However is a strong contrastive conjunction that draws attention to a change in events. “Then” in Good News Translation is a less emphatic discourse marker than However. In the Aramaic this is followed by the same expression of time with which the book of Ezra began: in the first year of Cyrus (see the comment on Ezra 1.1). Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation maintain the same syntactic position for this prepositional phrase of time as the Aramaic text does, while New Revised Standard Version shifts the focus from the time to the person by bringing forward the reference to the king: “However, King Cyrus of Babylon, in the first year of his reign.” It is preferable to retain the focus on time at the beginning of the verse, if this is acceptable narrative style in the receptor language.

Cyrus is referred to twice in this verse. First, he is identified as Cyrus king of Babylon (see Ezra 2.1). This is the title he took after capturing Babylon and replacing the Babylonian kings as head of the empire. Second, his name and title (Cyrus the king) are repeated as the subject of the sentence in this verse. New International Version attempts to capture the repetition: “However, in the first year of Cyrus king of Babylon, King Cyrus issued a decree” (also New King James Version , New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, New Jerusalem Bible, Bible de Jérusalem, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible). Translators should maintain natural forms of expression here in their own language.

Made a decree that this house of God should be rebuilt: The decree of King Cyrus (Ezra 1.2-4) is mentioned to prove their right to rebuild the Temple. The information from the decree that is given here includes the repeated phrase house of God, but specifies this house. Omitted from the information here is who should rebuild it. Some English translations conveniently use the passive verb form here (Revised Standard Version, Good News Translation, Biblia Dios Habla Hoy), although the original text uses the active verb “to rebuild” (so New International Version, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch). Many languages will have a grammatical structure similar to the original text, saying “gave a decree to rebuild this house of God.” Some languages may use an indefinite subject, for example, “gave a decree that one should rebuild.” Or it may be necessary to say “… that we should rebuild.”

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 .