18 And they set the priests in their classes, and the Levites in their divisions, for the service of God, which is at Jerusalem: as it is written in the book of Moses.
Bring the tribe of Levi near, and present them before Aaron the priest, that they may minister unto him;
And the divisions of the sons of Aaron: the sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.
and prepare yourselves by your fathers' houses, in your divisions, according to the writing of David king of Israel, and according to the writing of Solomon his son; and stand in the sanctuary for the classes of the fathers' houses, for your brethren, the children of the people, and [according] to the divisions of the fathers' houses of the Levites;
And thou shalt bring the Levites before the tent of meeting; and thou shalt gather together the whole assembly of the children of Israel. And thou shalt bring the Levites before Jehovah; and the children of Israel shall put their hands upon the Levites. And Aaron shall offer the Levites as a wave-offering before Jehovah from the children of Israel, and they shall perform the service of Jehovah. And the Levites shall lay their hands upon the heads of the bullocks, and thou shalt offer the one for a sin-offering, and the other for a burnt-offering, to Jehovah, to make atonement for the Levites. And thou shalt set the Levites before Aaron, and before his sons, and offer them as a wave-offering to Jehovah. And thou shalt separate the Levites from among the children of Israel, that the Levites may be mine. And afterwards shall the Levites come in to do the service of the tent of meeting. And thou shalt cleanse them, and offer them as a wave-offering. For they are wholly given unto me from among the children of Israel; instead of every one that breaketh open the womb, instead of every firstborn among the children of Israel, have I taken them unto me. For all the firstborn among the children of Israel are mine, both of man and beast; on the day that I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt, I hallowed them to myself. And I have taken the Levites instead of all the firstborn among the children of Israel. And I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and to his sons, from among the children of Israel, to perform the service of the children of Israel in the tent of meeting, and to make atonement for the children of Israel; that there be no plague among the children of Israel, when the children of Israel draw near to the sanctuary. And Moses and Aaron, and all the assembly of the children of Israel, did to the Levites according to all that Jehovah had commanded Moses concerning the Levites: so did the children of Israel to them. And the Levites purified themselves from sin, and they washed their garments; and Aaron offered them as a wave-offering before Jehovah; and Aaron made atonement for them to cleanse them. And afterwards the Levites came in to perform their service in the tent of meeting before Aaron, and before his sons; as Jehovah had commanded Moses concerning the Levites, so did they to them. And Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying, This is that which concerneth the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upward shall he come to labour in the work of the service of the tent of meeting. And from fifty years old he shall retire from the labour of the service, and shall serve no more; but he shall minister with his brethren in the tent of meeting, and keep the charge, but he shall not serve [in] the service. Thus shalt thou do unto the Levites with regard to their charges.
And David was old and full of days; and he made Solomon his son king over Israel. And he gathered together all the princes of Israel, with the priests and the Levites. And the Levites were numbered from thirty years old and upward; and their number, by their polls, man by man, was thirty-eight thousand. Of these, twenty-four thousand were to preside over the work of the house of Jehovah; and six thousand were officers and judges; and four thousand were doorkeepers; and four thousand praised Jehovah with the instruments which I made, [said David,] to praise [therewith]. And David divided them into courses according to the sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari. Of the Gershonites: Laadan and Shimei. The sons of Laadan: the head was Jehiel, and Zetham, and Joel, three. The sons of Shimei: Shelomith, and Haziel, and Haran, three. These were the chief fathers of Laadan. And the sons of Shimei: Jahath, Ziza, and Jeush, and Beriah. These were the four sons of Shimei. And Jahath was the head, and Ziza the second; and Jeush and Beriah had not many sons: as father's house, therefore, they were reckoned as one. The sons of Kohath: Amram, Jizhar, Hebron, and Uzziel, four. The sons of Amram: Aaron and Moses. And Aaron was separated, that he should be hallowed as most holy, he and his sons for ever, to offer before Jehovah, to do service to him, and to bless in his name for ever. -- And as to Moses the man of God, his sons were named of the tribe of Levi. The sons of Moses: Gershom and Eliezer. The sons of Gershom: Shebuel the head. And the sons of Eliezer: Rehabiah the head; and Eliezer had no other sons, but the sons of Rehabiah were very many. -- The sons of Jizhar: Shelomith the head. The sons of Hebron: Jeriah the head, Amariah the second, Jahaziel the third, and Jekameam the fourth. The sons of Uzziel: Micah the head, and Jishijah the second. The sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi. The sons of Mahli: Eleazar and Kish. And Eleazar died, and had no sons, but daughters; and their brethren the sons of Kish took them. The sons of Mushi: Mahli, and Eder, and Jeremoth, three. These were the sons of Levi according to their fathers' houses, the chief fathers, as they were reckoned, by number of names by their polls, who did the work of the service of the house of Jehovah, from twenty years old and upward. For David said, Jehovah the God of Israel has given rest to his people, and he will dwell in Jerusalem for ever; and the Levites also have no more to carry the tabernacle, nor any of its vessels for its service.
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Commentary on Ezra 6 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 6
Ezr 6:1-12. Darius' Decree for Advancing the Building.
1. Darius the king—This was Darius Hystaspes. Great and interesting light has been thrown on the history of this monarch and the transaction of his reign, by the decipherment of the cuneatic inscriptions on the rocks at Behistun.
in the house of the rolls, where the treasures were laid up in Babylon—An idea of the form of this Babylonian register house, as well as the manner of preserving public records within its repositories, can be obtained from the discoveries at Nineveh. Two small chambers were discovered in the palace of Koyunjik, which, from the fragments found in them, Mr. Layard considers "as a house of the rolls." After reminding his readers that the historical records and public documents of the Assyrians were kept on tablets and cylinders of baked clay, many specimens of which have been found, he goes on to say, "The chambers I am describing appear to have been a depository in the palace of Nineveh for such documents. To the height of a foot or more from the floor they were entirely filled with them; some entire, but the greater part broken into many fragments, probably by the falling in of the upper part of the building. They were of different sizes; the largest tablets were flat, and measured about nine inches by six and a half inches; the smaller were slightly convex, and some were not more than an inch long, with but one or two lines of writing. The cuneiform characters on most of them were singularly sharp and well-defined, but so minute in some instances as to be almost illegible without a magnifying glass. These documents appear to be of various kinds. The documents that have thus been discovered in the house of rolls' at Nineveh probably exceed all that have yet been afforded by the monuments of Egypt, and when the innumerable fragments are put together and transcribed, the publication of these records will be of the greatest importance to the history of the ancient world" [Nineveh and Babylon].
2. Achmetha—long supposed to be the capital of Greater Media (the Ecbatana of classical, the Hamadan of modern times), [is] at the foot of the Elwund range of hills, where, for its coolness and salubrity, Cyrus and his successors on the Persian throne established their summer residence. There was another city, however, of this name, the Ecbatana of Atropatene, and the most ancient capital of northern Media, and recently identified by Colonel Rawlinson in the remarkable ruins of Takht-i-Soleiman. Yet as everything tends to show the attachment of Cyrus to his native city, the Atropatenian Ecbatana, rather than to the stronger capital of Greater Media, Colonel Rawlinson is inclined to think that he deposited there, in his fortress, the famous decree relating to the Jews, along with the other records and treasures of his empire [Nineveh and Persepolis].
8-10. of the king's goods, even of the tribute beyond the river … expenses be given unto these men—The decree granted them the privilege of drawing from his provincial treasury of Syria, to the amount of whatever they required for the furthering of the work and providing sacrifice for the service of the temple, that the priests might daily pray for the health of the king and the prosperity of the empire.
11, 12. whosoever shall alter this word—The warning was specially directed against the turbulent and fanatical Samaritans. The extremely favorable purport of this edict was no doubt owing in some measure to the influence of Cyrus, of whom Darius entertained a high admiration, and whose two daughters he had married. But it proceeded still more from the deep impressions made even on the idolatrous people of that country and that age, as to the being and providence of the God of Israel.
Ezr 6:13-15. The Temple Finished.
13-15. Then Tatnai … did speedily—A concurrence of favorable events is mentioned as accelerating the restoration of the temple and infusing a new spirit and energy into the workmen, who now labored with unabating assiduity till it was brought to a completion. Its foundation was laid in April, 536 B.C. (Ezr 3:8-10), and it was completed on February 21, 515 B.C., being twenty-one years after it was begun [Lightfoot].
Ezr 6:16-18. Feasts of the Dedication.
16. the children of Israel … kept the dedication … with joy—The ceremonial was gone through with demonstrations of the liveliest joy. The aged who had wept at the laying of the foundation [Ezr 3:12] were most, if not all of them, now dead; and all rejoiced at the completion of this national undertaking.
17. twelve he-goats—as at the dedication of the tabernacle (Nu 7:87; 8:17).
18. they set the priests in their divisions, and the Levites in their courses … as it is written in the book of Moses—Although David arranged the priests and Levites in courses according to their families, it was Moses who assigned to the priests and Levites their rights and privileges, their stations and several duties.
Ezr 6:19-22. And of the Passover.
21. all such as had separated themselves … from the filthiness of the heathen of the land—that is, who had given satisfactory evidence of being true proselytes by not only renouncing the impure worship of idolatry, but by undergoing the rite of circumcision, a condition indispensable to a participation of the passover.
22. kept the feast … with joy: for the Lord … turned the heart of the king of Assyria unto them—that is, king of the Persian empire, which now included the possessions, and had surpassed the glory, of Assyria. The favorable disposition which Darius had evinced towards the Jews secured them peace and prosperity and the privileges of their own religion during the rest of his reign. The religious joy that so remarkably characterized the celebration of this feast, was testified by expressions of lively gratitude to God, whose overruling power and converting grace had produced so marvellous a change in the hearts of the mighty potentates, and disposed them, pagans though they were, to aid the cause and provide for the worship of the true God.