,
the priests also, and the Levites moved up to Jerusalem to build an
house for the Lord there. And they were helped in all things with silver
and gold, with horses and cattle, and with very many free gifts. King
Cyrus also brought forth the holy vessels which Nabuchodonosor had
carried away from Jerusalem and had set up in his temple of idols. The
vessels of gold and of silver which were brought back by Sanabassar,
together with them of the captivity from Babylon to Jerusalem, were, in
number, five thousand four hundred three score and nine.

But in the time of Artaxerxes, the building of the Temple ceased. Now,
when Darius reigned, he made a great feast unto all the governors and
captains that were under him from India unto Ethiopia, of an hundred and
twenty-seven provinces. And when they had eaten and drunken, three young
men that were of the guard that kept the king's body strove to excel
each other in wise speeches. Every one wrote his sentence and referred
the writings to the judgment of the king. The first declareth the
strength of wine; the second declareth the power of a king; the third
the force of women and of truth. The third, who was Zorobabel, was
judged to be wisest; and all the people then shouted: Great is Truth,
and mighty above all things.

Then said the king unto him: Ask what thou wilt, and we will give it to
thee, because thou art found wisest. Then Zorobabel said unto the king:
Remember thy vow which thou hast vowed to build Jerusalem in the day
when thou camest into thy kingdom, and to build up the Temple, which the
Edomites burned when Judea was made desolate by the Chaldees.

Then Darius the king stood up and kissed him, and wrote letters for him
unto all the treasurers and governors that they should safely convey on
their way both him and all those that went with him to build Jerusalem.
He also wrote letters unto the lieutenants in Celosyria, Phenice, and
Libanus, that they should bring cedar wood from Libanus to Jerusalem;
and that they should build the city. Then the families and tribes with
their men-servants and maid-servants and singing men and women, escorted
by a thousand horsemen which Darius sent with them, were brought back to
Jerusalem.

On the first day of the second month, in the second year after they were
come back to Jerusalem, the foundation of the House of God was laid; and
the Temple was finished in the three and twentieth day of the month of
Adar, in the sixth year of D