'Exiles' in the Bible
Now these are the people of the province [of Judah] who came up from the captivity of the exiles, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had deported to Babylon, and who returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his own city.
Now when [the Samaritans] the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles from the captivity were building a temple to the Lord God of Israel,
And all Israel—the priests, the Levites, and the rest of the [former] exiles—celebrated the dedication of this house of God with joy.
The [former] exiles kept the Passover on the fourteenth [day] of the first month.
For the priests and the Levites had purified themselves together; all of them were [ceremonially] clean. So they slaughtered the Passover lamb for all the exiles, for their brothers the priests, and for themselves.
Also the [former] exiles who had come from the captivity offered burnt offerings to the God of Israel: 12 bulls for all Israel, 96 rams, 77 lambs, and 12 male goats for a sin offering. All this was a burnt offering to the Lord.
Then everyone who trembled at the words of the God of Israel because of the unfaithfulness of the exiles gathered to me as I sat appalled until the evening offering.
Then Ezra got up from before the house of God and went into the chamber of Jehohanan the son of Eliashib [and spent the night there]. He did not eat bread nor drink water, for he was mourning over the [former] exiles’ faithlessness.
They made a proclamation throughout Judah and Jerusalem to all the [former] exiles, that they were to assemble at Jerusalem,
and that whoever would not come within three days, by order of the counsel of the leaders and the elders, all his possessions and property would be forfeited and he himself would be excluded from the assembly of the exiles.
Then the [former] exiles did so. Ezra the priest and men who were heads of fathers’ households were selected, according to their fathers’ households, each of them by name; and they sat down on the first day of the tenth month to investigate the matter.