God’s Word for You

Ezra 1:1-4 The command of Cyrus

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Monday, June 30, 2025

The book of Ezra is connected to Nehemiah. The two men knew each other and worked together, and although Nehemiah arrived later than Ezra, they are shown working with one another in Nehemiah 8:9, and their time of service is known as “the days of Nehemiah the governor and of Ezra the priest and scribe” (Nehemiah 12:26). Nehemiah’s task was to rebuild the city’s walls. The role of Haggai and Zechariah (who were also present and active) was to urge the reconstruction of the temple. Ezra’s big job was the spiritual rebuilding of the people themselves, the returning remnant from Babylon.

The book of Ezra is also connected to the end of Chronicles; they may both have been written by the same man. But Ezra was very young, perhaps not yet born, when the book bearing his name begins. The book is presented in two halves.

In chapters 1-6, King Cyrus of Persia allows the Jews to return to Jerusalem; The altar is rebuilt under the direction of a leader from the tribe of Judah, Zerubbabel (a descendant of King Jehoiachin and an ancestor of Jesus, Matthew 1:12-13). After the arrival of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, the temple is finally completed. After this, there is a gap of more than fifty years. During that time, the events of the book of Esther took place.

In chapters 7-10, the second return of exiles is led to Jerusalem by Ezra the priest in 458 BC. A third return soon follows, led by a layman named Nehemiah, in about 446 or 445. Ezra addresses the problem of Jews intermarrying with unbelievers, and this issue occupies the final chapters of the book.

A quick chronology of events might be helpful to you the reader but will be especially helpful to me as I write, and so permit me to include it here, with all the dates of course being BC. Incidentally, “BC” is an English abbreviation meaning “Before Christ.” It is relatively modern, in use for only a few hundred years. Its counterpart, AD, is not English at all and certainly does not stand for anything like “After Death,” although I am surprised by the large number of people I have encountered over the years, including many teachers and professionals with college educations, who have thought this. AD is the abbreviation of Anno Domini, Latin for “The Year of Our Lord.” It means, in effect, the year since Christ’s birth, although a truly minor error in the original calculation of the date means that Christ’s birth probably happened in about 4 BC and not in 1 AD. Also of interest to students of history is the detail that any timeline of dates will not include a year “zero.” The mathematics of Latin-speaking Romans did not have a concept of zero. Therefore 1 BC is followed by 1 AD—a point that needs to be remembered when doing addition or subtraction across the dividing point of the two systems: since five minus 8 in math is -3. But eight years prior to 5 AD would be 4 BC, not 3 BC.

605   Babylon removes a number of Israelites into captivity, including Daniel the prophet.

598   A second deportation is made, including King Jehoiachin, Ezekiel and Mordecai.

586   Following King Zedekiah’s rebellion against Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar destroys the temple and deports more people of Judah to Babylon. Jeremiah was chained up to accompany this last group, but was set free.

539   Babylon falls to Persia. Cyrus, King of Persia, allows captives their freedom.

537   Zerubbabel, prince of Judah, returns to Judah with a large group of Jews. It is not quite seventy years since the first deportation.

520   Haggai and Zechariah begin to prophesy and minister to the people in Judah.

516   Dedication of the rebuilt temple.

483-473   The events of Esther take place.

458   A second return of exiles, led by Ezra.

445   A third return of exiles, led by Nehemiah. The walls of Jerusalem are rebuilt.

433-415   Prophetic ministry of Malachi.

Ezra is partly written in Aramaic, a language similar to Hebrew in much the same way that German is similar to English. Being able to understand the one does not necessarily mean being able to understand the other. In each case, these Aramaic portions are quotations of official documents:

An accusation against the Jews (4:11-16).
The reply by King Artaxerxes I (4:17-22).
A report from Tattenai, a Persian governor (5:7-17).
A memorandum of Cyrus’ original decree (6:2-5).
The reply of King Darius I to Tattenai (6:6-12).
A letter of permission from Artaxerxes to Ezra (7:12-26).

Ezra continues in Aramaic in between most of these sections except the last one, so effectively 4:8-6:18 is in Aramaic, and so is 7:12-26. The book of Daniel also has a long Aramaic portion (chapters 2:4-7:28).

1:1 In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order that the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing:

Apart from the spelling of the names of Jeremiah and Cyrus and one accent mark, this verse is exactly the same as 2 Chronicles 36:22. Turn the page from 2 Chronicles, and there it is again as Ezra 1:1. But a lot of things have actually changed. If we step back to see the big picture of the Old Testament, the transition from Genesis to Exodus saw the transformation of the family of Jacob into the nation of Israel. “My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down to Egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation, powerful and numerous” (Deuteronomy 26:5). Now, released from captivity in Babylon by a Persian king, the Israelites were no longer a nation with a king, but “a little flock with the makings of a church.” All throughout Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings and Chronicles, the people we saw were Israelites, mostly divided by family regions, towns, and world-view. Now in Ezra, at this eleventh hour of the Old Testament, the people of Israel are finally more familiar to us who know the New Testament. They are, at last, Jews.

2 “This is what Cyrus king of Persia says, ‘The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. 3 Any of his people among you may go up to Jerusalem, and may his God be with him. He may go up to Jerusalem in Judah, and rebuild the house of the LORD, the God of Israel—he is the God who is in Jerusalem. 4 Let each survivor, in whatever place he is now living, be assisted by the people of that place with silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and freewill offerings for the House of God in Jerusalem.”

It was the policy of Cyrus to let people who had been exiled by the Babylonians to be permitted to return home if they wished. This solidified loyalty to his new Persian kingdom. People were grateful to be allowed to go home, and other people were grateful that there were permitted to stay where they were. From the point of view of Cyrus, everybody was a winner; almost everyone was happy.

Ezra records Cyrus’ words faithfully, but there is also irony here. The Israelites who were now heading back to the Promised Land were in a sense doing what the Israelites had done when they left Egypt. God had told them: “Every woman is to ask her neighbor and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing, which you will put on your sons and daughters. And so you will plunder the Egyptians” (Exodus 3:22). The people this time were probably not Persians or Babylonians, but they were “the people of that place (of survivors).” This seems to mean that they were Israelites who were not going to return—people such as Mordecai the Jews, who remained in Persia to take care of his orphaned niece (Esther 2:7), and probably the elderly Daniel, who (if he were still alive) would have been in his eighties.

Here is the mercy of God. His mercy extended to his people to allow them to return home, if they wished, or to remain in Persia and continue to live as a light in the wilderness for the good of their neighbors and friends who were there. His mercy also extended to the heart of Cyrus the Great, whose heart was turned by God and who was permitted to hear the word of the Lord spoken.

The mercy of God also extends to us, but we are blessed with the knowledge of just how great that mercy is. For the mercy we know about is not merely a release from a physical captivity, but it is the release from the spiritual bondage of sin through the blood of Jesus. God did not move the immoveable heart of Satan to rescue us; God crushed Satan’s power with the perfect obedience and willing death of his Son Jesus Christ. Hymn writer Ernst C. Homburg’s hymn lifts the cross and work of Christ in the heart in stirring words and music:

Christ, the Life of all the living
Christ, the Death of death our foe.
Who, thyself for me once giving
To the darkest depths of woe—
Through thy suff’rings, death, and merit,
I eternal life inherit.
Thousand, thousand thanks shall be,
Dearest Jesus, unto thee.

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

Browse Devotion Archive