EZRA-NEHEMIAH, BOOK OF. The book of Ezra and Nehemiah originally formed one book in the Jewish Canon. In a passage of the Talmud (q.v.) the book of Nehemiah is evidently understood to be Included in the book of Ezra (Baba bathra 14, 2; cp. Melito of Sardis in Eusebius, HE, iv. 26). The Jewish Rabbis Bashi and Aben Ezra regard Nehemiah I. 1 as directly continuing Ezra x. 44. The Massoretes by their liturgical divisions of Ezra-Nehemiah and by their appended Massoretic notes (at the end of Nehemiah) show that they regarded the two books as one. In the Septuagint they actually appear as one (Second Esdras). But, besides this, there is a close connection between Ezra-Nehemiah and the Books of Chronicles (q.v.), so close a connection that Ezra-Nehemiah would seem to have been compiled by the Chronicler as an immediate sequel to his books of Chronicles. As Prof. Harper says, " Ezra-Nehemiah takes up the history at the point where it stops in Chronicles and continues it until the building of the second temple is narrated, the two boobs, Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah, thus constituting a history of the temple and its worship from the time of the building of Solomon's temple until the restoration of worship In the days of Ezra and Nehemiah." Ezra-Nehemiah resembles Chronicles in literary style and in vocabulary; and the opening words of the book of Ezra (i. 1-3a) are identical with the closing words of the Second Book of Chronicles (II. Chron. xxxvi. 22 ff.). The contents of the Book of Ezra may be divided into two sections: I., Chapters i.-xiii. 3; II., Chapter xiii. 4-31. In section I. Chapters 1.-vi. describe the return of the Jews to Palestine and their experiences there from the first year of Cyrus as king of Babylon to the sixth year of Darius Hystaspis (533-515 B.C.). Chapters vii.-x. continue the history
after an interval of about sixty years. They describe the arrival of Ezra in Jerusalem in the seventh year of Artaxerxes (453 B.C.) and his work as a reformer there. The contents of the Book of Nehemiah also divide them selves in the main into two sections. Chapters 1.-vii. narrate (in the first person) events connected with the planning and carrying out of Nehemiah's visit to Jeru salem, and with his efforts at reform there. Chapters viii.-x. narrate (in the third person) events connected with the public reading of the " book of the Law of Moses " by Ezra, the celebration of the Feast of Taber nacles, etc.. Chapters xi.-xiii. 3 give statistics. and deal with the dedication of the walls of Jerusalem, etc. Section II. (chap. xiii. 4-31) gives an account (in the first person) of Nehemiah's second visit to Jerusalem and of his work as a reformer. It is clear that the compiler of the work Ezra-Nehemiah made use of a number of different sources. Part of the Book of Ezra is written in Aramaic (iv. S-vi. 18 and vii. 12-26); and it has been mentioned already that the narrative in Ezra and Nehemiah is partly in the third and partly in the first person. The most important of the sources used F. God F is a designation used by anthropologists for a deity depicted in the MSS. of the Mayan Indians of Central America. He is represented with black lines on his face and body. These, according to Schellhas, signify death wounds. In any case, the deity is a death god and resembles God A (q.v.).