The Proclamation of Cyrus

^22 (A)Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, ^(B)that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, ^(C)the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing: ²³ “Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may the Lord his God be with him. Let him go up.’”

² “Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and ^(A)he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah.

³ But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the rest of the heads of fathers' houses in Israel said to them, ^(A)“You have nothing to do with us in building a house to our God; but we alone will build to the Lord, the God of Israel, ^(B)as King Cyrus the king of Persia has commanded us.”

⁵ and bribed counselors against them to frustrate their purpose, all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia.

³ In the first year of Cyrus the king, Cyrus the king issued a decree: Concerning the house of God at Jerusalem, let the house be rebuilt, the place where sacrifices were offered, and let its foundations be retained. Its height shall be sixty cubits^[a] and its breadth sixty cubits,

^14 (A)And the elders of the Jews built and prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. They finished their building by decree of the God of Israel and ^(B)by decree of Cyrus and ^(C)Darius and ^(D)Artaxerxes king of Persia;

Cyrus, God's Instrument

²¹ And Daniel ^(A)was there until the first year of ^(B)King Cyrus.