Contradiction claim
How old was Jehoiachin when he began to reign?
Kings gives Jehoiachin’s age at accession as eighteen and his reign as three months; Chronicles gives eight and three months and ten days. The reign lengths are close but not identical, and the ages differ by ten years.
2 source records · no review date recorded
How to read this record
Passages side by side
TextThe primary text, as seeded. Nothing here is summarised or paraphrased.
Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. And his mother’s name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem.
Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months and ten days in Jerusalem: and he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD.
Why they appear to conflict
AnalysisEach side states a proposition attributable to its passages. A claim is not assumed to have exactly two sides.
2 Kings
Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign.
Eighteen
2 Kings 24:8
2 Chronicles
Jehoiachin was eight years old when he began to reign.
Eight
2 Chronicles 36:9
Formal analysis
AnalysisA contradiction requires a proposition and its incompatible counterpart under materially equivalent conditions. Every dimension below must hold for the formal test to succeed.
No formal analysis has been recorded for this claim yet. Until one exists, the classification cannot be stronger than a descriptive category.
Analytical questions
AnalysisWhat a researcher must answer to classify this record. Open questions are recorded, not resolved by preference.
- Do the two reign lengths (three months; three months and ten days) describe the same period measured differently, or two periods?
- Is either age figure secure across the Hebrew and Greek traditions?
- Does the narrative of Jehoiachin’s reign presuppose an adult or a child?
- Would a co-regency premise reconcile the figures, and is any co-regency stated by either text?
Hebrew / Greek relevance
LanguageNo original-language dependency has been recorded for this claim.
Textual variants
ManuscriptA variant is a transmission phenomenon, never in itself a logical contradiction.
No textual variant record is linked to this claim.
Manuscript evidence
ManuscriptManuscript evidence has not yet been curated for this record.
Narrator and speaker analysis
AnalysisWhat the narration establishes, distinguished from what would additionally establish that the reported event occurred.
No narrator or speaker analysis has been recorded for these passages yet.
Proposed harmonisations
InterpretationEach proposal records the premises it must supply that the text does not state. Premises are never injected silently.
A numeral changed during copying
One figure is a copying error; the narrative context favours the higher figure.
Premises this proposal must supply
- textualThe received figure in at least one book differs from what its author wrote.
A co-regency beginning at eight
Chronicles dates the start of a co-regency and Kings the start of the sole reign.
Premises this proposal must supply
- historicalA co-regency existed.
- contextualThe two books use "began to reign" for different events without saying so.
Editorial Harmonisation Cost Heuristic
4 / 5 — Multiple substantial unstated premises
Neither text mentions a co-regency, and both use the same accession formula immediately before a differing reign length. The reading requires two substantial unstated premises.
Reviewed by CodexTrace Editorial Board on 2026-09-07. This is an editorial heuristic, not an objective measurement.
Critical responses
InterpretationArguments that the proposed reconciliations do not succeed, treated structurally the same way as the harmonisations.
No critical response has been recorded for this claim yet.
Analytical classification
Analysis- Classification
- Manuscript transmission issue
- What it means
- The difference is plausibly explained by copying, numeral notation, or transmission history.
- Requires formal analysis
- No
- Review status
- reviewed
- Source collections
- codextrace_research
Sources
SourceEvery externally-sourced claim on this page resolves to one of these records.
- [1]
CodexTrace. "CodexTrace editorial research". licence: CC-BY-4.0
Critical / scholarlyotherCC-BY-4.0 - [2]
King James Version (Authorised Version)
"King James Version (Authorised Version)". licence: public-domain-us
Primarytranslationpublic-domain-usLink unverified
Related records
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Community
CommunityCommunity discussion requires a configured Supabase project on this deployment. Research pages are unaffected.