The peoples listed by ethnic origin were peoples who had been settled in the province Beyond the River but who had kept their ethnic identity. They together with other nations (or “peoples”) had been deported and settled there by Osnappar, probably Ashurbanipal (so Good News Translation), the Assyrian king who ruled from 668 to 627 B.C. These peoples would be objecting to the special treatment given to the people of Israel and their presumed disloyalty to the Persian king.
Great and noble Osnappar: Rulers are often described in extravagant terms as is the case here. The adjectives that are used for Osnappar (or, Ashurbanipal) are near synonyms; that is, Aramaic is using two words to say nearly the same thing. The first word is great; the second is translated by a variety of terms that have the same general meaning: “illustrious” (Traduction œcuménique de la Bible) “renowned” (New English Bible), “honorable” (New International Version), and “glorious” (Chouraqui). The translator should use an appropriate pair of terms for describing a powerful ruler in the receptor culture.
Deported and settled: These two words are used to describe the situation of those peoples defeated by Ashurbanipal. The first is an Aramaic word related to the Hebrew word that was used for the captivity and exile of the Israelites (see Ezra 2.1). The second is a different word. Their captor had caused them to settle in this land to which the Israelites had now returned. Translators may express these ideas in words like “took away by force from their own homes and made them dwell in.”
The cities of Samaria were north of Judah in the former northern kingdom of Israel. The Aramaic form of the word for cities can be understood as either singular (so Good News Translation, Revised English Bible, New International Version) or preferably plural (so Revised Standard Version/New Revised Standard Version following many ancient versions and Hebrew Old Testament Text Project with a B rating).
The province Beyond the River was the satrapy to the west of the Euphrates River as Good News Translation makes explicit (also New American Bible). During the time of the Persian Empire, the Euphrates River was a boundary between east and west. The province called Beyond the River included all the territory that lay to the west of the Euphrates River from what is today Syria to southern Palestine. It included the lands of Samaria and Judah. New English Bible calls it “the province of Beyond-Euphrates,” and New International Version says “Trans-Euphrates” (also New Jerusalem Bible, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible). Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch calls it “the western province of the Euphrates,” while Contemporary English Version refers to it as “the Western Province.” Another possibility is “the province called ‘Across the River.’ ”
The verse ends with the words and now, which seem to lead into the beginning of the next verse (so New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). This phrase normally introduces the body of the letter after the salutation, as in the next verse. Some translations, however, interpret the Aramaic word here as a general “and so forth” (New King James Version , Amplified Bible) or “etc.” (Bible en français courant, La Sainte Bible: La version Etablie par les moines de Maredsous, Nouvelle version Segond révisée, Osty-Trinquet, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible). Some translations omit it (Good News Translation, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, Bible de Jérusalem, New English Bible, New International Version). It may either be translated in a way that is natural to introduce the text of a letter or left untranslated.
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 .