[1] When the seventh month was come, and the children of Israel were in the
cities, the people gathered themselves together as one man to Jerusalem.
[2] Then stood up Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and his brothers the priests,
and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and his brothers, and built the altar
of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings thereon, as it is written in
the law of Moses the man of God. [3] They set the altar on its base; for
fear was on them because of the peoples of the countries: and they offered
burnt offerings thereon to Yahweh, even burnt offerings morning and
evening. [4] They kept the feast of tents, as it is written, and [offered]
the daily burnt offerings by number, according to the ordinance, as the
duty of every day required; [5] and afterward the continual burnt-offering,
and [the offerings] of the new moons, and of all the set feasts of Yahweh
that were consecrated, and of everyone who willingly offered a
freewill-offering to Yahweh. [6] From the first day of the seventh month
began they to offer burnt offerings to Yahweh: but the foundation of the
temple of Yahweh was not yet laid. [7] They gave money also to the masons,
and to the carpenters; and food, and drink, and oil, to them of Sidon, and
to them of Tyre, to bring cedar-trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa,
according to the grant that they had of Cyrus king of Persia. [8] Now in
the second year of their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem, in the
second month, began Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua the son of
Jozadak, and the rest of their brothers the priests and the Levites, and
all those who were come out of the captivity to Jerusalem, and appointed
the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to have the oversight of the
work of the house of Yahweh. [9] Then stood Jeshua with his sons and his
brothers, Kadmiel and his sons, the sons of Judah, together, to have the
oversight of the workmen in the house of God: the sons of Henadad, with
their sons and their brothers the Levites. [10] When the builders laid the
foundation of the temple of Yahweh, they set the priests in their clothing
with trumpets, and the Levites the sons of Asaph with cymbals, to praise
Yahweh, after the order of David king of Israel. [11] They sang one to
another in praising and giving thanks to Yahweh, [saying], For he is good,
for his lovingkindness endures forever toward Israel. All the people
shouted with a great shout, when they praised Yahweh, because the
foundation of the house of Yahweh was laid. [12] But many of the priests
and Levites and heads of fathers` [houses], the old men who had seen the
first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes,
wept with a loud voice; and many shouted aloud for joy: [13] so that the
people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of
the weeping of the people; for the people shouted with a loud shout, and
the noise was heard afar off.
