s of the first
victories of the Persians aroused in the exiled Jews the idea of speedy
deliverance, and Cyrus clearly appeared to them as the hero chosen by
Jahveh to reinstate them in the country, of their forefathers.

The number of the Jewish exiles, which perhaps at first had not exceeded
20,000* had largely increased in the half-century of their captivity,
and even if numerically they were of no great importance, their social
condition entitled them to be considered as the _elite_ of all Israel.

* The body of exiles of 597 consisted of ten thousand
persons, of whom seven thousand belonged to the wealthy, and
one thousand to the artisan class, while the remainder
consisted of people attached to the court (2 Kings xxiv. 14-
16). In the body of 587 are reckoned three thousand and
twenty-three inhabitants of Judah, and eight hundred and
thirty-two dwellers in Jerusalem. But the body of exiles of
581 numbers only seven hundred and forty-five persons (Jer.
lii. 30). These numbers are sufficiently moderate to be
possibly exact, but they are far from being certain.

There had at first been the two kings, Jehoiachin and Zedekiah, their
families, the aristocracy of Judah, the priests and pontiff of the
temple, the prophets, the most skilled of the artisan class and the
soldiery. Though distributed over Babylon and the neighbouring cities,
we know from authentic sources of only one of their settlements, that
of Tell-Abib on the Chebar* though many of the Jewish colonies which
flourished thereabouts in Roman times could undoubtedly trace their
origin to the days of the captivity; one legend found in the Talmud
affirmed that the synagogue of Shafyathib, near Nehardaa, had been built
by King Jehoiachin with stones brought from the ruins of the temple at
Jerusalem. These communities enjoyed a fairly complete autonomy, and
were free to administer their own affairs as they pleased, provided that
they paid their tribute or performed their appointed labours without
complaint. The shekhs, or elders of the family or tribe, who had played
so important a part in their native land, still held their respective
positions; the Chaldaeans had permitted them to retain all the
possessions which they had been able to bring with them into exile, and
recognised them as the rulers of their people, who were responsible to
their conquerors for the obedience of those under them, leaving them
entire