The Samaritans Stop the Work

4 When the enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the people who returned from exile were building a temple for Yahweh Elohim of Israel, ² they approached Zerubbabel and the heads of the families. They told them, “We want to help you build because we worship the same Elohim you worship. We have been sacrificing to him^[a] since the time of King Esarhaddon of Assyria, who brought us here.”

³ But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the rest of the heads of Israel’s families told them, “It isn’t right for your people and our people to build a temple for our Elohim together. We must build it alone for Yahweh Elohim of Israel, as King Cyrus of Persia ordered us to do.”