Opposition to the Rebuilding

4 When the enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles were building^(A) a temple for the Lord, the God of Israel, ² they came to Zerubbabel and to the heads of the families and said, “Let us help you build because, like you, we seek your God and have been sacrificing to him since the time of Esarhaddon^(B) king of Assyria, who brought us here.”^(C)

³ But Zerubbabel, Joshua and the rest of the heads of the families of Israel answered, “You have no part with us in building a temple to our God. We alone will build it for the Lord, the God of Israel, as King Cyrus, the king of Persia, commanded us.”^(D)

⁴ Then the peoples around them set out to discourage the people of Judah and make them afraid to go on building.^{[a](E) 5} They bribed officials to work against them and frustrate their plans during the entire reign of Cyrus king of Persia and down to the reign of Darius king of Persia.

¹⁰ When Sanballat^(A) the Horonite and Tobiah^(B) the Ammonite official heard about this, they were very much disturbed that someone had come to promote the welfare of the Israelites.^(C)

¹⁹ But when Sanballat^(A) the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official and Geshem^(B) the Arab heard about it, they mocked and ridiculed us.^(C) “What is this you are doing?” they asked. “Are you rebelling against the king?”

Opposition to the Rebuilding

4 ^[a]When Sanballat^(A) heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed. He ridiculed the Jews, ² and in the presence of his associates^(B) and the army of Samaria, he said, “What are those feeble Jews doing? Will they restore their wall? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they finish in a day? Can they bring the stones back to life from those heaps of rubble^(C)—burned as they are?”

³ Tobiah^(D) the Ammonite, who was at his side, said, “What they are building—even a fox climbing up on it would break down their wall of stones!”^(E)