And they appointed the Levites who were twenty or more years of age to have charge of the work of the Lord: The Jews gave the Levites the responsibility to supervise the rebuilding of the Temple to assure that it was done in a ritually correct way. Compare the work of the Levites in the building of Solomon’s Temple (1 Chr 23.4). Men who were twenty or more years of age were counted in the census taken by Moses in the second month of the second year after leaving Egypt (Exo 38.26; Num 1.1-3) and all the men who were twenty years old and older were required to pay a tax to maintain the house of the Lord (Exo 30.14). Good News Bible provides a good model of this sentence. But in languages that do not have a passive voice, translators may say “They [or, The Jews] put every Levite who was twenty or more years old in charge of some part of rebuilding the Temple of the Lord.”
And Jeshua arose, and his sons and brethren and Kadmiel his brother and the son of Jeshua Emadabun and the sons of Joda son of Iliadun, with their sons and brethren, all the Levites: And Jeshua arose may be rendered “Among these Levites was Jeshua” or “One of these Levites was Jeshua.” His sons and brethren refers to Jeshua’s sons and male relatives. Since names are not given for the son of Jeshua Emadabun or for the sons of Joda, we may assume that these are family groups. Their sons and brethren refers to the men of the family of Jeshua Emadabun and the men of Joda’s family. All the Levites means every Levite was involved in overseeing the rebuilding of the Temple.
As one man pressing forward the work on the house of God: For the Greek word rendered as one man, see the comments on verse 47. This clause may be translated “They had one purpose in mind: to rebuild the Temple of God” or “They all worked together as one person to rebuild God’s house.”
The first half of this verse can be rearranged for easier understanding as follows.
• All the Levites twenty years of age or older were put in charge of the work. They had one thing in mind [or, They all worked together as one person]: rebuilding God’s house [or, the Temple of God]. The Levite Jeshua was there with his sons and other [male] relatives, including his brother Kadmiel. All the men of the Jeshua Emadabun family joined in, as well as the men of the family of Joda son of Iliadun.
So the builders built the temple of the Lord: Good News Bible and New English Bible do well to join this clause to the next verse, which tells what was happening while the builders were at work on the Temple (compare Ezra 3.10). The builders refers to the men who actually did the labor. The next verse seems to indicate that the priests and Levites, while supervising the work, had other duties. This clause may be rendered “While the workers were building the Lord’s Temple.”
Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on 1-2 Esdras. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2019. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.