So that all the vessels both of gold and silver, were five thousand and four hundred. Sheshbazzar brought them all up, with them that came up out of the captivity of Babylon unto Jerusalem.

Now these are the people of the province who came up out of the captivity of the exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away to Babylon, and returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his city.

These came with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum and Baanah.The number of the men of the people of Israel:

Now these are those who came up from Tel-melah, Tel-harsha, Cherub, Addan and Immer, but they were not able to give evidence of their fathers’ households and their descendants, whether they were of Israel:

And the Tirshatha said that they were not to have the most holy things for their food, till a priest came to give decision by Urim and Thummim.

And some of the chief fathers, when they came to the house of Jehovah which is at Jerusalem, offered freely for the house of God to set it up in its place.

Now when the seventh month came, and the sons of Israel were in the cities, the people gathered together as one man to Jerusalem.

Now in the second year of their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak and the rest of their brothers the priests and the Levites, and all who came from the captivity to Jerusalem, began the work and appointed the Levites from twenty years and older to oversee the work of the house of the Lord.

So that in the ears of the people the cry of joy was mixed with the sound of weeping; for the cries of the people were loud and came to the ears of those who were a long way off.

Now news came to the haters of Judah and Benjamin that the people who had come back were building a Temple to the Lord, the God of Israel;

and they came to Zerubbabel and to the chief fathers, and said to them, We would build with you; for we seek your God, as ye; and we have sacrificed to him since the days of Esar-haddon king of Assyria, who brought us up hither.

Then came it to pass, that, the people of the land, were weakening the hands of the people of Judah, - and troubling them in building;

let it be known to the king that the Jews who came up from you have come to us at Jerusalem; they are rebuilding the rebellious and evil city and are finishing the walls and repairing the foundations.

So the work on the temple of God in Jerusalem came to a halt. It remained halted until the second year of the reign of King Darius of Persia.

At that time Tattenai, the governor of the province beyond the River, and Shethar-bozenai and their colleagues came to them and spoke to them thus, “Who issued you a decree to rebuild this temple and to finish this structure?”

But the eye of their God was upon the elders of the Jews, and they did not make them cease till the matter came to Darius; and then they returned answer by letter concerning it.

Be it known unto the king, that we came into Jewry to the house of the great God, which is builded with all manner of stone, and beams are laid in the walls, and the work goeth fast forth, and prospereth in their hands?

Then that Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundations of the house of God in Jerusalem; and from then until now it has been under construction and it is not yet completed.’

And at Achmetha, in the great house of the king in the land of Media, they came across a roll, in which this statement was put on record:

And the sons of Israel who came again out of the captivity, and all such as had separated themselves to them from the filthiness of the nations of the land, to seek LORD, the God of Israel, ate,

Now after these things had happened, during the reign of King Artaxerxes of Persia, Ezra came up from Babylon. Ezra was the son of Seraiah, who was the son of Azariah, who was the son of Hilkiah,

this Ezra, came up out of Babylon, he, being a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which Yahweh God of Israel had given, - and the king gave him, according to the hand of Yahweh his God upon him, all his request.

So then there came up some of the sons of Israel, and some of the priests and the Levites and the singers and the doorkeepers and the Nethinim, unto Jerusalem, - in the seventh year of Artaxerxes the king.

He came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, which was in the seventh year of the king.

For on the first of the first month he began to go up from Babylon; and on the first of the fifth month he came to Jerusalem, because the good hand of his God was upon him.

Now, these, are their ancestral heads, and their genealogical register, - even of those who came up with me, in the reign of Artaxerxes the king, out of Babylon: -

From the descendants of Adonikam, those who came last, these were their names: Eliphelet, Jeiel, Shemaiah, and with them sixty males.

Thus we came to Jerusalem and remained there three days.

They who came in out of the captivity, Sons of the Exile, offered as ascending-sacrifices unto the God of Israel - bullocks twelve for all Israel, rams ninety-six, young sheep seventy-seven, he-goats for bearing sin, twelve, - the whole, as an ascending-sacrifice unto Yahweh.

Now when these things were completed, the princes came to me, saying, The people of Israel, and the priests and the Levites, have not separated themselves from the peoples of the lands, according to their abominations, even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites;

Then everyone who went in fear of the words of the God of Israel, because of the sin of those who had come back, came together to me; and I kept where I was, overcome with grief, till the evening offering.

Now while Ezra was making his prayer and his statement of wrongdoing, weeping and falling down before the house of God, a very great number of men and women and children out of Israel came together round him: for the people were weeping bitterly.

Then arose Ezra from before the house of God, and went into the chamber of Jehohanan son of Eliashib, - and, when he came thither, bread, did he not eat, and, water, did he not drink, for he was mourning over the unfaithfulness of them of the Exile.

and that whosoever came not within three days, according to the counsel of the princes and the elders, all his substance should be forfeited, and himself separated from the assembly of the captivity.

Then all the men of Judah and Benjamin came together to Jerusalem before three days were past; it was the ninth month, on the twentieth day of the month; and all the people were seated in the wide square in front of the house of God, shaking with fear because of this business and because of the great rain.