Jerusalem

Then the people of the land took Y'ho'achaz the son of Yoshiyahu and made him king in his father's place, in Yerushalayim.

Y'ho'achaz was twenty-three years old when he began his reign, and he ruled for three months in Yerushalayim.

But the king of Egypt deposed him in Yerushalayim and imposed a penalty on the land of three-and-a-third tons of silver and sixty-six pounds of gold.

Then the king of Egypt made Elyakim his brother king over Y'hudah and Yerushalayim, changing his name to Y'hoyakim; N'kho took Yo'achaz his brother and carried him off to Egypt.

Y'hoyakim was twenty-five years old when he began his reign, and he ruled for eleven years in Yerushalayim. He did what was evil from the perspective of ADONAI his God.

Y'hoyakhin was eight years old when he began his reign, and he ruled in Yerushalayim for three months and ten days. He did what was evil from ADONAI's perspective.

In the spring, King N'vukhadnetzar sent and had him brought to Bavel together with the valuable articles from the house of ADONAI, and made Tzedekyah his brother king over Y'hudah and Yerushalayim.

Tzedekyah was twenty-one years old when he began his reign, and he ruled for eleven years in Yerushalayim.

In addition, the chief cohanim and the people grew increasingly unfaithful, following all the abominable practices of the other nations; and they polluted the house of ADONAI, which he had consecrated in Yerushalayim.

Then they burned down the house of God, broke down the wall of Yerushalayim, put to flames all its palaces and destroyed everything in it of worth.

"Here is what Koresh king of Persia says: ADONAI, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms on earth, and he has charged me to build him a house in Yerushalayim, in Y'hudah. Whoever there is among you of all his people, may ADONAI his God be with him! He may go up . . . ."

"Here is what Koresh king of Persia says: ADONAI, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms on earth; and he has charged me to build him a house in Yerushalayim, in Y'hudah.

Whoever there is among you of all his people, may his God be with him! He may go up to Yerushalayim, in Y'hudah, and build the house of ADONAI the God of Isra'el, the God who is in Yerushalayim.

Let every survivor, no matter where he lives, be helped by his neighbors with silver, gold, goods and animals, in addition to the voluntary offering for the house of God in Yerushalayim."

The heads of fathers' clans in Y'hudah and Binyamin, along with the cohanim, the L'vi'im, and indeed all whose spirit God had stirred, set out to go up and rebuild the house of ADONAI in Yerushalayim.

In addition, Koresh the king brought out the vessels from the house of ADONAI which N'vukhadnetzar had taken from Yerushalayim and put in the house of his god.

In all there were 5,400 articles of gold and silver. Sheshbatzar took all of them along when the exiles were brought up from Bavel to Yerushalayim.

Here is a list of the people of the province who had been exiled, carried off to Bavel by N'vukhadnetzar king of Bavel, but who later returned from exile and went up to Yerushalayim and Y'hudah, each to his own city;

Some of the heads of fathers' clans, when they came to the house of ADONAI in Yerushalayim, made voluntary offerings for rebuilding the house of God on its site.

When the seventh month arrived, after the people of Isra'el had resettled in the towns, the people gathered with one accord in Yerushalayim.

In the second year after their arrival at the house of God in Yerushalayim, in the second month, Z'rubavel the son of Sh'alti'el, Yeshua the son of Yotzadak, the rest of their kinsmen the cohanim and L'vi'im, and all who had come out of exile to Yerushalayim began the project. They appointed the L'vi'im aged twenty and up to direct work in the house of ADONAI.

During the reign of Achashverosh, at the beginning of his reign, they brought a charge in writing against the people living in Y'hudah and Yerushalayim.

Rechum the district governor and Shimshai the secretary wrote a letter against Yerushalayim to Artach'shashta the king as follows:

"Let the king know that the Judeans who left you to come to us in Yerushalayim are building this rebellious and wicked city. They have finished the walls and are now digging the foundations.

also that there have been powerful kings over Yerushalayim who ruled all the territory beyond the River; and tribute, taxes and tolls were paid to them.