Ezra 4:4-6

Contemporary English Version

⁴Then the neighboring people began to do everything possible to frighten the Jews^[a] and to make them stop building. ⁵During the time that Cyrus was king and even until Darius^[b] became king, they kept bribing government officials to slow down the work.

Trouble Rebuilding Jerusalem^[c]

⁶^(A) In the first year that Xerxes was king,^[d] the neighboring people brought written charges against the people of Judah and Jerusalem.

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Footnotes

4.4 Jews: This was the name given to those Israelites who settled in Judah after returning from Babylonia.
4.5 Cyrus … Darius: Cyrus ruled 539–530 b.c. (see the note at 1.1); Darius I, known as Darius the Great, ruled 522–486 b.c.
4.6 Jerusalem: Verses 6-23, which tell about the events of a later period, are placed here because they are also concerned with the problem of stopping or slowing down work on the temple.
4.6 first year that Xerxes was king: Either the end of 486 or the beginning of 485 b.c. The Hebrew has the king's Persian name “Ahasuerus,” but he is better known as “Xerxes,” the Greek form of the name.