Ezra 3 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
~537-536 BC, the seventh month after the return and then the second year of the work
Location
Jerusalem, on the ruined temple platform, with cedar timber shipped from Lebanon down the coast to the port of Joppa
Audience
Jews in Persian-period Judah, worshiping at a temple far plainer than the one their ancestors had lost
Situation
The returned exiles rebuild the altar and resume daily sacrifices and the Festival of Shelters before any building work starts, then lay the foundation of the temple with music and shouting. Older people who remembered the first temple weep while others cheer.
Key Background
Rebuilding the altar first made sense because sacrifice, not architecture, was the actual business of a temple, and an open-air altar on the old site could function immediately. The Festival of Shelters was the autumn harvest pilgrimage during which people camped in temporary shelters to recall the wilderness years, a fitting first observance for people newly out of displacement. Importing cedar from Lebanon and paying Phoenician workers in food and oil deliberately repeats how Solomon built the first temple, and laying a foundation with ceremony, singing, and offerings matches Mesopotamian temple-building rites, where the foundation deposit was a formal public event.
When the around, and the Israelites had settled into their towns, the people as in Jerusalem.
Then Jeshua son of Jozadak, along with his fellow priests, and son of Shealtiel, along with his relatives, got started and built the of the God of Israel so they could offer on it, exactly as it's written in the of the man of God.
They set the altar on its foundation even though they were of the people already living in the land around them. And they offered burnt offerings on it to Yahweh — both the morning and evening offerings.
They also celebrated the of as it's written, offering the exact number of burnt offerings required for each day.
After that, there was the regular burnt offering, the offerings for the and offerings for all of Yahweh's appointed festivals, the for plus whatever anyone wanted to give voluntarily to Yahweh.
From the first day of the seventh month they started offering burnt offerings to Yahweh, even though the of Yahweh's temple hadn't been laid yet.
They gave money to the stonecutters and craftsmen, and gave food, drink, and oil to the people of Sidon and Tyre to bring by sea from to Joppa, as Cyrus king of Persia had authorized.
In the second month of the second year after they arrived at the house of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and Jeshua son of Jozadak got started, along with the rest of their fellow priests and Levites and everyone who had come back to Jerusalem from They appointed Levites twenty years old and older to oversee the work on the house of Yahweh.
Jeshua with his sons and brothers, Kadmiel with his sons — the descendants of Hodaviah — joined together to oversee those doing the work on the house of God. So did the sons of Henadad with their sons and fellow Levites.
When the builders laid the foundation of Yahweh's temple, the priests stood in their robes with and the Levites — the sons of — stood with cymbals to praise Yahweh, following the directions of David, king of Israel.
They and praising and giving thanks to Yahweh: "He is good — his for Israel never runs out." And all the people erupted in a great shout of praise to Yahweh because the foundation of Yahweh's house had been laid.
But many of the older priests and Levites and family leaders — those who had seen the with their own eyes — wept loudly when they saw the foundation of this being laid. Meanwhile, many others shouted with joy at the top of their lungs.
Nobody could tell the sound of the joyful shouts from the sound of the weeping, because the people were making so much noise that it could be heard from far away.