1 in the first year of cyrus king of persia, in order to fulfill the word of the lord spoken by jeremiah, the lord moved the heart of cyrus king of persia to make a proclamation throughout his realm and also to put it in writing 2 “this is what cyrus king of persia says: Ezra, whose name means “help,” was a descendent of aaron, the chief priest under moses, and was related to joshua, who became the high priest of the rebuilt temple (ezra 3:2) Appointed to be a priest and a scribe, ezra was also a prolific writer. Ezra was a scribe and priest, who in 457 bc, was sent with religious and political powers by the persian king artaxerxes to lead a group of jewish exiles from babylon to jerusalem (ezra 7:8, 12) Ezra condemned mixed marriages and encouraged jews to divorce and banish their foreign wives.
Ezra recounts the return of the jewish exiles from babylon to jerusalem under the leadership of zerubbabel and later ezra It highlights the rebuilding of the temple, the restoration of worship, and the reestablishment of the law. Ezra set the tone of the postexilic community, and it was characterized by fidelity to the torah, judaism’s authentic way of life It is in this light that we can judge most fairly the work of ezra during the restoration. Ezra is one of the books of the section in the hebrew bible called writings, and originally included the book of nehemiah as well The two books describe the jewish return to israel in the 6th and 5th centuries bce, following seven decades of babylonian exile.
Through his narrative, ezra declared that they were still god’s people and that god had not forgotten them. Read the book of ezra online Scripture chapters verses with full summary, commentary meaning, and concordances for bible study.
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