The story is well known, because the text declares that the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin are the Samaritans, whom the king of the Assyrians, during the captivity of the ten tribes, assembled from different nations and moved into their cities and lands.^[1] And while they had accepted the law of God and partly served it . . . , they still worshiped their old idols. Therefore those who abhorred the true followers of God promised that they would have helped in the reconstruction of the temple, so that, after being received in their society, they might cause a loss of funds. It is obviously clear to everybody that these people figuratively represent the false brothers, that is, the heretics and the evil Catholics. In fact, they are the adversaries of Judah, that is, of the confession and praise that now the church offers to the Lord through orthodox faith and works that are worthy of faith. They are also enemies of Benjamin, that is, of the son of the right, because they separate the people who listen to them from the fate of the faithful people who will receive the blessing and the eternal kingdom at the right hand of the Judge.

Josephus^[1] believes that this Artaxerxes, who forbade that the temple might be reconstructed in Jerusalem after receiving the letter from the Samaritans, was Cambyses, son of Cyrus, who took power after his father had reigned for thirty years and ruled the kingdom for eight years. Then the magi reigned one year after him, until Darius, son of Hystaspis, succeeded. And in the second year of his reign, in which he allowed the temple to be rebuilt, the angel said through the prophet Zechariah before the people: O Lord of hosts, how long will you withhold mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, with which you have been angry these seventy years?^[2] With regard to Ahasuerus, to whom it is said that a letter of accusation was sent as well, it is not mentioned whether he replied or wrote anything back, because he died in the same year in which he had begun to reign, so that he left to Artaxerxes all the power and also the care of this case.

The Jews said, This temple was built in forty-six years, and you will raise it up in three days?^[1] They answered as they understood. But lest we too should perceive our Lord’s spiritual word in a carnal way, the Evangelist subsequently explained what temple it was of which he was speaking. As for their stating that the temple was built in forty-six years, they meant not its first but its second building. For Solomon, the first [builder], finished the temple very rapidly within seven years, during a time of great peace in his kingdom.^[2] It was destroyed by the Chaldeans,^[3] but after seventy years it began to be rebuilt, at the bidding of Cyrus the Persian, when the captivity was lightened.^[4] But the descendants of those who were deported were unable to finish the work that they were doing under the rulers Zerubbabel and Jeshua before forty-six years had passed, on account of the resistance of the neighboring nations.

This number [forty-six] of years is also most apt for the perfecting of our Lord’s physical body. Writers on natural history tell us that the form of the human body is completed within this number of days. During the first six days after conception it has a likeness to milk; during the following nine days it is changed into blood; next, in twelve days, it becomes solid; during the remaining eighteen days it is formed into the perfect features of all its members; and after this, during the time remaining until birth, it increases in size. Six plus nine plus twelve plus eighteen makes forty-five. If to this we add one, that is, the day on which the body, divided into its separate members, begins to grow, we find the same number of days in the building up of our Lord’s body as there were years in the construction of the temple.