Ezra 4:4

4:4 Then the local people ¹  began to discourage ²  the people of Judah and to dishearten them from building.

Ezra 5:13

5:13 But in the first year of King Cyrus of Babylon, ³  King Cyrus enacted a decree to rebuild this temple of God.

Ezra 7:9

7:9 On the first day of the first month he had determined to make ⁴  the ascent from Babylon, and on the first day of the fifth month he arrived at Jerusalem, ⁵  for the good hand of his God was on him.

[4:4]  ¹ tn Heb “the people of the land.” Elsewhere this expression sometimes has a negative connotation, referring to a lay population that was less zealous for Judaism than it should have been. Here, however, it seems to refer to the resident population of the area without any negative connotation.

[4:4]  ² tn Heb “were making slack the hands of.”

[5:13]  ³ sn Cyrus was actually a Persian king, but when he conquered Babylon in 539 b.c. he apparently appropriated to himself the additional title “king of Babylon.” The Syriac Peshitta substitutes “Persia” for “Babylon” here, but this is probably a hyper-correction.

[7:9]  ⁴ tc The translation reads יִסַּד (yissad, “he appointed” [= determined]) rather than the reading יְסֻד (yÿsud, “foundation”) of the MT. (The words “to make” are supplied in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.)

[7:9]  ⁵ sn Apparently it took the caravan almost four months to make the five hundred mile journey.