EZRA 4
Read Ezra 4:1-25
On the face of it, the Israelites who came back from Babylon seem to be a bit churlish. They have received an offer of help to rebuild the Temple from people living not far away who say they worship the same god as them and have been doing so for years. But the Israelites rejected the offer and refused to have anything to do with them. Why such an attitude? Well, we are told from the outset that these people offering their support are actually enemies of the returnees and were put there by the King of Assyria; they weren’t the original inhabitants of the region.
If we look back at our history of God’s people in 2 Kings, we see that the Northern Kingdom (called Israel) was invaded by Assyria and the inhabitants deported to the Assyrian kingdom. 2 Kings 17 tells us all about this and tells us that the King of Assyria brought people from various parts of his kingdom to resettle the area. These people worshipped various gods, but the King of Assyria commanded that one of the Jewish priests go back and teach them about worshipping the Lord (2 Kings 17:27-28). What happened was that the Lord became just one of the gods that these people worshipped. These people became known as Samaritans as Samaria was the capital of the region and in the New Testament we read that the Jewish people would have nothing to do with the Samaritans because of their corrupt religious practices. That is why it was so shocking to the disciples when Jesus reached out to the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4).
That is why those who returned from exile to Babylon (originally from the Southern Kingdom of Judah) were so opposed to receiving help from them. What was at stake here was the purity of worship. We have seen that the building of the Temple was the priority for those returning from exile and it was important that the worship was proper – done on an altar and in the right way as set out by the Lord. They were not being rude or un-neighbourly. It was the conviction that God should be worshipped in the way that he ordained, rather than in a way that suits the people who are worshipping. It is as if a strange cult wanted to help a Christian denomination in a building project with the expectation of worshipping together, when they held views that were incompatible with Christian worship.
God’s people should expect opposition, and, as is often the case it is the opponents who hold the upper hand. They wrote to the King (now King Xerxes, not Cyrus who allowed them to return) with lies and insinuations, ‘you know this lot you sent back to Jerusalem; well, when they finish they’re not going to pay their taxes and whatever else they owe you’ (v13). They also re-wrote history to paint God’s people in a bad light. The new king, obviously alarmed, ordered the work on the Temple to be stopped while he investigated.
The promise that God made through his prophets that his people would return and once again worship at the Temple seemed to be under threat. How could this be resolved?