Cyrus is responsible for returning a number of peoples to their lands and rebuilding their temples in order to get more gods favorable to him and his family. Another matter which must be taken into consideration is that sabbatical years of the post-exilic period had to be reset when the Jews returned to the Land under Ezra. The ancient exegetes, it will be shown, understood shavua to refer to the seven-year cycle, the last year of which was the year of the Lord (Lev. The gracious commission of Artaxerxes to Ezra 27. Sabbatical Year Cycles were Reset After the Exile. Is it possible to say so? Site Design and Management by:Nehemiah Communications [http://nehemiahcommunications.com] & Enktesis [http://enktesis.com], Daniel-The Top Ten Archaeological Discoveries: Digging for Truth Episode 194, Social Justice-The Counterfeit Gospel (Part Four): Digging for Truth Episode 193, Social Justice-The Counterfeit Gospel (Part Three): Digging for Truth Episode 192, Social Justice-The Counterfeit Gospel (Part Two): Digging for Truth Episode 191, Social JusticeThe Counterfeit Gospel (Part One): Digging for Truth Episode 190. Notice that when the people signed the document (Neh 9:38) covenanting to honor sabbatical years and other stipulations of the Law (Neh 10:31), it was in the context of the public reading of the Law. For this reason it appears Shea is mistaken here. The murderer accused the king's eldest son Darius of the crime, with the result that Darius was slain by his younger brother Artaxerxes, who then mounted the throne. Sabbatical Years Began in the Month of Tishri. We find in Deuteronomy 31:1012 that such public reading of the Law was prescribed to be done at the start of a sabbatical year, normally during the Feast of Booths (Tishri 1521) in the fall, although Tishri 1, Rosh Hashanah, was also set apart for special observation (Lev 23:2425: Speak to the people of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall observe a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blast of trumpets, a holy convocation). The principle of release at the beginning of year seven, not at its end, is also given by several Scriptures: Exodus 21:2: If you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve for six years; but on the seventh he shall go out as a free man without payment., Deuteronomy 15:9, 12, 18: Beware that there is no base thought in your heart, saying, The seventh year, the year of remission, is near. Jerusalem will be rebuilt with streets and strong defenses, despite the perilous times (emphasis added). Observations: This passage begins, in verses 15, with a focus on the first returnees from Persia under Zerubbabel. Ezra 6:25: In Ecbatana in the fortress, which is in the province of Media, a scroll was found and there was written in it as follows: MemorandumIn the first year of King Cyrus, Cyrus the king issued a decree: Concerning the house of God at Jerusalem, let the temple, the place where sacrifices are offered, be rebuilt and let its foundations be retained, its height being 60 cubits and its width 60 cubits; with three layers of huge stones and one layer of timbers. Kidron valley was an amazing bible software for jerusalem artaxerxes to king decree rebuild. Nothing is said about city rebuilding. Ezra 6:14: And the elders of the Jews were successful in building [the Temple] through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. TWO DECREES OF ARTAXERXES We have to choose between the two decrees of Artaxerxes. God foretold to the day when Messiah would present Himself to Israel as their Messiah-King. Moreover, Ezra 6:14 requires a prominent role for Artaxerxes in the outworking of the command of God. 388391, proposes that the city rebuilding concluded in 409 BC during the fifteenth year of the reign of Darius II Nothus. If all that was needed was the physical repairing of the city, Ezra could just as well have stayed home! The difference between the two interpretations is that, according to the former, any septennial number will do; according to the latter, however, each seven-year period had its fixed place in a series, precise in beginning and end. Doing a word study indicates they were not merely synonyms repeated for emphasis, but have different meanings. There was nothing indirect or oblique about this. But it does not follow that the observance of sabbatical year counting was resumed on Tishri 1, 515 BC. If king came: and restore and . 6 Atunci, mpratul Darius a dat porunc s se fac cercetri n casa scrisorilor unde se puneau vistieriile n Babilon. The term banah is readily understood as referring to construction. , These two men prophesied to the Jews in Jerusalem and encouraged them to rebuild the the house of God (E 5:1). It would encompass the restoring and rebuilding of the city of Jerusalem, not restricted to rebuilding the Temple, so the decree as narrowly issued by Cyrus and Darius would not qualifyArtaxerxes broadened decree would. Now in the reign of Ahasuerus [the Aramaic-translated name for Xerxes, not a title for Cambyses or Smerdis/Bardiya; see my previous article], in the beginning of his reign, they wrote an accusation against the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem. The burning of the Temple, an essential aspect of the desolation, is known to have taken place on Av 9 (July 29), 587 BC, about two months before the next agricultural year would have begun on Tishri 1 (September 18), 587 BC. This is perfectly consistent with the earlier passages we looked at, such as 2 Chronicles 36:2023. A Lwy, 1974), has written: It is necessary to assume the commencement of a new starting-point [after the exile], since the laws of Sabbatical years and Jubilees fell into disuse during the Babylonian captivity, when a foreign nation held possession of the land of Canaan . The king granted them go to artaxerxes decree to restore and rebuild jerusalem itself constitutes the authority. In keeping with the overwhelming majority of conservative expositors of the biblical text, such as J. Paul Tanner (Is Daniels Seventy-Weeks Prophecy Messianic? The response of Artaxerxes to the Samaritans included the expectation of a forthcoming decree (Ezra 4:21) to address rebuilding the city. Temple Mount Revisionism: Requiesce in pace! 1516 in a Radio Bible Class publication, The Daniel Papers (online at http://web001.rbc.org/pdf/discovery-series/the-daniel-papers.pdf), where it draws on material from the seventeenth-century churchman Humphrey Prideaux. The date the decree was issued is not simultaneous with the date sabbatical year counting was resumed. Now I, King Artaxerxes, decree that all the treasurers of Trans-Euphrates are to provide with diligence whatever Ezra the priest, the teacher of the Law of the God of heaven, may ask of you . And there went up also to Jerusalem, in the seventh year of Artaxerxes the king, some of the people of Israel, and some of the priests and Levites, the singers and gatekeepers, and the temple servant Once that is done, we will look at the big picture and see how each passage sheds light on the others and guides how we should interpret them as a whole. qowl, voice] throughout his kingdom, and also put it in writing, saying, Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and He has appointed me to build Him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Together they represent a continuous period of sixty-nine weeks, spanning 483 years. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until seventy years were complete [emphasis added]. The decree to rebuild Jerusalem in verse 25 may refer to King Artaxerxes authorizing Nehemiah to rebuild Jerusalem in March of 445 BC That is when the count. Ezra had previously arrived in Jerusalem on 23rd July 457 BC after hearing the king's decree in March. Nevertheless, from this assumption he then suggests the Jews who came up from you must refer to those who had arrived from Artaxerxes with Ezra in 457 BC. Nothing is said about rebuilding the city of Jerusalem, only the Temple. And they finished building according to the command of the God of Israel and the [singular] decree of Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia (brackets added). This fact emphasizes that the sabbatical years significance was fundamentally a spiritual matter, a sign of the people keeping covenant with their God, rather than simply giving the land a break. Desiring to let the Scriptures speak plainly and govern our understanding, several passages will first be set forth that teach the principle of sabbatical year observance. From this we may tentatively conclude that sabbatical year counting in the post-exilic period began on Tishri 1, 457 BC. Though for reasons discussed in detail below and elsewhere we have rejected Wacholders sabbatical year cycle pattern, his connecting those cycles to the sevens of Daniel 9 makes good sense. Porunca lui Darius. is from the 1885 Bible. Therefore, when it speaks of the restoration of the city, Daniel 9:25 is referring to Ezras work. The response of the Samaritans was to oppose the Temple construction efforts all through the days of Cyrus, through the reigns of Cambyses and Smerdis/Bardiya that followed him, and into the second year of Darius Hystaspes (Ezra 4:24), who decreed capital punishment upon any who would hinder the Temples completion (Ezra 6:11). In a word, yes. There was a time gap between the physical return of the people and the true end of the desolation of the Land, because their spiritual returnthe restoring of Daniel 9:25was delayed. King Artaxerxes gave this decree in 444 BC. Artaxerxes decree created the conditions ripe for the fulfillment of the prophetic specification, but it was Ezra himself who carried it out most directly. It is His will, not simply Cyruss. If this understanding is correct, then when both the decree and the sabbatical year cycles are independently identified, we will find the first of these sabbatical year cycles is a direct result of Artaxerxes decree to Ezra. Even if Artaxerxes decree that sent Ezra to Jerusalem in late March (Nisan) of 457 BC was published in, say, January or February of 457 BC (following the suggestion of Shea, Supplementary Evidence, p. 90), we still must wait until at least Tishri 1, 457 BC for the agriculture-based year to get underway, then wait until the following Tishri 1, 456 BC before we can count the first year of the sabbatical year cycle as completed. 53BC King Cyrus issued a decree that the Jewish exiles were free to. 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