What is the context?
Tattenai and his associates carry out Darius’s instructions. The elders continue building, encouraged by Haggai and Zechariah, and the temple is completed on the third day of Adar in Darius’s sixth year.
The account places God’s command alongside the Persian royal decrees. The people then celebrate the dedication with joy, offering bulls, rams and lambs, together with twelve male goats as a sin offering for all Israel, one for each tribe.
Priests and Levites are assigned to their groups for service according to the Book of Moses. Completion means the restoration of an ordered place of worship, not merely finishing a building.
How is this passage commonly understood?
Wesley emphasizes that the success belongs to God, who both sends the prophets and moves the ruler to support the work. Gill reads the twelve goats as expressing concern for all Israel, including people from beyond Judah and Benjamin.
Readers also discuss why Artaxerxes is named in the summary of royal decrees before the completion date under Darius. Gill considers several possibilities and favors treating the name as another title of Darius; the Cambridge commentary understands it as a reference to later royal help included in the summary. The completion date itself is explicitly given as Darius’s sixth year.
What is our position?
We don't have a position on this passage yet. When our study reaches a conclusion the text supports, it will appear here.