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Book 15 of 66 · History

Ezra

The exiles come home, rebuild the temple through years of opposition, and a teacher arrives who has set his heart to learn God’s law, do it, and teach it, in that order.

The big idea

In short: love God by learning the law, doing it, and only then teaching it. “Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach” (7:10).

Chronicles ends with the decree to go home. Ezra shows the slow, discouraging work of rebuilding a people around God’s word.

The rule underneath: Law 1 · God first

Love God with everything. You are not the owner.

Keep it: Your life has one center, and everything else finds its place.
Break it: Money, power, or people become your god, and they let you down.

Shows up in: Deuteronomy, Jeremiah, Psalms, Mark, James

Other rules in this book: Keep your word, Tell the truth, Repair

Live it: Playbook 01 · How to be a person

For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.Ezra 7:10 · KJV

At a glance

What it is
A history book. 10 chapters: the first return under Cyrus and the rebuilding of the temple (1–6, about 538–515 BC), and Ezra’s return and reforms about sixty years later (7–10).
Who wrote it
Parts are in Ezra’s own voice (7:27–9:15). Jewish tradition credits Ezra with the book and with Chronicles. Many scholars see Ezra–Nehemiah as one work edited later from memoirs and official letters. debated
Languages
Mostly Hebrew, but official letters and records (4:8–6:18; 7:12–26) are in Aramaic, the language of the Persian empire.
History
Cyrus’s decree (1:2–4) fits his known policy of letting deported peoples go home and rebuild their temples, recorded on the Cyrus Cylinder.
In which Bibles
In Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox Bibles. Ezra and Nehemiah were one book in the Hebrew Bible. Orthodox Bibles also include 1 Esdras, a Greek retelling (see the [deuterocanon page](deuterocanon.html#1-esdras)).
Read it in
About 45 minutes.

What it says

1–2 · Home. Cyrus of Persia lets the exiles go home to rebuild the temple and returns the temple’s gold and silver vessels (1). A list of those who returned (2).

3–6 · Rebuilding. They rebuild the altar and lay the temple’s foundation. The young shout for joy. The old men who remembered the first temple weep. And “the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping” (3:12–13). Neighbors oppose the work and get it stopped for years (4). The prophets Haggai and Zechariah stir the people to start again, a Persian search finds Cyrus’s decree, and the temple is finished around 515 BC (5–6).

12But many of the priests and Levites and chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice; and many shouted aloud for joy: 13So that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people: for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the noise was heard afar off.Ezra 3:12-13 · KJV

7–8 · Ezra. Ezra, a priest and expert in God’s law, arrives with a letter from King Artaxerxes. He is ashamed to ask the king for soldiers after telling him God protects those who seek him, so the group fasts and prays and travels unguarded (8:21–23).

9–10 · The marriages. Ezra learns that many men, including leaders, have married women from surrounding peoples. He tears his clothes and confesses the people’s sin as his own: “I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee” (9:6). The community decides to send away the foreign wives and their children (10:3, 44).

Go deeper
  • Original words. Darash, “seek” (7:10), means to study and inquire. Ezra is called a sopher, a scribe expert in the law.
  • Structure. The first return and the temple (1–6), then Ezra’s return and reforms (7–10).
  • How the laws interlock. Law 1 comes before teaching: learn, do, then teach (7:10). Law 12 is public confession (9:6). Law 4 is the hard question the ending leaves open (10:44).

Hard parts

Sending away wives and children (10)

What it says The leaders make “a covenant with our God to put away all the wives, and such as are born of them” (10:3). The book ends with the list of men who had foreign wives, “and some of them had wives by whom they had children” (10:44).

The rule underneath Love God and protect the weakest. The law’s concern was worship of other gods (Deuteronomy 7:3–4). Women and children are the ones who bear the cost here.

What people added Some readers see a necessary step to keep a small, fragile community from losing its faith. Others see ethnic exclusion and point to Ruth, a Moabite ancestor of David, and to Malachi 2:16. Some note the book records the decision without saying God approved it. Readers differ.

Who were the “people of the land”?

What it says “The people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah” (4:4). They had offered to help build and were refused (4:1–3).

The rule underneath Tell the truth, and keep the covenant clear.

What people added Later tradition often linked these people to the Samaritans, and the split between Jews and Samaritans shaped the world of the Gospels (John 4:9). Historians debate how early that split was. debated

Ezra and Nehemiah: who came first?

What it says Ezra comes “in the seventh year of Artaxerxes” (7:7). Nehemiah comes in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 2:1). They appear together in Nehemiah 8.

The rule underneath No core law depends on the order.

What people added The traditional order is Ezra (458 BC), then Nehemiah (445 BC). Some scholars put Ezra later, under Artaxerxes II (398 BC). debated

Translation notes that change meaning

  • “Strange wives.” The Hebrew means foreign, not odd.
  • Ezra’s title. “Scribe” (7:6) means a trained expert in the law, not just a copyist.
  • 1 and 2 Esdras. In the Latin Vulgate, Ezra and Nehemiah are called 1 and 2 Esdras, which causes confusion with the separate books called 1 and 2 Esdras.

Where it leads

  • 10 · How to repair: public confession owned as “our” sin (9:6).
  • 12 · How to decide: a hard community decision, and who pays for it.
  • 11 · How to live together: rebuilding a people after disaster.
  • Also feeds 04 speech (prayer and confession out loud) and 03 protecting the weak (the cost to the women and children, 10:44).

One thing to do

This week

Learn, do, then teach

Ezra learned the law, did it, and only then taught it (7:10). Pick one thing you often tell other people to do. This week, practice it yourself every day before you mention it to anyone. Write in your journal what you learned by doing it first.

How to read it. Read 1 and 3 together for the return. Read 7:1–10 for Ezra himself. Read 9–10 slowly and hold the hard questions open.