EZRA – a challenge

Joyce Voysey

Ezra, so far, is proving to be quite a challenge; so different from Mark and Twelve Years with Mary Baker Eddy. 

Julie has done us a great service with writing up the results of her investigations.  I, too, found Dummelow to be very good with its information.  For example, we find that the book of Ezra is very important in the recording of the history of the Jewish people, being the chief authority for that particular period.  It records the fulfilling of the prophecy that the Jewish people will be restored to their own land; which they were, after 50 years in Persia.  To quote Dummelow further: It relates the establishment at Jerusalem of the community to which the world owes the preservation, arrangement and completion of the Hebrew Scriptures, and it marks the beginning and development of that intense attachment to the Mosaic Law which became so conspicuous a feature of Jewish religion life in after times.

My investigations had me consulting Ann Putcamp’s Guide for Bible Teaching in seeking to get my thinking straight about the historical order of the books of the Bible.  I found that Malachi, Isaiah 56-59, 63-65, Ruth and Jonah were all written at about the same time circa 400 BC.  It states that these were written as protests against Ezra’s exclusive policies.

So, as I read I must remember to look out for evidence of that.  And, I need to establish the identity of the prophet who foresaw that the Jewish people would be restored to their own land.  What was their land called?  Israel?  Judea?