Ezra 6:7

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

let the work of this house of God alone; let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in its place.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Highlights

1 first appearance in the Hebrew Bible

Full analysis ↓

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שְׁבֻ֕קוּ

shᵉbaq

H7662

“leave”

Adjective, V

Appears 5× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears here

Full BDB Definition

Origin: corresponding to the root of H7733

TWOT: 3018

to leave, let alone - (Peal) to leave, let alone - (Ithpael) to be left

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

15: words
11: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is שְׁבֻ֕קוּ to leave H7662 — appearing just 5 times in the whole Hebrew Bible.

First appearance in Scripture

This word makes its first canonical appearance in the Hebrew Bible here:

שְׁבֻ֕קוּ to leave H7662

Shared distinctive vocabulary

שְׁבֻ֕קוּ to leave H7662 occurs in 5 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

2 nouns
9 adjectives
4 particles

Repetition

Words recur within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

בֵּית house H1005 ×2
אֱלָהָ֣א God H426 ×2
יְהוּדָיֵא֙ Jew H3062 ×2
דֵ֑ךְ this H1791 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 29 words from the Hebrew and 30 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 15 Hebrew tokens and 24 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Ezra 6:7 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Acts 5:38–39 Now I tell you, withdraw from these men, and leave them alone. For if this counsel or this work is of men, it will be overthrown.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Ezra 6:7 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

שְׁבֻ֕קוּ לַעֲבִידַ֖ת בֵּית אֱלָהָ֣א דֵ֑ךְ פַּחַ֤ת יְהוּדָיֵא֙ וּלְשָׂבֵ֣י יְהוּדָיֵ֔א בֵּית אֱלָהָ֥א דֵ֖ךְ יִבְנ֥וֹן עַל אַתְרֵֽהּ

let the work of this house of God alone; let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in its place.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Ezra 6:7 Septuagint · lemma form

ἀποἵημι ὁ ἔργον οἶκος ὁ θεός ὁ ἀποἡγέομαι ὁ ἰουδαῖος καί ὁ πρεσβύτερος ὁ ἰουδαῖος οἶκος ὁ θεός ἐκεῖνος οἰκοδομέω ἐπί ὁ τόπος αὐτός

Now let alone the work of the house of God: let the rulers of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build that house of God on its place.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

In the Septuagint this is one book — Esdras B (2 Esdras): Ezra is chapters 1–10, Nehemiah 11–23.

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Commentary

Notes on Ezra 6:7 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

Ezr 6:7 Let the work of this house of God alone; let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in his place.

Ver. 7. Let the work of this house of God alone] Meddle not, make no disturbance; this was doubtless a hard task to them, for their spirits were irked, as Moab, Num 22:3, and their fingers even itched at these builders. They sleep not, except they may do mischief, Pro 4:16.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

Moreover, I make a decree, what ye shall do to the elders of these Jews, for the building of this house of God,.... This must be considered as an additional decree of Darius, which was peculiarly made by him, in which more was granted in favour of the Jews, and as an encouragement to them to go on with the building of the temple; though Josephus (a) says this is no other than a confirmation of the decree of Cyrus; for, according to him, all that is here granted to them, or threatened to others, from hence to the end of Ezr 6:10, was contained in the decree:

that of the king's goods, even of the tribute beyond the river; what was collected out of his dominions on that side the river Euphrates, towards the land of Israel: according to Herodotus (b), this Darius was the first of the kings of Persia that exacted tribute; under Cyrus and Cambyses only presents were brought; but he imposed a tribute, and was therefore called an huckster, as Cambyses had the name of lord, and Cyrus that of father: the same writer gives an account of the several nations he received it from, and the particular sums, which in all amounted to 14,560 Euboic talents of gold; among whom are mentioned all Phoenicia and Syria, called Palestine, the tribute of which parts is the tribute beyond the river he referred to: and this king was well disposed to the Jewish nation, temple, and worship, before he was king, if what Josephus (c) says is true, that, while a private man, he vowed to God that, if he should be king, he would send all the sacred vessels that were in Babylon to the temple at Jerusalem: and out of the above tribute it is ordered:

that forthwith expenses be given unto these men, that they be not hindered; from going on with the building, for want of money to buy materials, and pay the workmen.

(a) Antiqu. l. 11. c. 4. sect. 6. (b) Thalia, sive, l. 3. c. 89-95. (c) Antiqu. l. 11. c. 3. sect. 1.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Rashi

Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (Rashi)

this [as translated,] this.

the governors of the Jews The rulers of the Jews shall do this thing.

and to the elders of the Jews And to the elders of the Jews I command.

this House of God [as translated,] this House of God.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Ezra, in the Historical, opens this verse with 15 words (11 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is shᵉbaq (“to leave”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “to leave” (shᵉbaq) shape what this verse is saying?
This is the first place “to leave” appears in Scripture (first appears here). What does its debut here establish?
How does Daniel 2:44, which shares the word «to leave», read alongside this verse?
What does the repetition of “house” (2× in this one verse) do in this verse?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
Compare how Trapp's Complete Commentary and John Gill's Exposition read this verse. Where do they agree or differ?

Things to notice

1 word makes its first canonical appearance in Scripture here.
This verse counts 15 Hebrew ↔ 24 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 1 word in this verse.
“house” occurs 2× in this single verse.
11 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 15 words in this verse.