We jump a couple of chapters. In them, we see that the mixed multitude of pagans Esarhaddon had shipped into the northern kingdom, eventually called “Samaritans,” came and asked to participate in building the new temple. Keep in mind that King Josiah, as part of his reforms, had torn down the shrine at Bethel, and Syria had raided the one up in Dan, so they had only their typical idolatrous shrines scattered around. They honestly believed they were worshiping the same God as the Judeans.
However, the Judeans would not let them join. It’s quite certain the explanation given was much longer than the short answer quoted in Ezra. At any rate, the Samaritans took offense and began politicking to have the work in Jerusalem halted, and eventually built their own shrine on Mount Gerizim. Again, keep in mind that the Medo-Persian Emperor is not the only figure with authority here; both the Persians and Medes retained their own national rulers and officials, plus there were lower ranking imperial officials, some with the same names passed around among the emperors. Thus, there is the passage of time while emperors die and successors take the throne, but there are also lower ranking officials acting on behalf of the emperor, and not always telling him until later, if at all.
So, we have a letter from the Samaritans and those appointed to manage imperial business in that region of the empire to one Artaxerxes who is obviously not the emperor who takes that name later. Given the time frame, this was still while Cyrus was Emperor, and the Samaritans avoided alerting him by writing to some other official, someone who wasn’t aware of the Edict of Cyrus, but authorized to act on his behalf. Keep in mind that the order to rebuild the Temple was a fairly insignificant matter on the scale of imperial business. It was not a major issue to Cyrus, who probably signed the decree on the advice of someone like Daniel, like a lot things major figures sign nowadays without giving much thought to the matter. But by this time, Daniel would have died and no one would be looking out for the Judeans.
Side notes: Osnapper is a common Aramaic version of Ashurbanipal. The reference to “Beyond the River” is the imperial name for the Fifth Satrapy that includes everywhere west of the Euphrates. Ezra also mentions a similar political campaign much later, under Emperors Xerxes and Artaxerxes (4:6). They kept hiring lobbyists and bribing lower officials off and on for a very long time. At any rate, they wrote this letter to a lower official who had quick access to more ancient records from Babylon.
The response to this letter was exactly what the Samaritans hoped for, and they brought troops to shut down the Temple construction. It sat in this unfinished state for 15 years — through the end of Cyrus’ reign, Cambyses and Smerdis, and into the reign of Darius I (starting around 521-520 BC).
It was under the preaching of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah that the leadership of the Returnees got back to work on the Temple. By now, Tattenai was the Satrap over this region. When he was alerted, and came to investigate, the Judeans showed him the Edict of Cyrus, which was no doubt news to him. The text makes the point that God was behind this resurgence, and kept anyone from actually hindering the work while it takes a year or so to hear back from Darius. Also notice that, while the previous lying letters from Samaria included mention of the city wall, the context of Tattenai’s inquiry is accurately limited to the matter of the Temple only.
This brings us to our focal passage. Whoever ordered the work to stop in the past did not have it properly registered in the imperial records. Thus, the servants of Darius found only the Edict of Cyrus in the fortress of Ecbatana. This was a cooler, drier climate in the Zagros Mountains where scrolls would last longer than in the muggy, swampy air down in old Babylon. So the response was a very strong affirmation that Tattenai was to support the work from imperial resources there in the Fifth Satrapy, along with any ongoing support the Judeans might request. Indeed, anyone interfering would be impaled and stood upright on a timber pulled from his own home (Darius had actually done this to about 3000 Babylonians). Ezra notes in passing that this supportive attitude ran through the reign of his own Emperor Artaxerxes.
So the Temple was completed in roughly four years, upon which the people celebrated with a massive offering. The priests and Levites were put to work in Temple service on a rotation system. When the calendar came around, they also celebrated Passover and Unleavened Bread. It was the Lord who made them joyful.
Don’t get hung up on the mention of Assyria. It was one of the many proper titles of the Emperor. In this case, it circles all the way back around to when the troubles with Mesopotamian empires started, and now are all quelled by the current rulers who are not at all hostile to the Judean people. Ezra writes this knowing that the imperial court is going to see it, and there’s nothing wrong with giving credit where due.
