cried over its unimpressive stature (Ezra 3:10–13; Hag 2:3). Israel’s promised restoration had not arrived at the hands of Ezra and Nehemiah. As the centuries to follow would demonstrate, the peace and prosperity God swore to his people had yet to be realized in the period immediately following the Babylonian exile. Instead, generation after generation witnessed subjugation and suffering at the hands of still other foreign powers—namely, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome—and these experiences significantly colored the texts these Jews produced.
