Calculations

3431: Cyrus the Great appoints Cambyses II as governor of Babylon

3431: Cyrus the Great removes Cambyses II as governor

3431: The Jews rebuild the altar

3433: The Jews lay the foundation of the Second Temple

3433: Cambyses II becomes co-regent with Cyrus in Persia

The Jews rebuilt the altar in “the seventh month” (Ezra 3:1), which without a qualifier must be in 3431, the year the Jews returned to Judea. They then began to bring in materials for the temple’s reconstruction (Ezra 3:7), laying its foundation in the “second month of the second year of their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem” (Ezra 3:8), which would be 3433.

Now, we know from secular history that shortly after conquering Babylon, Cyrus the Great appointed his son Cambyses II as governor of northern Babylon. This governorship lasted nine months, from April until December, at which point Cyrus dismissed him from the post. Not long after, Babylonian records show both Cyrus and Cambyses as carrying the title “King of Babylon, King of the Lands,” suggesting that Cyrus established Cambyses as co-regent shortly after dismissing him from his governorship.

In Daniel 10-12, we see that Daniel has been mourning for three weeks in the third year of Cyrus (Daniel 10:1-3). An angelic warrior appears to Daniel, mentions that he is resisting “the prince of the kingdom of Persia” (Daniel 10:13), and says that he also confirmed and strengthened Cyrus in his first year (Daniel 11:1).

I accept James B. Jordan’s suggestion that this narrative has to do with Cambyses II (Esther: Historical & Chronological Comments [IV]). Cyrus must have appointed Cambyses as governor in 3431, but due to the intervention of the angelic overlord of Persia (because Cambyses was an enemy of the Jews), Cyrus removed Cambyses from the post. However, Cyrus must have made his son co-regent in 3433, at which point, Daniel began fasting and mourning, most likely hoping that by doing so he could have Cambyses removed from this position as well.

Unfortunately, while the angelic overlord of Persia has been resisting Cambyses (the prince of Persia) for the three weeks Daniel has been mourning (Daniel 10:13), he does not promise Daniel that Cambyses will be removed. Instead, he indicates that he will watch over and fight for the Jews in Persia for the remainder of the reign of the Persian emperors, at which point, “the prince of Greece will come” (Daniel 10:20). This is obviously a reference to Alexander the Great, the Greek prince (later king) who conquered Persia and took over their empire.

If Daniel was mourning because Cambyses was in power, and this occurred in 3433, it seems most logical that this is connected to the events that immediately followed the laying of the temple’s foundation in 3433: “Then the people of the land tried to discourage the people of Judah. They troubled them in building, and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia” (Ezra 4:4-5). These counselors must have been working hand in hand with Cambyses to oppose the temple rebuilding effort all through the remainder of Cyrus’ reign and during all of Cambyses’ solo reign.

3431: The 7 Weeks of Years begin

3447: Darius the Great becomes king

3447: Darius the Great stops the Jews from rebuilding the city of Jerusalem

3449: The Jews resume the construction of the Second Temple again

3450: Darius the Great banishes Queen Vashti (Esther 1:3)

3453: The Jews complete the construction of the Second Temple

3454: Ezra comes to Jerusalem

3454: Darius the Great marries Esther (Esther 2:16)

3459: Haman attempts to exterminate the Jews

3459: Purim is established

3467: Nehemiah rebuilds the wall of Jerusalem (Nehemiah 2:1)

3467: Nehemiah becomes governor of Judah (Nehemiah 5:14)

3479: Nehemiah returns to Darius the Great

3479: The 7 Weeks of Years end

Cambyses’ reign was followed by a chaotic half-year of rule by Pseudo-Smerdis, after which Darius the Great took over Persia, which led to temple reconstruction efforts finally resuming and succeeding.

As with Cyrus the Great being known as both Cyrus the Persian and Darius the Mede, it is critical to realize that all the stories in the latter half of Ezra, in Nehemiah, and in Esther concern a single king: Darius the Great. This Darius has three aliases: Darius king of Persia, Ahasuerus, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.

There are at least five pieces of evidence for this:

• Ezra 4 mentions that a letter from Artaxerxes causes work on the temple to be discontinued until the second year of Darius king of Persia. Then in Ezra 6, Darius decrees that the Temple should be completed. The temple is completed in the sixth year of Darius (Ezra 6:15). Then, in Ezra 7, the narrative goes back to Artaxerxes, only now we’re in his seventh year. And the narrative continues through Nehemiah with Artaxerxes in place.
  The only plausible interpretation is that the narrative is transitioning seamlessly from the sixth year of Darius the Great to his seventh, especially because the letter in Ezra 7 makes clear that the purpose of Ezra’s trip was to re-establish temple worship and observance of the Law of Moses properly, so a long gap between Ezra 6 and Ezra 7 wouldn’t make sense (as opposed to it happening the year after the temple was completed).
  Furthermore, in Nehemiah 6:10, which takes place during the reign of Artaxerxes, the Temple is clearly already complete, so it couldn’t have been a second Darius who completed the Temple after Artaxerxes’ death. “Darius king of Persia” and “Artaxerxes king of Persia” must therefore be different names for the same person.
• If the “Darius king of Persia” of Ezra 4:5 is also the “Ahasuerus” of Ezra 4:6 and the “Artaxerxes” of Ezra 4:7, then the accusation of Ezra 4:6 is the letter immediately following that verse, instead of a completely out-of-context reference that is never explored. Furthermore, the accusatory letter being sent to Artaxerxes also picks up the narrative thread concerning Darius in Ezra 4:5, thereby making both “Ahasuerus” and “Artaxerxes” out of place if they are not references to the same king.
• The events of the Book of Esther running parallel to those of the Book of Ezra explains why the city of Shushan was perplexed in Esther 3:15: Darius had recently sponsored the completion of the Jewish Temple. He was a great champion of the Jewish people – why would he suddenly call for their extermination?
• It also explains why Nehemiah 2:6 draws attention to the queen sitting beside Darius. That queen was Esther, who at that point had already defeated Haman and revealed herself as a Jew. Therefore, she was openly promoting the welfare of the Jews as the Jewish queen of Persia.
• Daniel 11:1-4, which I will discuss in the next section.

You would tie yourself in knots trying to connect every name in use in these Bible books to a different Persian king. The simplest explanation by far is that the Bible books of post-Exile Persian rule involved only two kings, Cyrus the Great and Darius the Great, each of whom had multiple titles in the Bible. Note: Jordan has pointed out (Biblical Horizons No. 80: Rethinking the Order of the Old Testament) that Cyrus was like David, in that he prepared the construction of the temple, and Darius was like Solomon, in that he actually built it, then married a lot of women.

Now, in Ezra 4, the letter that went to Darius the Great in the year he became king was specifically phrased to get the king to stop the Jews from rebuilding “the city and the walls” (Ezra 4:12-13), not the temple. However, the enemies of the Jews used his response to stop the Jews from working on the temple until Darius’ second year (Ezra 4:23-24).

Note: The adversaries of the Jews deceived Darius by depicting something appropriate (temple reconstruction) as an act of rebellion (rebuilding the city in order to resist Persian rule), much as Haman tricked Darius into ordering the extermination of the Jews by referring to them as an unnamed rebellious people (Esther 3:8-9).

In the second year of Darius the Great, Haggai and Zechariah instructed Zerubbabel and Joshua to resume temple construction again (we see this in both Ezra 4:24-5:2 and Haggai 1, indicating that unlike in the Book of Zechariah, in Haggai, “Darius” is Darius the Great). This time, the Persian officials Tattenai and Shethar-Boznai and their companions (who were not listed amongst the adversaries of the Jews in Ezra 4) knew the Jews had been commanded to stop rebuilding the city and so asked them by what authority they were rebuilding the temple.

The Jews responded by referencing the decree of Cyrus, so the officials sent an inquiry to Darius the Great, who found a record of Cyrus’ decree and wrote back, ordering the officials not to interfere with the temple rebuilding efforts, but rather to financially support first its construction and then the regular activities of the restored Jewish worship system. This led to the completion of the Second Temple in the sixth year of Darius the Great (Ezra 6:15).

Interestingly, the Jews of Jesus’ day claimed that the Second Temple took 46 years to build (John 2:20). Looking at secular history, this cannot reference Herod’s later enhancements of the temple, nor can it stretch from the beginning of temple construction shortly after the return from exile to the sixth year of Darius the Great.

To understand this number, we must consider God’s promise in Haggai 2:1-9 that the Second Temple would end up being more glorious than the First Temple. God declares that “in a little while” He will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land (i.e., the Gentiles and Israel), and will bring the nations and fill the temple with glory, paid for with gold and silver (Haggai 2:6-8). This is a reference to the first Purim in the Book of Esther, which occurred in the 12th year of Darius the Great (Esther 3:7) and resulted in two important outcomes:

• Many non-Jews converted to Judaism (Esther 8:17). Some of these converts would have given gifts of gold and silver and other riches to be used to beautify the Temple.
• The Jews killed their enemies, but “did not lay a hand on the plunder” (Esther 9:10), which, as Jordan has explained, means they used it to beautify the Temple (Biblical Horizons No. 2: The Battle of Gog and Magog).

In this way, we can understand that the restoration of the temple extended beyond the completion of its initial construction and into later events that caused it to be beautified (Darius the Great was explicitly supportive of temple beautification efforts after the temple’s initial construction, according to Ezra 7:27). In fact, if we assume that these beautification and restoration activities included the events of the Book of Nehemiah as well (it would make sense that Nehemiah would return to Shushan when all temple glorification efforts were complete, the worship system was restored, and the civil system was stable), we can see that the 46 years would take us from the third year of Cyrus (when the temple foundation was laid) until the 32nd year of Darius the Great (Nehemiah 5:14; Nehemiah 13:6). This lines up almost perfectly with secular history concerning the timelines of Cyrus, Cambyses, Pseudo-Smerdis, and Darius (especially if we take into account how time is accounted differently in the Bible).

This means the 32nd year of Darius the Great was 3479, which means he started reigning in 3447, the initial accusation in his reign also occurred in 3447, the Jews resumed temple construction in 3449, the temple was completed in 3453, Ezra came to Jerusalem in 3454, and the events of the year of the first Purim occurred in 3459.

Understanding the 7 Weeks of Daniel 9

As mentioned previously, in Daniel 9, Gabriel provides a prophecy to Daniel that fills in the gap between the decree of Cyrus and the coming of Jesus. He says that 69 weeks are between those two events, divided into 7 weeks and 62 weeks. For now, let’s consider the 7 weeks, during which time, “the street [would] be built again, and the wall, even in troublesome times” (Daniel 9:25).

This is obviously a reference to the narratives of Ezra and Nehemiah, which deal with the rebuilding of the temple and the wall of Jerusalem, despite fierce opposition from various hostile groups of adversaries. Several minor prophets (including Haggai and Zechariah, as previously mentioned) and parts of Daniel also cover the events of this time period. Finally, as mentioned, the narrative of Esther is also relevant, since it involves the glorification of the Second Temple.

Before we proceed further, let’s resolve one potential confusion. The “command to restore and build Jerusalem” in Daniel 9:24 must be the decree of Cyrus the Great and not the command of Darius the Great in Ezra 6 for three reasons:

• Gabriel gave his prophecy to Daniel right before the decree of Cyrus. It is illogical to assume that there was an almost two-decade gap before the 70 weeks began, when a more logical candidate occurred right after Gabriel visited Daniel.
• The decree of Cyrus was a fulfillment of the Jeremiah prophecy that Daniel was just praying about in the first half of Daniel 9. To interpret Daniel 9:25 as referring to Darius’ decree divorces the purpose of Gabriel’s visit from the context of the preceding verses.
• Darius’ decree was merely a reinforcement of Cyrus’ decree, as Ezra 5 and 6 make clear. The Bible mentions Cyrus’ decree at least four times because it is the initiating event of this entire section of Bible history. Darius’ decree, on the other hand, was just a formality to permit the Jews to continue fulfilling Cyrus’ decree. It therefore receives no other mention in Scripture.

Now, if the “weeks” of the first 7 weeks of Daniel 9 were segments of 7 literal years each (credit to Jordan for making me aware of this, even though my exact interpretation of the 70 Weeks of Years is different from his), then the 7 Weeks of Years would be exactly 49 years. And indeed, if Cyrus conquered Babylon in 3430 and released the Jews from exile in the first year of his reign, 3431, which would also be the “first year” of the 7 Weeks of Years, then the Book of Nehemiah ends in 3479, the 49th year from the beginning of Persian rule.

This also means temple restoration activities ended on a Sabbath of Sabbaths. This lends particular weight to the immediate backsliding of the Jews after Nehemiah left (discussed in Nehemiah 13), as it was yet another major Sabbath failure, similar to how the First Apostasy started on the Sabbath of Sabbaths after the Exodus.