This Artaxerxes,^[1] under whom Ezra came up from Babylon to Jerusalem, Josephus believes to be Xerxes son of Darius, who reigned after him.^[2] Moreover, the books of the Chronicon^[3] hold that the successor of this same Xerxes, who also among them was called Artaxerxes, is designated here. Now Darius, under whom the temple was built, ruled thirty-six years; after him Xerxes ruled for twenty years; after him Artabanus ruled for seven months (which the chroniclers set down as a year); and after him Artaxerxes ruled for forty years.^[4]

Now Ezra, who is called a swift scribe in the law of Moses for having restored the Law that had been destroyed, rewrote not only the Law but also, as the common tradition of our forebears holds, the whole sequence of sacred Scripture that had likewise been destroyed by fire, in accordance with the way that seemed to him to meet the needs of readers.^[1]

By his name too, which means helper, Ezra openly stands for the Lord. For it is he by whom alone the people of the faithful are constantly liberated from tribulations and, as though from captivity in Babylon to freedom in Jerusalem, are brought from the confusion of the vices to the peace and serenity of the virtues as they advance by the steps of meritorious deeds. In the second psalm of the same anabathmoi^[1] [i.e., of the Ascents], the psalmist proclaims to all those who strive for the highest under whose leadership they ought to strive to attain it when he suggests, My help is from the Lord who made heaven and earth.^[2] In his actions, too, Ezra was a figure of the Lord, since Ezra led back no small portion of the people from the captivity to Jerusalem and at the same time conveyed money and vessels consecrated to God for the glory of his temple; and through his pontifical authority^[3] he purged these people of their foreign wives.^[4] What all this suggests with regard to what is done or is going to be done in the church by the Lord is clear to the learned reader, but we will take pains to make them accessible to the less learned as well. For the fact that Ezra goes up from Babylon, and some of the children of Israel and descendants of the priests and the Levites go up with him. This signifies the merciful provision of our Redeemer by which, appearing in the flesh, he entered into the confusion of this world though he himself was free from the confusion of sins so that, when he returned, he might free us from all confusion and lead us with him into the restfulness of celestial peace.

This Artaxerxes, who in his own way pays homage to God’s temple and priests with a most devout mind and offers willing service to him, like his predecessor Darius signifies Christian rulers. Nor should one marvel if we have said that the successors of Cyrus, who caused the Lord’s temple and city to be built, who loved and assisted his servants and law, contain a figure of Christian kings, since the Lord himself said through the prophet that Cyrus came as a figure of his own Son and deigned that Cyrus should be honored through his name: Thus the Lord says to my anointed Cyrus,^[1] and the other things about him that we have spoken about more extensively above.^[2]

These are their family heads, and this is the genealogy of those who went up with me from Babylonia, in the reign of King Arta-xerxes: Of the descendants of Phinehas, Gershom, and so on until the end of the genealogy. He carefully enumerates the leaders who came up with him from Babylon and unfolds their genealogy. He takes pains, too, to add their total, which reached 1,440, to suggest that the names of those who come up from the confusion of this world are contained in the book of life of the Lamb.^[1] But also all teachers [i.e., the heads of the families] of God’s people receive increases in their eternal reward commensurate with the number of souls they have acquired for the Lord, according to that parable in the Gospel wherein the good and wise servant said, Master, your pound has earned ten pounds, and the master replied, Take charge of ten cities,^[2] which is to say, appear more glorious in the heavenly kingdom because of the life of those whom you have taught.

Ezra fittingly arranged that before he began so great a journey, he might carefully provide for himself a sufficient supply of ministers of God’s house in order to carry out those things that were necessary for the needs of the temple when he arrived in Jerusalem.

It is worth noting here that although historians write Caspian,^[1] Ezra in this passage calls it Casiphia. For the Hebrews, not having the letter p, use the letter ph in Greek or barbarian names, as in Phetrus or Philatus. Thus, as a result of the captivity of the Assyrians and Chaldeans, the descendants of Israel are shown to have reached even as far as the region of Casiphia, since Ezra sent to that place for ministers of the Lord’s house to be brought to him, namely, Levites and Nathinnites, whom Josephus calls sacred servants.^[2] Concerning these people it should be noted that they were living very freely and peacefully even among foreigners, since, at Ezra’s command or requests, they were immediately able to appoint so great an army. For the catalogue of them that follows shows that there were 258 men chosen in that expedition; when these were added, Ezra is found to have had a total of nearly 1,700 men in his army.

It has frequently been said that the silver and gold and the vessels that were being sent from Babylon to Jerusalem designate souls that are converted to the Lord from the confusion and sins of this world. So it is fitting that Ezra entrusts vessels of this kind to the priests to convey them to Jerusalem, because all who desire to join the community of the holy church must be washed in baptism and consecrated to the Lord through the hands of priests. Equally, those who by sinning have been drawn away from the church’s fellowship into the devil’s servitude, and who by remaining in their sins have fallen into the captivity of the king of Babylon, must be reconciled to the holy church by doing penance through the office of a priest. And it is well that there are twelve priests to whom this charge was assigned because there are twelve apostles by whose teaching the church was first established throughout the world and by whose successors it does not cease to be built until the end of the world.

Appropriately, it is added that when those who came up from Babylon arrived at Jerusalem, they remained there for a period of three days and only then offered and weighed out in the Lord’s house the silver and the gold and the vessels that they had brought. For the three days of tarrying in Jerusalem are the excellent virtues of faith, hope and love that all the faithful should possess.^[1] Teachers, therefore, must first of all manifest these in themselves and only then offer those whom they have taught and educated in these same virtues to the Fathers who have preceded them in Christ for their approval. For when the holy church finds that those whom we are catechizing are sound in faith and action, it is as if, on weighing the vessels that we offer in the temple through the hands of the priests, [the church] discovers them to be both of pure metal and of perfect weight. This is not only done in this church by the elect every day in examining the life of believers, but, as we said above,^[2] is also completed more perfectly in the heavenly Jerusalem in those who have deserved to enter it. For in this life, holy teachers, as though after remaining for three days in the silver and the gold that they brought as an offering when they reveal that they themselves are strong in faith, sublime in hope and fervent in love and show that their hearers shine forth like tested silver through the confession of true faith, gleam in the manner of the best gold through the purity of inviolate understanding and stand out as though they were vessels consecrated to God through the reception of spiritual gifts in themselves. In the heavenly homeland too, these same teachers, when they receive a reward first of all for their own faith, hope and love and then for those whom they have taught, it is as though after the joy of a three-day stay in Jerusalem they are honored more handsomely for the gifts and precious vessels worthy of God they have brought.