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EBED-MELECH

(Heb. ʾeḇeḏ meleḵ)

An Ethiopian who reproached King Zedekiah for the decision to place Jeremiah in a cistern (Jer. 38:7-13; 39:15-18) during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem. Ebed-melech then rescued Jeremiah from the cistern at a time when all of Jerusalem appeared to have abandoned the prophet. His name in Hebrew means “servant of a king.” Traditionally, scholars have assumed that he was Zedekiah’s slave, but the king’s acquiescence to his request would be an unusual response to a slave’s criticism. The phrase “servant of the king” occurs on numerous seals from 7th-century Judah, where it refers to high-ranking officials. Ebed-melech is called a sāris, a term which refers to a eunuch or an official (so used throughout the book of Jeremiah, usually in military contexts).

Ebed-melech is called “the Cushite” (Jer. 38:7). Ebed-melech was undoubtedly an African with black skin (cf. Jeremiah’s reference to the skin of the Cushites, Jer. 13:23). The Cushites were soldiers and mercenaries in the army of Egypt, the primary ally of Judah in her rebellion against the Babylonians. Ebed-melech, therefore, was probably the commander of an Egyptian/Cushite military unit, exerting considerable political pressure on Zedekiah.

Bibliography. R. Deutsch and M. Heltzer, Forty New Ancient West Semitic Inscriptions (Tel Aviv, 1994); J. D. Hays, “The Cushites: A Black Nation in the Bible,” BSac 153 (1996): 396-409.

J. Daniel Hays

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

EBED-MELECH

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)