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10 Foreigners shall build up your walls,
    and their kings shall minister to you,
for in my wrath I struck you down,
    but in my favor I have had mercy on you.(A)

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Strangers shall stand and feed your flocks;
    foreigners shall till your land and dress your vines,(A)

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23 Kings shall be your foster fathers
    and their queens your nursing mothers.
With their faces to the ground they shall bow down to you
    and lick the dust of your feet.
Then you will know that I am the Lord;
    those who wait for me shall not be put to shame.(A)

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24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.(A)

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15 “Those who are far off shall come and help to build the temple of the Lord, and you shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. This will happen if you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God.”(A)

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For a brief moment I abandoned you,
    but with great compassion I will gather you.(A)
In overflowing wrath for a moment
    I hid my face from you,
but with everlasting love I will have compassion on you,
    says the Lord, your Redeemer.(B)

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For his anger is but for a moment;
    his favor is for a lifetime.
Weeping may linger for the night,
    but joy comes with the morning.(A)

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26 People will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.

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Nations shall come to your light
    and kings to the brightness of your dawn.(A)

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17 Because of their wicked covetousness I was angry;
    I struck them; I hid and was angry,
    but they kept turning back to their own ways.(A)
18 I have seen their ways, but I will heal them;
    I will lead them and repay them with comfort,

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Restoration of Judah

14 But the Lord will have compassion on Jacob and will again choose Israel and will settle them in their own land, and aliens will join them and attach themselves to the house of Jacob.(A) And the nations will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess the nations[a] as male and female slaves in the Lord’s land; they will take captive those who were their captors and rule over those who oppressed them.(B)

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Footnotes

  1. 14.2 Heb them

Thanksgiving and Praise

12 You will say on that day:
“I will give thanks to you, O Lord,
    for though you were angry with me,
your anger turned away,
    and you comforted me.(A)

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21 And I will also take some of them as priests and as Levites, says the Lord.(A)

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Then I said to the king, “If it pleases the king, let letters be given me to the governors of the province Beyond the River, that they may grant me passage until I arrive in Judah,(A) and a letter to Asaph, the keeper of the king’s forest, directing him to give me timber to make beams for the gates of the temple fortress and for the wall of the city and for the house that I shall occupy.” And the king granted me what I asked, for the gracious hand of my God was upon me.(B)

Then I came to the governors of the province Beyond the River and gave them the king’s letters. Now the king had sent officers of the army and cavalry with me.(C)

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12 “Artaxerxes, king of kings, to the priest Ezra, the scribe of the law of the God of heaven: Peace.[a] And now(A) 13 I decree that any of the people of Israel or their priests or Levites in my kingdom who freely offers to go to Jerusalem may go with you. 14 For you are sent by the king and his seven counselors to make inquiries about Judah and Jerusalem according to the law of your God, which is in your hand,(B) 15 and also to convey the silver and gold that the king and his counselors have freely offered to the God of Israel, whose dwelling is in Jerusalem,(C) 16 with all the silver and gold that you shall find in the whole province of Babylonia and with the freewill offerings of the people and the priests, given willingly for the house of their God in Jerusalem.(D) 17 With this money, then, you shall with all diligence buy bulls, rams, and lambs and their grain offerings and their drink offerings, and you shall offer them on the altar of the house of your God in Jerusalem.(E) 18 Whatever seems good to you and your colleagues to do with the rest of the silver and gold, you may do, according to the will of your God. 19 The vessels that have been given you for the service of the house of your God, you shall deliver before the God of Jerusalem. 20 And whatever else is required for the house of your God that you are responsible for providing, you may provide out of the king’s treasury.(F)

21 “I, King Artaxerxes, decree to all the treasurers in the province Beyond the River: Whatever the priest Ezra, the scribe of the law of the God of heaven, requires of you, let it be done with all diligence,(G) 22 up to one hundred talents of silver, one hundred cors of wheat, one hundred baths[b] of wine, one hundred baths[c] of oil, and unlimited salt. 23 Whatever is commanded by the God of heaven, let it be done with zeal for the house of the God of heaven, or wrath will come upon the realm of the king and his heirs.(H) 24 We also notify you that it shall not be lawful to impose tribute, custom, or toll on any of the priests, the Levites, the singers, the doorkeepers, the temple servants, or other servants of this house of God.

25 “And you, Ezra, according to the God-given wisdom you possess, appoint magistrates and judges who may judge all the people in the province Beyond the River who know the laws of your God, and you shall teach those who do not know them.(I) 26 All who will not obey the law of your God and the law of the king, let judgment be strictly executed on them, whether for death or for banishment or for confiscation of their goods or for imprisonment.”

27 Blessed be the Lord, the God of our ancestors, who put such a thing as this into the heart of the king to glorify the house of the Lord in Jerusalem(J) 28 and who extended to me steadfast love before the king and his counselors and before all the king’s mighty officers. I took courage, for the hand of the Lord my God was upon me, and I gathered leaders from Israel to go up with me.(K)

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Footnotes

  1. 7.12 Syr Vg: Aram Perfect
  2. 7.22 A Heb measure of volume
  3. 7.22 A Heb measure of volume

In the first year of his reign, King Cyrus issued a decree: Concerning the house of God at Jerusalem, let the house be rebuilt, the place where sacrifices are offered and burnt offerings are brought;[a] its height shall be sixty cubits and its width sixty cubits,(A) with three courses of hewn stones and one course of timber; let the cost be paid from the royal treasury.(B) Moreover, let the gold and silver vessels of the house of God that Nebuchadnezzar took out of the temple in Jerusalem and brought to Babylon be restored and brought back to the temple in Jerusalem, each to its place; you shall put them in the house of God.”(C)

“Now you, Tattenai, governor of the province Beyond the River, Shethar-bozenai, and you, their associates, the envoys in the province Beyond the River, keep away;(D) let the work on this house of God alone; let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews rebuild this house of God on its site. Moreover, I make a decree regarding what you shall do for these elders of the Jews for the rebuilding of this house of God: the cost is to be paid to these people, in full and without delay, from the royal revenue, the tribute of the province Beyond the River. Whatever is needed—young bulls, rams, or sheep for burnt offerings to the God of heaven, wheat, salt, wine, or oil, as the priests in Jerusalem require—let that be given to them day by day without fail, 10 so that they may offer pleasing sacrifices to the God of heaven and pray for the life of the king and his children.(E) 11 Furthermore, I decree that, if anyone alters this edict, a beam shall be pulled out of the house of the perpetrator, who then shall be impaled on it. The house shall be made a dunghill.(F) 12 May the God who has established his name there overthrow any king or people who shall put forth a hand to alter this or to destroy this house of God in Jerusalem. I, Darius, make a decree; let it be done with all diligence.”(G)

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Footnotes

  1. 6.3 Meaning of Aram uncertain