EZRA AND NEHEMIAH, BOOKS OF, in the Old Testa ment. A Hebrew apologist of the 3rd century B.C. (known as "the Chronicler") wrote with much skill a history of Israel beginning with Adam and ending in the 4th century. Jewish scholars of a later day set apart the latter portion of this history, covering the entire Persian period, under the convenient name "Ezra." In much later Christian usage this in turn was divided into two books, Ezra and Nehemiah. The Jewish terminology, however, remained unchanged, and was followed in the Greek and Latin translations.
(See CHRONICLES, BOOKS OF.) The Book of Ezra.—This contains : (I) the story of the return of the Jews, by permission of Cyrus, from Babylonia to Judaea, and of their attempts to restore the worship and rebuild the temple, finally successful under Darius Nothus. (2) the story of Ezra, the leader of a second expedition from Babylonia to Jeru salem, and of his reforms, culminating in the expulsion of the gentile wives, and in a solemn pledge to keep separate from "the peoples of the land" and to support the service of the temple.
The Hebrew text, as it has come down to us, is not in its original form. A long and important passage of 18 verses, the continuation of Ezra i. 1-11, was cut out, along with the interpolated Story of the Three Youths, in the 2nd century A.D. (See EZRA, THIRD BooK oF.) It contained the account of the of Cyrus for the returning exiles, now preserved in the Apocrypha in strange surroundings (1 Esdr. iv. 47b-56; 62–v. 6b). Another accident to the text, in the process of its transmission, has had far more serious consequences. Three chapters which originally belonged to the story of Ezra have been transposed to the book of Nehe miah—with chaos as the result. Neh. vii. 69 (7o)–viii. 18 originally followed immediately upon Ezra viii. 36. (The transposition was occasioned by the close resemblance of Ezra ii. 68–iii. 1 to Neh. vii..69–viii. Ia, coupled with the fact that the chronicler repeated his all-important list of returning exiles, giving it official authenti cation at both ends of the Persian period.) This first transposi tion rendered a second absolutely necessary. The original order of the remainder of the Ezra story was Ezra ix., x., Neh. ix., x. Then followed the story of Nehemiah. (Torrey, Ezra Studies, chap. viii.) The chronicler himself was the sole author of the book of Ezra, with the probable exception of the Aramaic section iv. 8–vi. 14. It is plain that every part of the book was composed with the same apologetic purpose, the purpose of the chronicler's whole history, to define and defend (but especially to define) the true "Israel," in opposition particularly to the very dangerous pretensions of the Samaritans, who claimed to be the true heirs of the religious tra dition after the destruction of Jerusalem. The question was set tled once for all by means of a historical fiction which seems to have originated in the 3rd century B.C. According to this fiction, the Jewish exiles in Babylonia (the sole survivors of the southern kingdom, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 20) returned to Judaea in large numbers, under the Persian rule, and thus restored to Palestine the only pure Israelite blood and the only genuine tradition. The chronicler was persuaded of this, and compiled his history to establish it. The great list (Ezra ii. and Neh. vii.), composed by the chronicler presumably from a census of the loyal families dwelling in Jerusa lem and Judaea in the 3rd century, is formally attested both by the Persian officer Sheshbazzar ("the Tirshatha") in S38 and also by Nehemiah in 384 (see below). All the other lists, earlier and later, were constructed with this one in view. The story of Ezra and his law (the Pentateuch) was designed to show—in a most dramatic and impressive manner—that the pure blood received not the slightest contamination.
The list of Persian kings furnished by Ezra–Nehemiah de serves especial attention. The order: Cyrus, Xerxes (iv. 6), Arta xerxes I. (iv. 7-24), Darius II. (v., vi.), Artaxerxes II. (Ezra and Nehemiah), compared with the order of the kings named in the book of Daniel, shows plainly that in the Jewish learned tradition of this late period Darius I. Hystaspis (as "Darius the Mede") was believed to have preceded Cyrus. (See DANIEL, BooK oF. ) With this one exception the chronicler has the correct order; and the history in our Hebrew-Aramaic text is all precisely as he him self composed it, when the story of Ezra is restored to its original sequence (see above). The chronology is of course defective; by the dating which was current Zerubbabel could flourish under both Cyrus and Darius II. (Moore, Judaism, i. 6) .
Portions of the book are written in the Aramaic language. Of these, vi. 15-18 and vii. 12-26 were certainly composed by the chronicler. It is possible that he was also the author of the remainder, iv. 8–vi. 14. He did not originate the fiction of the totally deserted cities of Judaea, the return from the exile, and the uncontaminated Israel, though it arose in his day. The Aramaic of all these passages has plain characteristics which render it impossible to date it earlier than the 3rd century. (See Ezra Studies, pp. 161-166; and especially Baumgartner, Zeit. alt test. Wissens, pp. 81-133.) The Book of contains : (I) the account of the rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem by Nehemiah. (2) con tinuation and conclusion of the chronicler's history, consisting mainly of his indispensable census; containing also the (equally indispensable) account of measures taken in order to confirm and perfect the work of purification accomplished by the chronicler's Ezra.
Nehemiah's remarkable narrative of his great undertaking and its successful accomplishment begins abruptly with a brief super scription. It ends in chap. vi., with the completion of the wall and its gates in the face of opposition by enemies. The leader of these adversaries is not the Sanballat of the Elephantine papyri (408 B.c.), but his grandson, the one mentioned by Josephus, Ant. XI., vii. 2, Viii. 2 sqq. If we may give credence to the account preserved in Josephus, Nehemiah's adversary afterwards spent some time at the Persian court, and ultimately received his ap pointment at Samaria from Darius III. It is plain that he was not governor at the time of the events narrated in Neh. i—vi.; his father (Delaiah?) presumably held that office. The epithet "Horonite" bestowed on him by Nehemiah may mean that he had taken his residence at Beth-horon with the purpose of taking a hand in Jewish affairs. The rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem was completed in 384 (see the evidence presented by Torrey, The Second Isaiah, pp. Nehemiah's account seems to have been written in 371 (v. 14). Not all of i.—vi. is from his hand, however. In chap. iii., verses 1-32, and probably also were written by the chronicler.
The remainder of the book, from vii. i onwards, is occupied solely with the chronicler's well known interests. His language, style and habits of composition are everywhere present, and there is no trace of any other hand than his. As was remarked above, the section vii. 69—x. 4o originally formed part of the chronicler's narrative of Ezra, and was at a later day transposed to his narrative of Nehemiah as the result of a copyist's mistake; vii. 68 (69) was immediately followed by xi. One other feature of the pseudo-Nehemiah requires mention: xiii. 28 seq. is not a direct allusion to the break with the Samaritans ; the chronicler wishes to show how Nehemiah had dealt with a similar case. He brings his account of Nehemiah's reforms to a close in precisely the manner in which he had ended the story of Ezra; cf. especially xiii. 31 with x. 35 (34) seq. This concluding verse of Nehemiah was the original and fitting close of the whole great work.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.-S. R. Driver, Lit. of the Old Testament; the Bibliography.-S. R. Driver, Lit. of the Old Testament; the commentaries of Bertheau-Ryssel (1887) , Siegfried (I 9oi) , Bertholet (1902) , Batten (1913) , with full bibliography; the "Ezra" and "Nehemiah" articles in the Encycl. Bibl. and the Jew. Encycl. For the views here presented, see Torrey, Composition and Historical Value of Ezra-Nehemiah (1896) and Ezra Studies (191o). See also JEws. (C. C. T.)