The Old Testament · The Historical Books · Book 15 of 73
Prophecy in Ezra
Ezra is the book of the homecoming. A Persian king keeps a promise God made through Jeremiah, the exiles go up to Jerusalem, and an altar and a Temple rise again from the rubble, to the sound of shouting and weeping so mixed that no one could tell them apart.
In progress: 3 passages so far
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The book at a glance
In the Hebrew Bible, Ezra and Nehemiah form one book; the Latin tradition long called them 1 and 2 Esdras. Ezra tells of two returns from Babylon. The first follows the decree of Cyrus in 538 BC and ends with the rebuilt Temple dedicated in 515 BC (chapters 1–6); the second, “in the seventh year of King Artaxerxes” (7:7), brings Ezra himself, a priest and scribe, to teach the law (chapters 7–10). Parts of the book are written in Aramaic, the language of the Persian court, and parts are Ezra's own first-person memoir. Scholars differ on Ezra's date: many place his mission in 458 BC, before Nehemiah's, while others put it later, in 398 BC under a second Artaxerxes. The book was compiled by an editor, possibly from the same circle as Chronicles, whose closing verses it repeats. The Church receives it as inspired Scripture.
Ezra contains no prophetic oracles of its own, though the prophets Haggai and Zechariah stand behind its story (5:1; 6:14). Its forward-looking content is fulfillment and type: it shows earlier prophecies coming true, and its rebuilt Temple and its scribe point ahead to Christ and the Church. Each card below names which form it takes.
Key to the labels
How a passage stands
Fulfilled Accomplished in history, above all in Christ.
Unfolding Being worked out now in the life of the Church.
Future Clearly still to come at Christ's return.
Mystery Its meaning or moment is not yet settled.
What kind of passage it is
Prophecy God's word through a prophet, or Christ, about what will come.
Promise A pledge God makes, kept over generations.
Type A person or event that foreshadows Christ or the Church.
Image A picture Scripture returns to and completes at the end.
Apocalypse A vision unveiling history from heaven's side, in symbols.
More on the labels
| Passage | Subject | Standing |
|---|
| 1:1–4 | The decree of Cyrus | Fulfilled |
| 3:1–13 | The altar and foundation, with weeping and joy | Fulfilled Future |
| 7:6–10 | Ezra the scribe | Fulfilled Unfolding |
The passages
“In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia…” (1:1)
- Reading
- The book opens with a fulfillment. Jeremiah had told the first exiles, “Only after seventy years have elapsed for Babylon will I deal with you and fulfill for you my promise to bring you back to this place” (Jeremiah 29:10). Now Babylon has fallen to Persia, and its new king proclaims: “All the kingdoms of the earth the LORD, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah” (1:2). Whoever wishes may go up, helped by their neighbors with silver, gold and goods (1:3–4), and Cyrus even returns the Temple vessels Nebuchadnezzar had taken (1:7–11). The return is a second exodus, with the people going out laden with gifts as their ancestors left Egypt (Exodus 12:35–36).
- Fulfilled
- The book itself names Jeremiah's prophecy as fulfilled, and Isaiah had gone further, naming Cyrus as God's instrument: “I say of Cyrus, My shepherd!” (Isaiah 44:28), and “Thus says the LORD to his anointed, Cyrus” (Isaiah 45:1). A pagan king is called God's shepherd and anointed, the same word as Messiah, because God uses him to free his people. He is a distant type of the true Shepherd and Anointed who frees his people from a deeper captivity. On the seventy years, see Prophecy in Jeremiah; on how Daniel later pondered the same number, Prophecy in Daniel.
- See also
- 2 Chronicles 36:22–23, which the opening verses repeat; Prophecy in 2 Chronicles.
“No one could distinguish the sound of the joyful shouting from the sound of those who were weeping;” (3:13)
- Reading
- Before any wall or Temple, the returned exiles rebuild the altar, led by the priest Jeshua and Zerubbabel of David's line, and offer sacrifice “both morning and evening” (3:2–3). Then the foundation of the Temple is laid. The priests sound trumpets and the Levites sing “in the manner laid down by David,” with the old refrain, “for he is good, for his love for Israel endures forever” (3:10–11; 1 Chronicles 16:34). The people shout for joy. But the old men who had seen Solomon's Temple weep aloud at how small the new one is (3:12). Haggai speaks to the same grief: “Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? And how do you see it now? Does it not seem like nothing in your eyes?” (Haggai 2:3).
- Fulfilled
- The work stalled for years and was finished, with the help of Haggai and Zechariah, in 515 BC: “They completed this house on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius” (6:15). Through Haggai God promised that this humbler house would have the greater glory (Haggai 2:9), and the Church sees that promise kept when Christ himself was presented and taught in it (Luke 2:22–32). See Prophecy in Haggai.
- Future
- Every building of God's house in this world mingles joy with tears, as the Church knows in every age. The last building will not: in the new Jerusalem God “will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain” (Revelation 21:4).
“Ezra had set his heart on the study and practice of the law of the LORD and on teaching statutes and ordinances in Israel.” (7:10)
- Reading
- Ezra arrives in Jerusalem, “a scribe, well-versed in the law of Moses given by the LORD, the God of Israel” (7:6), “for the favoring hand of his God was over him” (7:9). The order of verse 10 is worth noticing: first study, then practice, then teaching. Jewish tradition honors Ezra as a second Moses who restored the law to the people, and his public reading of it is told in Nehemiah 8. After the exile, Israel would be held together less by a king than by a book, read, prayed and lived.
- Fulfilled
- Ezra is a type of the teacher who opens Scripture to God's people. Jesus is that teacher in person. On the road to Emmaus, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them what referred to him in all the scriptures” (Luke 24:27).
- Unfolding
- Jesus also spoke of disciples who would carry on Ezra's work: “every scribe who has been instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like the head of a household who brings from his storeroom both the new and the old” (Matthew 13:52). The Church continues it whenever the Word is studied, lived and taught.
Still to come on this pageFurther passages to add: the list of the returned exiles (2), the opposition to the rebuilding and the prophets Haggai and Zechariah (4:1–6:14), the dedication of the Temple and the Passover (6:15–22), and Ezra's prayer of confession (9:6–15).
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