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For additional translations of the passage, use this link to Bible Gateway.

Rebuilding the Altar ¹When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled in their towns, the people assembled together as one in Jerusalem. ²Then Joshua son of Jozadak and his fellow priests and Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel and his associates began to build the altar of the God of Israel to sacrifice burnt offerings on it, in accordance with what is written in the Law of Moses the man of God. ³Despite their fear of the peoples around them, they built the altar on its foundation and sacrificed burnt offerings on it to the LORD, both the morning and evening sacrifices. ⁴Then in accordance with what is written, they celebrated the Festival of Tabernacles with the required number of burnt offerings prescribed for each day. ⁵After that, they presented the regular burnt offerings, the New Moon sacrifices and the sacrifices for all the appointed sacred festivals of the LORD, as well as those brought as freewill offerings to the LORD. ⁶On the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the LORD, though the foundation of the LORD’s temple had not yet been laid. Rebuilding the Temple ⁷Then they gave money to the masons and carpenters, and gave food and drink and olive oil to the people of Sidon and Tyre, so that they would bring cedar logs by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, as authorized by Cyrus king of Persia. ⁸In the second month of the second year after their arrival at the house of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Joshua son of Jozadak and the rest of the people (the priests and the Levites and all who had returned from the captivity to Jerusalem) began the work. They appointed Levites twenty years old and older to supervise the building of the house of the LORD. ⁹Joshua and his sons and brothers and Kadmiel and his sons (descendants of Hodaviah) and the sons of Henadad and their sons and brothers—all Levites—joined together in supervising those working on the house of God. ¹⁰When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the LORD, the priests in their vestments and with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their places to praise the LORD, as prescribed by David king of Israel. ¹¹With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the LORD: “He is good; his love toward Israel endures forever.” And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid. ¹²But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. ¹³No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.

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When God intervenes on our behalf and resolves a challenging situation or eases a burden, we may feel that we have our lives back. In such a situation, it is tempting to go back to pursuing our own goals without reference to God. For the exiles, God’s enabling of their return to their ancestral land would have raised a desire to reclaim their old lives, repossess family land, rebuild their homes, and make ends meet in a pioneer setting.¹ It would have been easy to forget the very God who made their return possible.

However, the exiles put God first and started with the restoration of worship (setting up the altar, offering sacrifices; vv. 1–6) and with rebuilding God’s house (gathering materials, organizing overseers; vv. 7–9) rather than with their personal concerns. They did so united in purpose (vv. 1, 9), despite their fear of the local people (v. 3) and the expense of sacrifices (animals were a source of wealth in the ancient world).

Their celebration at the laying of the temple foundations reveals their heart and motivation. They celebrated because they recognized God’s goodness and love (v. 11) and rejoiced in a renewed relationship with him. Their longing was for the Lord more than for a better life at home. Some, on the other hand, who remembered the first temple, cried (v. 12)—though we are not told why. It is often assumed that this was from disappointment over the small beginnings,² but equally, the tears may have been for the wasted years, for the sins that led to the destruction of that precious relationship with the Lord as symbolized in the temple building. If so, then the tears were the flip side of the joyful shout. Both spoke of the importance of a relationship with God.

¹ This temptation overtook them later; see Hag 1:2–4 ² Hag 2:3; Zech 4:9, 10.

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