Ezra 5

⁶So he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of Hosts.

⁷What are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you will become a plain. Then he will bring forth the capstone accompanied by shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it!’”

¹In the second year of the reign of Darius, on the first day of the sixth month, the word of the Lord came through Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, stating

¹In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, saying:

²“The Lord was very angry with your fathers.

⁴He will stand and shepherd His flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majestic name of the Lord His God. And they will dwell securely, for then His greatness will extend to the ends of the earth.

²Then Jeshua son of Jozadak and his fellow priests, along with Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and his associates, began to build the altar of the God of Israel to sacrifice burnt offerings on it, as it is written in the Law of Moses the man of God.

¹⁴So the Jewish elders built and prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah son of Iddo. They finished building according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes, kings of Persia.

¹Then the angel showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, with Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him.

²And the Lord said to Satan: “The Lord rebukes you, Satan! Indeed, the Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebukes you! Is not this man a firebrand snatched from the fire?”

¹²Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, as well as all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the words of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. So the people feared the Lord.

¹³Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, delivered the message of the Lord to the people: “I am with you,” declares the Lord.

²⁴Not that we lord it over your faith, but we are fellow workers with you for your joy, because it is by faith that you stand firm.

²⁰For the second time that day, the twenty-fourth day of the month, the word of the Lord came to Haggai, saying,

²¹“Tell Zerubbabel governor of Judah that I am about to shake the heavens and the earth:

⁶Therefore Darius decreed: To Tattenai governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and your associates and officials in the region: You must stay away from that place!

³Whoever among you belongs to His people, may his God be with him, and may he go to Jerusalem in Judah and build the house of the Lord, the God of Israel; He is the God who is in Jerusalem.

⁹So we questioned the elders and asked, “Who authorized you to rebuild this temple and restore this structure?”

¹³In response, Tattenai the governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and their associates diligently carried out what King Darius had decreed.

⁶This is the text of the letter that Tattenai the governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and their associates, the officials in the region, sent to King Darius.

²³When Jesus returned to the temple courts and began to teach, the chief priests and elders of the people came up to Him. “By what authority are You doing these things?” they asked. “And who gave You this authority?”

¹⁸Surely the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear Him, on those whose hope is in His loving devotion

⁶this Ezra came up from Babylon. He was a scribe skilled in the Law of Moses, which the Lord, the God of Israel, had given. The king had granted Ezra all his requests, for the hand of the Lord his God was upon him.

²⁸and who has shown me favor before the king, his counselors, and all his powerful officials. And because the hand of the Lord my God was upon me, I took courage and gathered the leaders of Israel to return with me.

¹⁵The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are inclined to their cry.

⁸I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will give you counsel and watch over you.

¹²For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are inclined to their prayer. But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

⁹From Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their associates—the judges and officials over Tripolis, Persia, Erech and Babylon, the Elamites of Susa,

²³When the text of the letter from King Artaxerxes was read to Rehum, Shimshai the scribe, and their associates, they went immediately to the Jews in Jerusalem and forcibly stopped them.

⁶Therefore Darius decreed: To Tattenai governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and your associates and officials in the region: You must stay away from that place!

¹¹(This is the text of the letter they sent to him.) To King Artaxerxes, From your servants, the men west of the Euphrates:

³At that time Tattenai the governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and their associates went to the Jews and asked, “Who authorized you to rebuild this temple and restore this structure?”

⁹saying to King Nebuchadnezzar, “O king, may you live forever!

¹King Nebuchadnezzar, To the people of every nation and language who dwell in all the earth: May your prosperity be multiplied.

²¹Then Daniel replied, “O king, may you live forever!

²⁷Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled; do not be afraid.

¹⁶Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.

¹⁷Then the king sent this reply: To Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of your associates living in Samaria and elsewhere in the region west of the Euphrates: Greetings.

⁴⁷The king said to Daniel, “Your God is truly the God of gods and Lord of kings, the Revealer of Mysteries, since you were able to reveal this mystery.”

⁶These are the people of the province who came up from the captivity of the exiles carried away to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar its king. They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his own town,

²³Whatever is commanded by the God of heaven must be done diligently for His house. For why should wrath fall on the realm of the king and his sons?

²“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, who has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, has appointed me to build a house for Him at Jerusalem in Judah.

³Whoever among you belongs to His people, may his God be with him, and may he go to Jerusalem in Judah and build the house of the Lord, the God of Israel; He is the God who is in Jerusalem.

¹As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of His disciples said to Him, “Teacher, look at the magnificent stones and buildings!”

²“Do you see all these great buildings?” Jesus replied. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

³¹For their rock is not like our Rock, even our enemies concede.

³At that time Tattenai the governor of the region west of the Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and their associates went to the Jews and asked, “Who authorized you to rebuild this temple and restore this structure?”

⁴They also asked, “What are the names of the men who are constructing this building?”

³²Therefore everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father in heaven.

²³For just last night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve stood beside me

⁹“I am a Hebrew,” replied Jonah. “I worship the Lord, the God of the heavens, who made the sea and the dry land.”

¹⁴But as for me, may I never boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

⁸I tell you, everyone who confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will also confess him before the angels of God.

²⁶Then Nebuchadnezzar approached the door of the blazing fiery furnace and called out, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out!” So Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came out of the fire,

¹⁶But they mocked the messengers of God, despising His words and scoffing at His prophets, until the wrath of the Lord against His people was stirred up beyond remedy.

¹⁷So He brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans, who put their young men to the sword in the sanctuary, sparing neither young men nor young women, neither elderly nor infirm. God gave them all into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar,

⁵we have sinned and done wrong. We have acted wickedly and rebelled. We have turned away from Your commandments and ordinances.

²And the Lord sent Chaldean, Aramean, Moabite, and Ammonite raiders against Jehoiakim in order to destroy Judah, according to the word that the Lord had spoken through His servants the prophets.

²⁶But they were disobedient and rebelled against You; they flung Your law behind their backs. They killed Your prophets, who had admonished them to return to You. They committed terrible blasphemies.

²⁷So You delivered them into the hands of enemies who oppressed them, and in their time of distress they cried out to You. From heaven You heard them, and in Your great compassion You gave them deliverers who saved them from the hands of their enemies.

¹In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Jerusalem with his entire army and laid siege to the city.

²And on the ninth day of the fourth month of Zedekiah’s eleventh year, the city was breached.

¹⁴Then the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He delivered them into the hands of those who plundered them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.

²⁸who says of Cyrus, ‘My shepherd will fulfill all that I desire,’ who says of Jerusalem, ‘She will be rebuilt,’ and of the temple, ‘Let its foundation be laid.’”

³In the first year of King Cyrus, he issued a decree concerning the house of God in Jerusalem: Let the house be rebuilt as a place for offering sacrifices, and let its foundations be firmly laid. It is to be sixty cubits high and sixty cubits wide,

⁴with three layers of cut stones and one of timbers. The costs are to be paid from the royal treasury.

¹In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken through Jeremiah, the Lord stirred the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia to send a proclamation throughout his kingdom and to put it in writing as follows:

²“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, who has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, has appointed me to build a house for Him at Jerusalem in Judah.

⁵Furthermore, the gold and silver articles of the house of God, which Nebuchadnezzar took from the temple in Jerusalem and carried to Babylon, must also be returned to the temple in Jerusalem and deposited in the house of God.

¹⁹The captain of the guard also took away the basins, censers, sprinkling bowls, pots, lampstands, pans, and drink offering bowls—anything made of pure gold or fine silver.

²Under the influence of the wine, Belshazzar gave orders to bring in the gold and silver vessels that Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken from the temple in Jerusalem, so that the king could drink from them, along with his nobles, his wives, and his concubines.

³Thus they brought in the gold vessels that had been taken from the temple, the house of God in Jerusalem, and the king drank from them, along with his nobles, his wives, and his concubines.

¹⁶So this Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundation of the house of God in Jerusalem, and from that time until now it has been under construction, but it has not yet been completed.”

²¹“Tell Zerubbabel governor of Judah that I am about to shake the heavens and the earth:

⁷an attendant of the proconsul, Sergius Paulus. The proconsul, a man of intelligence, summoned Barnabas and Saul because he wanted to hear the word of God.

⁸But Elymas the sorcerer (for that is what his name means) opposed them and tried to turn the proconsul from the faith.

³In the first year of King Cyrus, he issued a decree concerning the house of God in Jerusalem: Let the house be rebuilt as a place for offering sacrifices, and let its foundations be firmly laid. It is to be sixty cubits high and sixty cubits wide,

³They set up the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the Lord—both the morning and evening burnt offerings—even though they feared the people of the land.

²“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, who has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, has appointed me to build a house for Him at Jerusalem in Judah.

¹⁰When the builders had laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests in their apparel with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their positions to praise the Lord, as David king of Israel had prescribed.

¹⁵And this temple was completed on the third day of the month of Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius.

⁸In the second month of the second year after they had arrived at the house of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Jeshua son of Jozadak, and the rest of their associates including the priests, the Levites, and all who had returned to Jerusalem from the captivity, began the work. They appointed Levites twenty years of age or older to supervise the construction of the house of the Lord.

¹²Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, as well as all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the words of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. So the people feared the Lord.

¹³Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, delivered the message of the Lord to the people: “I am with you,” declares the Lord.

²Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and Jeshua son of Jozadak rose up and began to rebuild the house of God in Jerusalem. And the prophets of God were with them, helping them.

¹⁰For who has despised the day of small things? But these seven eyes of the Lord, which scan the whole earth, will rejoice when they see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel.”

¹⁵that a search should be made of the record books of your fathers. In these books you will discover and verify that the city is a rebellious city, harmful to kings and provinces, inciting sedition from ancient times. That is why this city was destroyed.

¹⁹I issued a decree, and a search was conducted. It was discovered that this city has revolted against kings from ancient times, engaging in rebellion and sedition.

²It is the glory of God to conceal a matter and the glory of kings to search it out.

¹Thus King Darius ordered a search of the archives stored in the treasury of Babylon.

²And a scroll was found in the fortress of Ecbatana, in the province of Media, with the following written on it: Memorandum: