4 Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity were building a temple to Yahweh, the God of Israel; ² they came near to Zerubbabel, and to the heads of fathers’ households, and said to them, “Let us build with you; for we seek your God, as you do; and we have been sacrificing to him since the days of Esar Haddon 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, “You have nothing to do with us in building a house to our God; but we ourselves together will build to Yahweh, the God of Israel, as king Cyrus the king of Persia has commanded us.”

⁴ Then the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah, and troubled them in building. ⁵ They hired counselors against them, to frustrate their purpose, all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia.