World English Bible · The Persian return
Zechariah 10
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Ask of in the spring time, who makes storm clouds, and he gives to everyone for the plants in the field. For the teraphim have spoken , and the have seen a lie; and they have told false . They comfort in . Therefore they go their way like sheep. They are oppressed, because there is no . My is kindled against the , and I will punish the male goats, for of Armies has visited his flock, the house of Judah, and will make them as his majestic horse in the battle. From him will come the , from him the tent peg, from him the battle bow, from him every ruler together. They will be as , treading down muddy streets in the battle. They will fight, because is with them. The riders on horses will be confounded. "I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will the . I will bring them back, for I have mercy on them. They will be as though I had not cast them off, for I am their , and I will hear them. will be like a mighty man, and their will rejoice as through . Yes, their children will see it and rejoice. Their will be glad in . I will signal for them and gather them, for I have them. They will increase as they were before. I will sow them among the peoples. They will remember me in far countries. They will live with their children and will return. I will bring them again also out of the land of , and gather them out of . I will bring them into the land of and ; and there won't be room enough for them. He will pass through the sea of affliction, and will strike the waves in the sea, and all the depths of will dry up; and the pride of will be brought down, and the of will depart. I will strengthen them in . They will walk up and down in his name," .
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The world at this moment · The Persian return, 539 BC to 332 BC ›
Persia takes Babylon and reverses its policy, sending exiled peoples home to rebuild their temples. Judah returns as a small province, rebuilding under imperial permission rather than independence.
- Persia
- The largest empire the world had yet seen, from the Indus to the Aegean, run through provinces, a royal road, and a postal system. Its policy on conquered peoples was to send them home and fund their temples, in exchange for loyalty and prayers for the king. The Cyrus Cylinder states the policy in Cyrus's own words, and Ezra opens with the same policy applied to Judah.
- Judah
- A small, poor province called Yehud, a fraction of the old kingdom, with a rebuilt temple that made the people who remembered the first one weep. No king, and no prospect of one. Leadership passes to priests and scribes, which shapes everything afterward.
- Greece
- Persia and Greece collide at Marathon and Salamis, Persia loses, and Athens spends the following decades on the Parthenon, tragedy, and Socrates. Herodotus writes the first history in order to explain that war. Then Plato and Aristotle, whose vocabulary the church will still be using at Nicaea eight centuries later.
- Further afield
- Rome throws out its kings and becomes a republic. In India and China this is the age of the Buddha's early followers and of Confucian teaching taking hold. More of what the world still thinks with was invented in this era than in almost any other.