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 counsellors 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,