The children of Hagab, the children of Shalmai, the children of Hanan,
The children of Hagab, Shalmai, and Hanan stand in the register in Ezra 2 of the families who responded to Cyrus's decree and offer and already returned from Babylon to Jerusalem and to their own land with Zerubbabel in the first year of Cyrus, marking the return from exile and the beginning of the rebuilding of the temple under Cyrus. The return numbered 42,360 persons, reckoned as nearly fifty thousand who took advantage of Cyrus's offer. It ended the captivity in the sense that all were free to go, yet it was distinct from the many Jews who still remained in Babylon and were invited to return and from the large number who afterward went up to Jerusalem with Ezra, even though many remained behind.
The same returned people rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem form the historical setting for Haggai's message, when the work had languished and the people were discouraged. The account in Ezra's first chapters is not used to date the temple's completion or the later command to restore and build Jerusalem.
The children of Hagab, Shalmai, and Hanan stand in the register in Ezra 2 of the families who responded to Cyrus's decree and offer and already returned from Babylon to Jerusalem and to their own land with Zerubbabel in the first year of Cyrus, marking the return from exile and the beginning of the rebuilding of the temple under Cyrus. The return numbered 42,360 persons, reckoned as nearly fifty thousand who took advantage of Cyrus's offer. It ended the captivity in the sense that all were free to go, yet it was distinct from the many Jews who still remained in Babylon and were invited to return and from the large number who afterward went up to Jerusalem with Ezra, even though many remained behind.
The same returned people rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem form the historical setting for Haggai's message, when the work had languished and the people were discouraged. The account in Ezra's first chapters is not used to date the temple's completion or the later command to restore and build Jerusalem.