Ezra 1:9

9 This is a list of the items that were returned: gold basins 30 silver basins 1,000 silver incense burners 29

Ezra 1:9 Meaning and Commentary

Ezra 1:9

And this is the number of them
Of the vessels delivered, as follows:

thirty chargers of gold, a thousand chargers of silver;
these, according to Ben Melech, were vessels in which water was put to wash hands in; but rather they were, as Aben Ezra observes from the Jerusalem Talmud ^F18, vessels in which they gathered the blood of lambs and bullocks slain for sacrifices:

nine and twenty knives;
which, because the handles of them were of gold or silver, were valuable, and might be very large knives, and what the priests used in slaying and cutting up the sacrifices.

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FOOTNOTES:

F18 T. Hieros. Yoma, fol. 41. 1.

Ezra 1:9 In-Context

7 King Cyrus himself brought out the articles that King Nebuchadnezzar had taken from the LORD ’s Temple in Jerusalem and had placed in the temple of his own gods.

8 Cyrus directed Mithredath, the treasurer of Persia, to count these items and present them to Sheshbazzar, the leader of the exiles returning to Judah.

9 This is a list of the items that were returned: gold basins 30 silver basins 1,000 silver incense burners 29

10 gold bowls 30 silver bowls 410 other items 1,000

11 In all, there were 5,400 articles of gold and silver. Sheshbazzar brought all of these along when the exiles went from Babylon to Jerusalem.

Footnotes

• [a]. The meaning of this Hebrew word is uncertain.