Corrupt and cruel leadership often acts like a young lion, spreading terror and destruction across its territory. King Jehoiakim severely damaged the foundations of morality, justice, and leadership, ultimately bringing ruin to his own people and land.
The king's cruelty manifested in several devastating ways. One perspective focuses on his profound moral failures and the direct harm he caused to his subjects. He tormented the women of his nation and murdered their husbands [רש״י, שטיינזלץ]. In acts of extreme brutality, he shed innocent blood and forced himself upon the widows of his victims [רד״ק]. A different approach shifts the focus from human victims to physical destruction, suggesting that the king shattered and ruined the grand palaces of his own people [רש״י, מצודת דוד, מצודת ציון, רד״ק]. A third viewpoint broadens the scope of his aggression beyond the borders of the land. Just as a lion leaves its den to prowl the outer grounds, the king went out to wage war and prey upon neighboring nations, such as Edom, Ammon, and Moab, which were under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar [מלבי״ם].
This trail of devastation extended to the ruin of entire cities. For those who view the king's aggression as directed outward, he physically destroyed the cities of the neighboring nations he attacked [מלבי״ם]. Others, however, understand this destruction as an internal crisis. The king financially ruined the cities of the Land of Israel by imposing crushing taxes on them to pay tribute to Pharaoh [רש״י]. Alternatively, the ruin was a broader consequence of his reign; his deep moral corruption and evil actions indirectly brought about the collapse of these cities, even if he did not tear them down with his own hands [רד״ק, שטיינזלץ].
The ultimate result of this terrifying rule was absolute desolation [מצודת ציון, מלבי״ם]. The land of Judah and all its inhabitants were left paralyzed and emptied by fear. Continuing the imagery of the wild beast, the king's reign of terror is compared to a deafening roar that shook the region and terrified everyone living within it [מצודת דוד, רד״ק].