3 But Zerubbaḇel and Yĕshua and the rest of the heads of the fathers’ houses of Yisra’ĕl said to them, “It is not for you and for us to build a house for our Elohim, but we alone build to יהוה Elohim of Yisra’ĕl, as Sovereign Koresh the sovereign of Persia has commanded us.”
4 And it came to be that the people of the land were weakening the hands of the people of Yehuḏah and troubling them in their building,
5 and hiring counsellors against them to thwart their plans all the days of Koresh sovereign of Persia, even until the reign of Dareyawesh sovereign of Persia.
6 And in the reign of Aḥashwĕrosh, in the beginning of his reign, they wrote an accusation against the inhabitants of Yehuḏah and Yerushalayim.
7 And in the days of Artaḥshashta, Bishlam, Mithreḏath, Taḇe’ĕl, and the rest of their companions wrote to Artaḥshashta sovereign of Persia. And the letter was written in Aramaic, and translated from Aramaic.
8 Reḥum the governor and Shimshai the scribe wrote a letter against Yerushalayim to Sovereign Artaḥshashta, thus:
9 Reḥum the governor, and Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their companions – the judges, and the emissaries, the consuls, the officials, the people of Ereḵ and of Baḇel and of Shushan, the Dehawites, the Ěylamites,