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"And I, King Artaxerxes, have also commanded the keepers of the treasures in Syria and Phoenicia that whatsoever Ezra the priest and the reader of the law of the Most High God shall send for, they should give it to him with speed,
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to the sum of a hundred talents of silver, likewise also of wheat, even to a hundred cors, and a hundred casks of wine, and other things in abundance.
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Let all things be performed according to the law of God diligently unto the Most High God, that wrath come not upon the kingdom of the king and his sons.
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I command you also that ye require no tax nor any other imposition on any of the priests, or Levites, or holy singers, or doorkeepers, or ministers of the temple, or on any that have doings in this temple, and that no man have authority to impose any thing upon them.
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"And thou, Ezra, according to the wisdom of God, ordain judges and justices, that they may judge in all Syria and Phoenicia all those who know the law of thy God; and those who know it not thou shalt teach.
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And whosoever shall transgress the law of thy God and of the king shall be punished diligently, whether it be by death or other punishment, by penalty of money or by imprisonment."
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Then said Ezra the scribe, "Blessed be the only Lord God of my fathers, who hath put these things into the heart of the king to glorify His house that is in Jerusalem,
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and hath honored me in the sight of the king and his counselors and all his friends and nobles.
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Therefore was I encouraged by the help of the Lord my God, and gathered together men of Israel to go up with me."
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And these are the chief men, according to their families and respective dignity, who went up with me from Babylon in the reign of King Artaxerxes:
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of the sons of Phinehas, Gershom; of the sons of Ithamar, Gamael; of the sons of David, Hattush the son of Shecaniah;