Israel (commonly referred to as the ten tribes of Israel or the lost ten tribes of Israel) was taken captive by Assyrian King Sargon II around 721 B.C.  Judah (composed of the tribe of Judah, Benjamin and Levi) was taken captive by Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar around 585 B.C.

It was also in 585 B.C. that Jerusalem's temple, first built by King Solomon, was burned, pillaged and destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar (2Kings 24:13; 2Chronicles 36:7), who carried all the temple's treasures with him to Babylon. The destruction of the temple began on the 9th of Ab (Hebrew month), the very same day the destruction of Jerusalem's SECOND temple by the Romans would begin in 70 A.D.