The Temple Builders Face Opposition

When the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the returned exiles were building a temple for the Lord, the God of Israel, they came to Zerubbabel and the family leaders. They asked to help, saying they also sought this God and had sacrificed to him since the days of Esar Haddon king of Assyria.

But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the other leaders refused. They said this work belonged to them together, because King Cyrus of Persia had commanded them to build a house for the Lord, the God of Israel. After that, the people of the land tried to weaken the builders of Judah and trouble them in the work.

They even hired counsellors to frustrate their plans through the days of Cyrus and until the reign of Darius. Ezra then shows that the hostility continued in later reigns too. At the beginning of Ahasuerus's reign, an accusation was written against the people of Judah and Jerusalem.

Later, in the days of Artaxerxes, Bishlam, Mithredath, Tabeel, Rehum, Shimshai, and others sent a letter against Jerusalem. They called the city rebellious and warned that if the city and its walls were completed, tribute, custom, and toll would stop. They asked the king to search the records for himself.

Artaxerxes replied that a search had been made and that Jerusalem had rebelled in the past. He ordered that those men be made to stop, and that the city not be rebuilt until he gave another command. When the letter was read, the officials hurried to Jerusalem and stopped the Jews by force. Ezra then returns to the temple story and says the work on God's house in Jerusalem had stopped until the second year of Darius.