Ezra-Nehemiah: Retrograde Revolution

In 539 BCE Cyrus the Great writes an edict allowing the Jews who had been exiled by the former Neo-Babylonian empire to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple. Many remain behind in Babylon, but some Jews pick up and return, and thus begins sefer Ezra-Nehemiah. What follows are the twists and turns of what becomes known as the Period of Restoration in Israel. The period is remarkable, and teeming with potential, but it is also fraught with unprecedented challenges. The ways in which the Jewish community and its leaders contend with those challenges make up the bulk of the sefer. But, as with all historiographical works in Tanakh, the events of the period aren’t simply chronicled. Language, genres, motifs, and personalities are carefully curated to persuade the reader of the sefer’s unique ideology and worldview. Ezra-Nehemiah takes its readers on a literary tour of 6th-5th century Judea, an era in which cohesiveness among fragmented Jewish communities was being tested, the parameters of Jewish identity were being re-assessed, political tact was being learned by necessity, and Biblical literacy was at long last, becoming the centerpiece of the Jewish community. In a sefer that feels more timely than ever, modern students of Ezra-Nehemiah are likely to learn as much about the times through which they are living, as they are about the trailblazers of their past.