23 “This is what Cyrus the king of Persia+ has said, ‘All the kingdoms of the earth Jehovah the God of the heavens* has given me,+ and he himself has commissioned me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah.+ Whoever there is among YOU of all his people,+ Jehovah his God be with him.+ So let him go up.’”+

1 And in the first year of Cyrus*+ the king of Persia, that Jehovah’s word from the mouth of Jeremiah+ might be accomplished, Jehovah roused+ the spirit of Cyrus the king of Persia so that he caused a cry+ to pass through all his realm, and also in writing,+ saying:

3 “In the first year of Cyrus the king,+ Cyrus the king put an order through concerning the house of God in Jerusalem: Let the house be rebuilt as the place where they are to offer sacrifices,+ and its foundations are to be fixed, its height being sixty cubits,* its width sixty cubits,+

28 the One saying of Cyrus,*+ ‘He is my shepherd, and all that I delight in he will completely carry out’;+ even in [my] saying* of Jerusalem, ‘She will be rebuilt,’* and of the temple, ‘You will have your foundation laid.’”+