple in] Jerusalem, is 4680 years. And from the second year of Dareius which was the first year of the 65th Olympiad [520 B.C.] [until the ministry of Christ], is 137 Olympiads and 548 years.
To show this in more detail, the kings of the Persians are listed here, along with the lengths of their reigns:
Cyrus reigned for 30 years
Then Cambyses - for 6 years
Dareius reigned for 36 years
In Dareius' second year, the temple in Jerusalem was restored. Dareius reigned for a further 34 years.
Then Xerxes the son of Dareius - for 20 years
In his reign, the story of Esther took place.