Ezra Chapter 7    .... by Joyce Voysey

Here we are at chapter7 and we finally get to see Ezra’s name.  Interestingly I hadn’t realised that he had not been mentioned before.  Looked up the Bible Concordance and found that he gets a mention in 1 Chronicles, and in Nehemiah.  I wonder when I will be urged to find out what they say about him?

More than 50 years have passed in the meantime, according to the reckoning of the times of the kings mentioned.  Artaxerxes is now king of
Persia.  We find that Ezra has a direct line back to Aaron, Moses brother.  We learn that there were Jews still in Babylon, and Dummelow tells us

that they were more strict in their religious observances than those at Jerusalem.  It was Ezra’s task to introduce reforms, and he was specially suited to the task, it seems.  The punishments for not obeying the law were to be very harsh – “...let judgment be executed speedily upon him, whether it be unto death, or to banishment, or to confiscation of goods, or to imprisonment.”  (7:26)

All of the Jews who wished to go with Ezra were free to go with the approval of the king.  Those who stayed contributed silver and gold, as did the king and his counsellors, this to provide offerings “…upon the altar of the house of your God which is in Jerusalem” (verse 17).  After all, the king was keen to have this part of his realm in good order.

So, by the last verse of the chapter, Ezra was ready for his work.  “And I was strengthened as the hand of the Lord my god was upon me, and I gathered together out of Israel chief men to go up with me.”

An interesting note in Dummelow: The story of Esther is set in the period of 50 years before Ezra’s time.