The Book of Ezra: Expository Commentary from Sermons by Dr Peter Masters

Bible Commentary on Ezra

by Dr Peter Masters, Metropolitan Tabernacle, London (adapted from sermons)

In the book of Ezra, the first six chapters are all about the first return of 42,000 plus Israelites from captivity in Babylon to Judah and to Jerusalem – the first great return. Ezra was not with that company. He remained in Persia. He remained in office as a leader among the Israelites in the capital, and as an attendant at court. But he had access to the documents. He had access, privileged access, to all Persian records. He quotes from them; he understands them, and so he is plainly the author of this book. The second part of the book begins in chapter 7, when for the first time Ezra speaks in the first person (Ezra 7:28) showing that he is now present in Jerusalem.

When we look at the last two verses of 2 Chronicles, the preceding book, we find they are exactly the same as the opening verses of the book of Ezra, which establishes that Ezra was, in all probability, the author also of the 1 and 2 Chronicles, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. He had access to all records including official Persian documents which he quotes from – two sections of Ezra are written in Aramaic, the language of Babylon, which the Jews there understood: Ezra 4:8-6:18;7:12-26. Ezra, the famous scribe and doctor of the law, is the author of the whole book. The two books of Chronicles were originally one book, and probably they were one book with Ezra and Nehemiah, but there is a gap between 2 Chronicles and Ezra which is obviously the 70 years captivity in Babylon, and then Ezra picks matters up and continues with the record.

Ezra is a record of the fulfilment of prophecy. Before Judah was taken into exile by the Babylonians, Jeremiah had foretold that this would be at the hand of the Babylonians, and how God would in turn punish them: ‘And this whole land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. ¹² And it shall come to pass, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the LORD, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans, and will make it perpetual desolations’ (Jeremiah 25:11-12). He had also prophesied that the captivity would return: ‘For thus saith the LORD, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place’ (Jeremiah 29:10). By studying Jeremiah’s prophecy Daniel was able to determine when they would return to Jerusalem, and prayed to God accordingly (Daniel 9:2-3). Isaiah had even foretold the name of Cyrus, and prophesied that he would be the one to give the command to rebuild Jerusalem. ‘Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself; ²⁵ That frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh diviners mad; that turneth wise men backward, and maketh their knowledge foolish; ²⁶ That confirmeth the word of his servant, and performeth the counsel of his messengers; that saith to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be inhabited; and to the cities of Judah, Ye shall be built, and I will raise up the decayed places thereof: ²⁷ That saith to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers: ²⁸ That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure: even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and to the temple, Thy foundation shall be laid’ (Isaiah 44:24- 45:1). The fulfilment of this amazing prophecy is given in those last two verses of 2 Chronicles and first three of Ezra. Jerusalem was in fact attacked by the Babylonians three times: in 605 BC, 597 BC, and finally in 586BC, when the temple was destroyed. The foundation of the second temple was laid in 536 BC. The seventy years captivity is to be counted from the earliest possible time – Nebuchadnezzar’s first campaign against Judah in 605 BC – until about the time the foundation stone is laid and sacrifices begin again.

The book tells us that only a small percentage of the people came back (Ezra 2:64), although there were some very elderly people who returned, who had seen the first temple, destroyed by the Babylonians, with their own eyes (Ezra 3:12). Of course, many of the Jews in Babylon had been born in exile, and had never known life in Judah. They had got used to their life in exile and could not face the hardships of returning home to such a task.

Ezra is a book of encouragement, a book of spiritual warfare, a book of strengthening, and of divine intervention. God’s people received something analogous at the time of the Reformation. The Reformation turned everything upside down, and humanity was given back the pure doctrines of the Bible, and given back even more than that. It has been rightly said that the Reformation – quite aside from its major gigantic spiritual accomplishments – gave mankind back the power of reason. Before the Reformation, everything was mad superstition, but the Reformation gave humanity back the power to think rationally, and it gave humanity back morality. What a transformation it was! But when God moves tremendous things happen. Revivals have had similar characteristics, but so too do individual conversions. A person's character is deeply changed: inclinations, desires, hopes and wishes; everything transformed by the power of the Spirit of God. We are seeing something similar here. Ezra is a book pre-eminently of challenge and encouragement: all the proofs they had as they went back, that God was with them: his protection on the long journey home, the return of pure doctrine, the ability to worship God in truth again as he had ordained, the paganism of Babylon now a thing of the past. That is how they should have seen it.

It is said that Ezra was no Elijah, and that's certainly true. It is also said that he was no David, and that is obviously true: he was a scribe. You think of Ezra and then you wonder, does he belong in the hall of fame of heroes of faith? By nature, if you met him, you wouldn't think so. His contemporary prophet Haggai was similar in a way, humanly speaking, the least impressive of the prophets. He was a prophet, a preacher – Haggai. He was surely never have accused of preaching sermons that were too long; he was the master of brief statements. He said the most dramatic and also strangely comprehensive things in very few words, and was mightily used of God, and Ezra is of the same cut in a way. His name doesn't lead you to expect a great deal if you set store by names, because he was named only ‘help’ or ‘helper’, a very modest name. He is constantly called ‘Ezra, the scribe’ because that is what he chiefly was: a scribe. Yes, an expounder and student of the law, and an extremely accomplished one, but not a noisy man, a prominent man. Yet he was trusted by the emperor, the king of the Medo-Persian Empire at court.

He was certainly an accountant. Now the Book of Ezra is inspired, of course, and it's just what God intended, but it reflects the style of its author. Notice how readily Ezra flies to genealogies and lists, and things like that, and the keeping of accounts. He doesn't tell you that there was such and such a sum gathered from Israel and contributed to by the emperor; instead he tells you exactly what it was made up of: how much gold, how much silver, how many pieces, what they were like. And he doesn't do it once, he does it twice, and then given half a chance he refers to it in detail again. It is the same with the genealogies. When he speaks of himself, he doesn't tell us much; he doesn't tell us any of his qualities or distinctives or accomplishments; he says nothing of that. But he was a priest and he establishes his priesthood, and his pen runs away with him, you would think, and he is telling you his entire lineage back to Aaron. He is an accountant in his mind, always running into detail, and we expound his book – and maybe we shouldn't do this – and we pass over those sections. Some expounders make something off them, and there is great interest in them, but we tend to pass over them, and we have a view of Ezra: the scribe, the quiet man. And yet he was the man for the hour, and he turns out to be a veritable hero of faith. Even mighty David's faith failed – ‘I will now perish by the hand of Saul’ – and not just on one occasion, on several occasions, whereas you never see Ezra waiver. It was the same with Elijah, as people say Ezra was no Elijah. ‘What doest thou here Elijah?’, when he is on the run, as it were, from his commission, momentarily, and depressed. You don't see that in Ezra: the quiet man. It reminds me of when we were boys and gathering up fireworks ready for the great day. But you soon discover that to have ten bangers – well, it was so in the old days anyway – at least two of them would turn out to be damp squibs. But if you had the slow showy things, they were reliable, and they went on for some time. It’s like that, sometimes with faith. The people who seem to want to be seen – I am not suggesting David and Elijah were in that category – fizzle out when there’s some great test of faith, and it's Ezra who holds the line, when just about everyone else has gone wrong. So we deeply respect this man.