Ezra 4:1-5

Legacy Standard Bible

Adversaries Discourage the Work

4 Then ^(A)the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that ^(B)the people of the exile were building a temple to Yahweh, the God of Israel, ² so they approached Zerubbabel and the heads of fathers’ households and said to them, “Let us build with you, for we, like you, seek your God; ^(C)and we have been sacrificing to Him since the days of ^(D)Esarhaddon king of Assyria, who brought us up here.” ³ But Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the rest of the heads of fathers’ households of Israel said to them, “^(E)You have nothing in common with us in building a house to our God; but we ourselves will together build to Yahweh, the God of Israel, ^(F)as King Cyrus, the king of Persia has commanded us.”

⁴ So ^(G)the people of the land ^[a]discouraged the people of Judah and dismayed them from building, ⁵ and hired counselors against them to frustrate their counsel all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia.