47
When the seventh month came, and the sons of Israel were each in his own home, they gathered as one man in the square before the first gate toward the east.
48
Then Jeshua the son of Jozadak, with his fellow priests, and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, with his kinsmen, took their places and prepared the altar of the God of Israel,
49
to offer burnt offerings upon it, in accordance with the directions in the book of Moses the man of God.
50
And some joined them from the other peoples of the land. And they erected the altar in its place, for all the peoples of the land were hostile to them and were stronger than they; and they offered sacrifices at the proper times and burnt offerings to the Lord morning and evening.
51
They kept the feast of booths, as it is commanded in the law, and offered the proper sacrifices every day,
52
and thereafter the continual offerings and sacrifices on sabbaths and at new moons and at all the consecrated feasts.
53
And all who had made any vow to God began to offer sacrifices to God, from the new moon of the seventh month, though the temple of God was not yet built.
54
And they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food and drink
55
and carts to the Sidonians and the Tyrians, to bring cedar logs from Lebanon and convey them in rafts to the harbor of Joppa, according to the decree which they had in writing from Cyrus king of the Persians.
56
In the second year after their coming to the temple of God in Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak made a beginning, together with their brethren and the Levitical priests and all who had come to Jerusalem from the captivity;
57
and they laid the foundation of the temple of God on the new moon of the second month in the second year after they came to Judea and Jerusalem.