Matthew Poole and continuators on 2 Kings 24:8

8 ¶ Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reigh , and he reigned in Jerusalem three months : and his mothers name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem.

Object. He was then but Eight years old, 2 Chron. 36. 9. Answ. 1. Both are true; in his Eighth Year he began to Reign with his Father, who made him King with him, as divers other Kings of Israel and Iudah had done in the like times of trouble; and in his Eighteenth Year he Reigned alone. 2. He is called a son of eight years when he began to reign, 2 Chron. 36. 9. because this was the Eighth Year, not of his Age, but of the Babylonish Captivity, or Bondage; under which, both he, and his Father had been just so long; for it began in the Fourth Year of Iehojakim, as it is affirmed, Ier. 25. 1. and continued all his Reign, which lasted Eleven Years, Chap. 23. 36. and so the First Year of Iehojakim was precisely the Eighth Year of that Captivity. And this is certain, That the Years of Kings mentioned in Scripture, are not always accounted from the beginning of their Age, but from some other Remarkable Time, or thing: thus Saul, when at Man's Estate, is called, the son of one year, 1 Sam. 13. 1. of which see my notes there; and Ahaziah, (whose Father lived onely Forty Years, 2 Chron. 21. 20.) is called a son of forty and two years when he began to reign, 2 Chron. 22. 2. because that was the Forty and second Year of the Reign of Omri's Family, as most think. And therefore it cannot seem strange, if the Years of this King be computed, not from liis Birth, but from the beginning of so great and famous a Change of the Iewish Affairs, as this Captivity made; this being the usual way of the Romans and Greeks, and other more Ancient and Eastern Nations, to compute the times from the great Changes and Revolutions hapning among them. And that this was the practise of the Iews in the Computation of these very times, is evident from the use of it in the Prophecy of Ezekiel, Chap. 1. 2. which was the fifth year of Iehojakim's captivity; and Chap. 33. 21. in the Twelfth year of our Captivity; and Chap. 40. 1. in the Twenty fifth year of our captivity. 3. To all this might be added, That some here acknowledge an Error of the Scribe, and affirm, That in the first and best Copies, in 2 Chron. 36. 9. it was not eight, but eighteen; which they gather from hence, because those two Ancient and Venerable Translators, the Syriack and Arabick, read there, as it is here, was eighteen years old▪ which they say, they would never have presumed to do, if they had not so read it in those Hebrew Copies, out of which they drew their Translation; or in some of them.

And ten days, which are added, 2 Chron. 36. 9. But such small sums are frequently omitted in great Numbers. See on Gen. 15. 13. 1 King. 16. 8.