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edit. 235, supposes he has discovered in the Chaldee section, first between Ezra 4:8-23 and Ezr 5:1-6, Ezr 5:14, Ezr 5:15, on the one hand, and Ezr 4:24 on the other, and then between these passages and the remaining chapters of the first part, Ezr 1:1-11, Ezr 3:1-13, Ezr 4:1; Ezr 7:24, and Ezr 6:14, Ezr 6:16-18, Ezr 6:19-22, can have no force of argument except for a criticism which confines its operations to the words and letters of the text of Scripture, because incapable of entering into its spiritual meaning. If the two public documents 4:8-23 differ from what precedes and follows them, by the fact that they speak not of the building of the temple but of the building of the walls of Jerusalem, the reason may be either that the adversaries of the Jews brought a false accusation before King Artachshashta, and for the sake of more surely gaining their own ends, represented the building of the temple as a building of the fortifications, or that the complaint of their enemies and the royal decree really relate to the building of the walls, and that section 4:8-23 is erroneously referred by expositors to the building of the temple. In either case there is no such discrepancy between these public documents and what precedes and follows them as to annul the single authorship of this Chaldee section; see the explanation of the passage. Still less does the circumstance that the narrative of the continuation and completion of the temple-building, Ezra 5:1-6:15, is in a simply historical style, and not interspersed with reflections or devotional remarks, offer any proof that the notice, Ezr 4:24, “Then ceased the work of the house of God which is at Jerusalem, so it ceased unto the second year of the reign of Darius king of Persia,” and the information, Ezr 6:16-18, that the Jews brought offerings at the dedication of the temple, and appointed priests and Levites in their courses for the service of God, cannot proceed from the same historian, who at the building of the temple says nothing of the offerings and ministrations of the priests and Levites. Still weaker, if possible, is the argument for different authorship derived from characteristic expressions, viz., that in Ezr 4:8, Ezr 4:11, Ezr 4:23; Ezr 5:5-7, Ezr 5:13-14, Ezr 5:17, and Ezr 6:1, Ezr 6:3, Ezr 6:12-13, the Persian kings are simply called “the