The book of Ezra is basically a series of letters between Persian empire officials that pertain to the jews. It’s not very exciting, but it is also very short. So that’s good.
So last we checked up on them Cyrus the Persian king was helping the exiled jews return to Jerusalem. Cyrus and other Persian kings were pretty badass when it came to allowing whatever the fuck religion people wanted to follow. Not only did he allow and help them to return. He even arranged it so they could get a bunch of their stolen temple stuff back. So they came back to Jerusalem and got to building their altars and shit. This guy Jeshua decided that it was time to start rebuilding the temple. Apparently it was such a big deal that everyone was either singing or crying or laughing or emoting somehow. And apparently it could be heard from far away.
A bunch of people who also worshipped Jehovah instead of all the other options they had thought they’d come help build the temple, too. Jeshua told them to fuck off. After that happened, they’d just sit around trying to discourage everyone from building. They literally had nothing better to do with their lives.
Eventually Cyrus died and this new guy Artixerxes came about. And this guy Reham sent him a letter saying that pretty soon Jerusalem won’t be paying taxes anymore and that he should really crack down. Artixerxes was like, “Good fucking call.” So he sent troops to stop them from building the temple.
When Artixerxes died, the Jews just started building that temple again, because apparently the troops stopped caring about stopping them. Someone sent a letter to the new king Darius saying, “These jews are building that temple again. They’re building it with stones and lumber (I have no idea why he felt the need to say this) We asked them who told them they could start building again and they said, ‘Our god did. So fuck you. Also, Cyrus was cool with it.’ So what should we do about this shit?”
Darius decided that if Cyrus was cool with it, he was cool with it and gave the famous decree, “Let the Jews build a temple. i don’t care. In fact, if they need any raw materials or helpless innocent animals to slaughter for no reason, give it to them. Also, if anyone tries to fuck with this edict pull a beam out of the structure of his house and impale him on it. Then destroy his house.” Darius was kind of a lunatic. So after three separate kings, they finished the goddamn temple and celebrated passover.
Finally as we come to an end of this book we come to Ezra. Apparently Ezra was Jewish but also respected in the Persian empire. Artixerxes told him to tell the Jews that they could do whatever they want. Ezra was like, “You’re goddamn right we can.” So, under Darius, they rebuilt Jerusalem and rebuilt the temple. Ezra declared that he was super opposed to interracial marriage and literally investigated every couple and punished anyone guilty of it. Then it lists all the people guilty of interracial marriage and the book kind of just ends.
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