Ezra 3:1–7

Worship Restored at Jerusalem

³When the seventh month came and the Israelites were in their^b towns, the people gathered together as one in Jerusalem.^{* 2}Then Jeshua son of Jozadak with his fellow priests and Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel with his kin set out to build the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings on it, as prescribed in the law of Moses the man of God.^{* 3}They set up the altar on its foundation because they were in dread of the people of the lands, and they offered burnt offerings upon it to the Lord, morning and evening.^{* 4}And they kept the Festival of Booths,^c as prescribed, and offered the daily burnt offerings by number according to the ordinance, as required for each day,^{* 5}and after that the regular burnt offerings, the offerings at the new moon and at all the sacred festivals of the Lord, and the offerings of everyone who made a freewill offering to the Lord. ⁶From the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the Lord. But the foundation of the temple of the Lord was not yet laid. ⁷So they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the grant that they had from King Cyrus of Persia.^*