Temple Rebuilding Resumes
And Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, the prophets, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and in Jerusalem — in the name of the God of Israel, upon them.
Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel rose up, and Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and began to build the house of God that is in Jerusalem; and with them were the prophets of God, supporting them.
At that time Tattenai, the governor of Beyond the River, came to them, and Shethar-bozenai, and their companions, and said this to them: “Who set you a decree to build this house and to complete this structure?”
Then we said this to them: “What are the names of the men who are building this building?”
But the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews, and they did not make them cease until the matter should go to Darius — and then an answer by letter would be returned concerning this.
Tattenai’s Letter to Darius
The copy of the letter that Tattenai, the governor of Beyond the River, sent — and Shethar-bozenai and his companions, the officials who were in Beyond the River — to Darius the king.
They sent a word to him, and thus it was written within it: “To Darius the king: all peace — and now:
Let it be known to the king that we went to the province of Judah, to the house of the great God. And it is being built with rolling stone, and timber is being set in the walls; and this work is being done diligently and prospers in their hand.
Then we asked those elders; we said this to them: ‘Who set you a decree to build this house and to complete this structure?’
And we also asked them their names, to make them known to you, so that we might write the names of the men at their head.
And this is the word they returned us, saying: ‘We are the servants of the God of the heavens and the earth, and we are building the house that was built many years before this — and a great king of Israel built it and completed it.
But because our fathers enraged the God of the heavens, he gave them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the Chaldean; and he tore down this house, and exiled the people to Babylon.
Yet in the first year of Cyrus, king of Babylon, Cyrus the king set a decree to build this house of God.
And also the vessels of the house of God, of gold and silver, which Nebuchadnezzar had brought out of the temple that is in Jerusalem and carried to the temple of Babylon — Cyrus the king brought them out of the temple of Babylon, and they were given to one named Sheshbazzar, whom he had made governor.
And he said to him: Take these vessels; go, set them down in the temple that is in Jerusalem, and let the house of God be built on its place.
Then that Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundations of the house of God that is in Jerusalem; and from then until now it has been being built, and it is not finished.’
And now, if it seems good to the king, let a search be made in the king’s treasure house there, which is in Babylon, whether it is so that a decree was set from Cyrus the king to build this house of God in Jerusalem; and let the king send us his pleasure concerning this.”