Permission to return to Jerusalem

1 In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia’s rule, to fulfill the Lord’s word spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Persia’s King Cyrus. The king issued a proclamation throughout his kingdom (it was also in writing) that stated:

Preparing to return

⁵ Then the heads of the families of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and the Levites—everyone whose spirit God had stirred up—got ready to go up and build God’s house in Jerusalem. ⁶ All their neighbors assisted them with silver equipment, with gold, with goods, livestock, and valuable gifts, in addition to all that was freely offered. ⁷ King Cyrus brought out the equipment of the Lord’s house—those items that Nebuchadnezzar brought from Jerusalem and placed in the house of his gods. ⁸ Persia’s King Cyrus handed them over to Mithredath the treasurer, who counted them out to Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah. ⁹ This was the count: thirty gold dishes, one thousand silver dishes, twenty-nine knives,^{[b] 10} thirty gold bowls, four hundred ten larger^[c] silver bowls, and one thousand other objects. ¹¹ The total of the gold and silver objects numbered five thousand four hundred. Sheshbazzar brought up all of these when the exiles went up from Babylonia to Jerusalem.

List of the returnees

2 These were the people of the province who went up from there—from among those captive exiles whom Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar had deported to Babylonia. They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, all to their own towns. ² They came with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, and Baanah.

The number of the people of Israel

³⁶ The priests

⁴¹ The singers

⁴² The family of the gatekeepers

⁴³ The temple servants

The family of Ziha, Hasupha, Tabbaoth, ⁴⁴ Keros, Siaha, Padon, ⁴⁵ Lebanah, Hagabah, Akkub, ⁴⁶ Hagab, Shamlai, Hanan, ⁴⁷ Giddel, Gahar, Reaiah, ⁴⁸ Rezin, Nekoda, Gazzam, ⁴⁹ Uzza, Paseah, Besai, ⁵⁰ Asnah, Meunim, Nephisim, ⁵¹ Bakbuk, Hakupha, Harhur, ⁵² Bazluth, Mehida, Harsha, ⁵³ Barkos, Sisera, Temah, ⁵⁴ Neziah, and Hatipha

⁵⁵ The family of Solomon’s servants

Sotai, Hassophereth, Peruda, ⁵⁶ Jaalah, Darkon, Giddel, ⁵⁷ Shephatiah, Hattil, Pochereth-hazzebaim, and Ami.

⁵⁸ All of the temple servants and the family of Solomon’s servants 392

Exclusions

⁵⁹ The following came up from Tel-melah, Tel-harsha, Cherub, Addan, and Immer, but they were unable to demonstrate that their family or their descent was from Israel: ⁶⁰ the family of Delaiah, Tobiah, and Nekoda, 652

⁶¹ and of the family of the priests: the family of Habaiah, Hakkoz, and Barzillai (who had married one of the daughters of Barzillai the Gileadite and was called by their name).

⁶² They looked for their entries in the genealogical records, but they were not found there, so they were excluded from the priesthood as unclean. ⁶³ The governor ordered them not to eat of the most holy food until a priest arose who could consult Urim and Thummim.

Total

⁶⁴ The whole assembly together totaled 42,360, ⁶⁵ not including their 7,337 male and female servants; they also had 200 male and female singers, ⁶⁶ 736 horses, 245 mules, ⁶⁷ 435 camels, and 6,720 donkeys.

Arrival in Jerusalem

⁶⁸ When they arrived at the Lord’s house in Jerusalem, some of the heads of the families brought spontaneous gifts for the rebuilding of God’s house on its site. ⁶⁹ According to their means, they gave to the building fund 61,000 drachmen of gold, 5,000 manehs of silver, and 100 priestly robes.

⁷⁰ The priests, the Levites, some of the people, the singers, the gatekeepers, and the temple servants settled in their own towns, and all Israel in their towns.

Rebuilding the altar

3 When the seventh month^[d] came and the Israelites were in their towns, the people gathered together as one in Jerusalem. ² Then Jeshua, Jozadak’s son along with his fellow priests, and Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son along with his kin, started to rebuild the altar of Israel’s God so that they might offer entirely burned offerings upon it as prescribed in the Instruction from Moses the man of God. ³ They set up the altar on its foundations,^[e] because they were afraid of the neighboring peoples,^[f] and they offered entirely burned offerings upon it to the Lord, both the morning and the evening offerings.

⁴ They celebrated the Festival of Booths, as prescribed. Every day they presented the number of entirely burned offerings required by ordinance for that day. ⁵ After this, they presented the continual burned offerings, the offerings at the new moons, and at all the sacred feasts of the Lord, and the offerings of everyone who brought a spontaneous gift to the Lord. ⁶ From the first day of the seventh month, they began to present entirely burned offerings to the Lord.

However, the foundation of the Lord’s temple had not yet been laid. ⁷ So they gave money to the masons and carpenters; and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedarwood by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, according to the authorization given them by Persia’s King Cyrus.

Laying the foundations of God’s house

⁸ In the second month of the second year after their arrival at God’s house in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son, and Jeshua, Jozadak’s son, and the rest of their kin—the priests and the Levites and all who had come from the captivity to Jerusalem—made a beginning. They appointed Levites 20 years old and above to oversee the work on the Lord’s house. ⁹ Then Jeshua with his sons and his kin, Kadmiel and his sons, Binnui and his sons, the sons of Judah, along with the sons of Henadad, the Levites, and their sons and kin, collaborated to supervise the workers in God’s house.

¹⁰ When the builders laid the foundation of the Lord’s temple, the priests clothed in their vests and carrying their trumpets, and the Levites the sons of Asaph with cymbals, arose to praise the Lord according to the directions of Israel’s King David. ¹¹ They praised and gave thanks to the Lord, singing responsively, “He is good, his graciousness for Israel lasts forever.”

All of the people shouted with praise to the Lord because the foundation of the Lord’s house had been laid. ¹² But many of the older priests and Levites and heads of families, who had seen the first house, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this house, although many others shouted loudly with joy. ¹³ No one could distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people’s weeping, because the people rejoiced very loudly. The sound was heard at a great distance.

Facing opposition

4 When the enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the returned exiles were building a temple for the Lord, the God of Israel, ² they came to Zerubbabel and the heads of the families and said to them, “Let’s build with you, for we worship your God as you do, and we’ve been sacrificing to him ever since the days of Assyria’s King Esarhaddon, who brought us here.”

³ But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the rest of the heads of the families in Israel replied, “You’ll have no part with us in building a house for our God. We alone will build because the Lord, the God of Israel, and Persia’s King Cyrus commanded us.”

⁴ The neighboring peoples^[g] discouraged the people of Judah, made them afraid to build, ⁵ and bribed officials to frustrate their plan. They did this throughout the rule of Persia’s King Cyrus until the rule of Persia’s King Darius.

Writing to King Artaxerxes

⁶ In the rule of Ahasuerus, at the beginning of his rule, they composed an indictment against those who lived in Judah and Jerusalem. ⁷ In the days of Artaxerxes, Bishlam, Mithredath, Tabeel, and the rest of their associates wrote to Persia’s King Artaxerxes. The letter was written in Aramaic and translated.^{[h] 8} Rehum the royal deputy and Shimshai the scribe wrote a letter concerning Jerusalem to King Artaxerxes as follows:

(¹¹ This is a copy of the letter they sent to him.)

Artaxerxes responds

¹⁷ The king sent this answer:

²³ When the copy of King Artaxerxes’ letter was read before Rehum and Shimshai the scribe and their colleagues, they hurried to Jerusalem to oppose the Jews and made them stop by force of arms.^{[k] 24} At that time the work on God’s house in Jerusalem stopped and was suspended until the second year of the rule of Persia’s King Darius.

Work on God’s house continues

5 Then the prophet Haggai and the prophet Zechariah, Iddo’s son, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of Israel’s God who was over them. ² Subsequently, Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son, and Jeshua, Jozadak’s son, began to rebuild God’s house in Jerusalem. God’s prophets were with them, helping them.

³ At the same time, Tattenai, the governor of the province Beyond the River, and Shethar-bozenai and their colleagues came to them and spoke to them, asking, “Who authorized you to build this house and finish preparing^[l] this building material?”^{[m] 4} They^[n] also asked them, “What are the names of the people who are building this building?” ⁵ But their God looked after the elders of the Jews, and they didn’t stop them until a report reached Darius and a letter with his response had arrived.

Writing to King Darius

⁶ This is a copy of the letter that Tattenai, the governor of the province Beyond the River, and Shethar-bozenai and his colleagues the officials who were in the province Beyond the River sent to King Darius. ⁷ In the message they sent him, the following was written: