1. Now after these things, in the reign of Artaxerxes king of Persia, Ezra the son of Seraiah, the son of Azariah, the son of Hilkiah,
2. the son of Shallum, the son of Zadok, the son of Ahitub,
3. the son of Amariah, the son of Azariah, the son of Meraioth,
4. the son of Zerahiah, the son of Uzzi, the son of Bukki,
5. the son of Abishua, the son of Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the chief priest—
6. this Ezra went up from Babylon. He was a skilled scribe in the Torah of Moses, which the Lord, the God of Israel, had given; and the king granted him all his request, according to the Lord his God’s hand on him.
7. Some of the children of Israel, including some of the priests, the Levites, the singers, the gatekeepers, and the temple servants went up to Jerusalem in the seventh year of Artaxerxes the king.
8. He came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, which was in the seventh year of the king.
9. For on the first day of the first month he began to go up from Babylon; and on the first day of the fifth month he came to Jerusalem, according to the good hand of his God on him.
10. For Ezra had set his heart to seek the Lord’s law, and to do it, and to teach statutes and ordinances in Israel.
11. Now this is the copy of the letter that the king Artaxerxes gave to Ezra the priest, the scribe, even the scribe of the words of the Lord’s commandments, and of his statutes to Israel: