As noted in the discussion on the heading for this section, Good News Translation considers this to be the beginning of a new section and gives it the heading “The Rebuilding of the Temple Begins.” Some versions insert a paragraph break here to indicate a break in discourse structure (Bible de Jérusalem, New Jerusalem Bible). However, the punctuation in the Hebrew text supports the Revised Standard Version paragraph division after verse 7.
So signifies the response of the community to the realization that nothing had been done to rebuild the Temple when sacrifices were already being made on the altar. Good News Translation begins the verse without any transitional word as though this action is not directly related to the preceding information (also New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, Nouvelle version Segond révisée, La Sainte Bible: La version Etablie par les moines de Maredsous). Some versions use the transitional word “Then” (New International Version, Bible de Jérusalem) or an expression of time (Bible en français courant with “Following that”) to indicate that the actions related here follow what took place earlier.
They gave money to the masons and the carpenters: Money is literally “silver,” but the Hebrew word is used generally for money. It can be translated with any general term that is used for monetary exchange in the form of payment. The meaning may be that the money was paid to the workmen as Revised Standard Version suggests (also New Revised Standard Version, New International Version, Bible de Jérusalem, Nouvelle version Segond révisée, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible) or it may be as Good News Translation interprets the text, that is, the community contributed money to be paid to workmen (also New English Bible, New Jerusalem Bible). In the technical terminology of employment, the money was used to “hire” the needed workmen (Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, La Sainte Bible: La version Etablie par les moines de Maredsous).
Masons were the men who quarried and worked with stone. Carpenters were those who worked with stone, brick, metal and wood. Bible en français courant restructures the clause to say “Following that they paid workmen to hew rocks and beams.”
Food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon: Food, drink, and oil refer to grain, wine, and olive oil. Compare the payment made by King Solomon to King Hiram of Tyre when building the Temple in 2 Chr 2.10. They bartered these products for cedar trees; that is, they gave these products as payment in kind for what was given by the Sidonians and the Tyrians, who were the people of Sidon and Tyre. Sidon and Tyre were Gentile city-states in Phoenicia in what is the present-day country of Lebanon. Thus, for Sidonians and Tyrians it may be helpful to say “people of the cities of Sidon and Tyre.” The Sidonians and Tyrians brought cedar trees for the Temple. These are tall and strong evergreen trees whose wood is ideal for roof beams. They grow in Lebanon, the coastal area north of Palestine and west of Syria. This area includes the Anti-Lebanon Mountains from Mount Hermon in the south, extending 160 kilometers (about 100 miles) north.
For food translators may use a general term for foods or foodstuffs that do not easily perish. A general term for drink may be used, or to avoid ambiguity and possible misunderstanding, it may be necessary to translate it as wine (see the comments at Ezra 6.9). Oil may be translated by a general term for cooking oil. It is not necessary to specify “olive oil.” However, another type of oil should not be substituted that could not have existed in the place and time referred to in this text. In some languages items in a list like this may be stated in plural forms to indicate indefinite objects and not specific foods that would be provided for a meal. Where cedar trees are not known, translators may substitute the name of a similar and related tree, they may borrow the name “cedar” or its equivalent, they may say “a tree called cedar like such and such a tree,” or they may describe the cedar’s use, for example, “special trees used for building.”
To the sea, to Joppa: In Hebrew this is an elliptical expression meaning that the trees were to be brought from the mountainous area down to the seaports of Tyre and Sidon and then fastened together like rafts and floated on the Mediterranean Sea to the port of Joppa to the south. From Joppa it was 58 kilometers (36 miles) by land to Jerusalem (see 2 Chr 2.16). The phrase to the sea can be translated “by sea” (Good News Translation, New International Version).
According to the grant which they had from Cyrus king of Persia: The English word grant usually refers to a donation or gift of money, but here it refers to official authorization (Nouvelle version Segond révisée, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible, La Sainte Bible: La version Etablie par les moines de Maredsous, Osty-Trinquet). New English Bible says “licence.” Cyrus gave permission for the trees to be brought from Lebanon by sea to Joppa (New King James Version ). Good News Translation makes this permission refer to all that was done by the Israelites as recounted in this verse, but it is preferable to relate it only to the transport of building materials from Lebanon to Judah. This phrase may be rendered “according to the permission that Cyrus king of Persia had given to them.” For Cyrus king of Persia, see Ezra 1.1.
Quoted with permission from Noss, Philip A. and Thomas, Kenneth J. A Handbook on Ezra. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2005. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .