Shouts and Weeping

A huge noise rises over the ruins of Jerusalem, so loud it can be heard far away. Some of it is shouting for joy. Some of it is weeping. And it is all mixed together, so no one can tell which is which.

Some fifty years before, the Babylonian army had burned Jerusalem and destroyed Solomon's great temple. The people of Judah were taken away to Babylon. Then Babylon itself fell to Cyrus, king of Persia, and Cyrus allowed the exiles to go home and rebuild the house of their God. Thousands made the long journey back. Now they are in Jerusalem, in a city of rubble and weeds. In their first autumn home, they built an altar on its old site and began offering sacrifices again. They paid stonemasons and carpenters, and sent food and oil to the people of Tyre and Sidon to bring cedar logs from Lebanon by sea. And now, in the second year, in the second month, they are ready to begin.

The work is led by two men. Zerubbabel, a descendant of King David, and Jeshua, the priest. Together with the priests and Levites and everyone who had come back from captivity, they make a start. They appoint Levites aged twenty and over to supervise the building of the LORD's house. Imagine the sounds of that work. Stone being cut and shaped. Men calling to each other. Ropes straining as great blocks are lowered into place. And at last the foundation of the temple is laid. Not the whole temple. Just the foundation. But it is a beginning.

So they celebrate. The priests put on their robes and stand with trumpets. The Levites, the descendants of Asaph, stand with cymbals, to praise the LORD in the way King David had arranged, long ago. And they sing to one another, back and forth, in praise and thanksgiving. For he is good. For his love towards Israel endures for ever. Then all the people give a great shout, praising the LORD, because the foundation of the LORD's house has been laid. You can almost hear it: the trumpets, the clash of cymbals, the song echoing across the hills, and thousands of voices shouting together.

But not everyone is shouting. Among the crowd are older priests and Levites and family heads. Old men and women who, as children, had seen the first temple, Solomon's temple, standing in all its glory. And as they watch this new foundation being laid, they weep with a loud voice. Perhaps they remember how magnificent the old temple was, and this one seems so small. Perhaps they remember everything that was lost: homes, family, the long years far away. Perhaps it is relief, after so long. The Bible does not tell us exactly why. It only tells us that many wept, and many shouted for joy. And the people could not tell the sound of the joyful shouting from the sound of the weeping, because the people were shouting so loudly. The noise was heard far away.

In 1879, archaeologists in Babylon found a clay cylinder covered in Babylonian writing. It is now known as the Cyrus Cylinder, and it is kept in the British Museum in London. On it, King Cyrus of Persia describes how he took Babylon, and says he returned peoples who had been taken from their homelands, and restored the sanctuaries of their gods. It does not mention Judah by name. But it shows exactly the kind of policy the book of Ezra describes.

Shouts and weeping. You'll find this story in Ezra chapter three, verses eight to thirteen. A new beginning, built on the ruins of the old, with joy and grief mixed together, and God's love that endures for ever. So here is a question to carry with you. When you are sad about what was lost, what can you still thank God for?