The books which in our Bible bear the names Ezra and Nehemiah (in the Jewish Bible, one book, Ezra) are the immediate continuation of Chronicles, by the same author. When they were divided, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22-23, the necessary sequel of vss. 20-21 was repeated at the beginning of Ezra (Ezra i. 1-3). The reason for the division is plain: down to the end of the exile the work was no more than an epitome of the Pentateuch and Historical Books; but from the time of Cyrus to Alexander it was the only history the Jews possessed. This part was therefore separated from what went before as the book of post-exilic history, and named "Ezra" after the figure most prominent in the earlier half of it, on the same principle that the history of the founding of the kingdom was named Samuel. The subdivision into two books of Ezra as in the Greek Bible, or as we name them Ezra and Nehemiah, is apparently due to Christian hands.

This part of the Chronicler's work begins, as has been said, with an edict of Cyrus permitting the Jews in Babylonia to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple. There follows a list (given again in Neh. 7) of the families who availed themselves of this permission, shortly after 538 B.C. The restoration of the temple is begun, then stopped by the machinations of their enemies under Xerxes (486-465 B.C.) and Artaxerxes (465-424 B.C.), but happily completed (by the same Zerubbabel and Joshua who began it) in the sixth year of Darius (Nothus, 424-405 B.C.). "After these things, in the reign of Artaxerxes," Ezra came up from Babylonia, armed with large powers by an edict of the king, to order things according to the law of his God in the province "beyond the river" (Euphrates, Ezra 7 f.). He found things enough that needed reform; particularly the frequent intermarriages of all classes, including the clergy, with the "peoples of the land," and succeeded in inducing the Jews, in a great act of penitence, to divorce these "foreign women" (cc. 9-10).

At this point the History of Nehemiah sets in abruptly in the form of personal memoirs. Nehemiah, a favourite cup-bearer of the Persian king Artaxerxes, hearing that the wall of Jerusalem was broken down and the gates burned, asks permission to go thither and repair the damaged fortifications, and is sent with a commission as royal governor of the district. In spite of dangerous opposition from jealous neighbours in Samaria and elsewhere, by the utmost endeavours he accomplishes the rebuilding of the walls in a very brief space (Neh. 1-6). In all this there is not so much as a mention of Ezra, who is supposed to have been now thirteen years in Jerusalem, but in Neh. 8 he suddenly appears on the scene with his law-book. The law is read, and the people solemnly covenant by sign and seal to observe it; Nehemiah's name stands at the head of the list of signers, but otherwise he is entirely ignored (Neh. 8-10). Lists of the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of other settlements, a catalogue of the priests and levites who came up under Cyrus, and a description of the dedication of the walls, in which the singers shine, fill Neh. 11-12. That the Chronicler is the author is palpable. Finally, in c. 13, Nehemiah, who had returned to court, reappears, and finds a sad state of things; a foreigner, and an Ammonite at that, lodged by the high priest in a chamber of the temple, flagrant violations of the sabbath by market men, and the old grievance of mixed marriages in full gait. Even the high priest's family was not pure: one of its scions was son-in-law to Nehemiah's arch-enemy, Sanballat of Samaria. Naturally Nehemiah expelled him.

It has been necessary to give this somewhat detailed synopsis of the books to make intelligible the problems they present. On this point it is further to be observed that the book is not all written in Hebrew: Ezra iv. 8-vi. 18; vii. 12-26, containing chiefly correspondence with the Persian court and documents issuing from it, are in Aramaic, the official language of the western provinces of the empire. Moreover, the oldest Greek translation of the Chronicler's history, part of which is preserved in the Bible of the church as 1 Esdras, differs both in matter and order from the Jewish standard text and the later Greek version; it contains, for example, the famous exhibition of wits by the three Jewish youths at the court of Darius (1 Esdr. 3 f.), as a result of which Zerubbabel obtains from Darius permission to go up to Jerusalem. In 1 Esdras the reading of the law (Neh. 8) immediately follows the act of penitence for the strange wives (Ezra 10).

A large part of Ezra-Nehemiah exhibits the Chronicler's familiar motives and manner; in other places he has incorporated extracts from the sources with or without annotations of his own. Of these sources the only ones which have been independently preserved are the prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah, from which the author takes, however, no more than the facts that at the instance of these prophets Zerubbabel and Joshua began to rebuild the temple in the second year of Darius (Ezra v. 1 f.); the completion of the work by the same hands, which according to the Chronicler took place in the sixth year of Darius and was celebrated in a great dedication ceremony, is in Zech. iv. 9 still prediction. Another source which stands out distinctly is the Memoirs of Nehemiah, of which Neh. 1-6 (except c. 3) is a solid piece. There is, moreover, a series of documents: Ezra 1, the edict of Cyrus; Ezra iv. 7-vi. 12, complaints to the court of the Jews' building operations, and answers of the kings Artaxerxes and Darius respectively. Ezra vii. 11-26, commission of Artaxerxes to Ezra. A diplomatic appearance is given to these by the fact that—except the edict of Cyrus—they are all couched in the official Aramaic; and, inasmuch as in cc. iv. 7-vi. 18 the connecting links of narrative are also in Aramaic, the presumption is that this material was taken bodily from an Aramaic book in which the letters and rescripts were already embodied.

Finally, a distinct source is commonly assumed for the history of Ezra. This is chiefly told of Ezra in the third person; but in some parts for a considerable space together Ezra speaks in the first person (I or we), and it is accordingly thought by most scholars that the Chronicler had in his hands Memoirs of Ezra as well as of Nehemiah, which in part he incorporated intact (e.g. Ezra 8 f.), in part recast into the form of a narrative about Ezra (as in Ezra 10; Neh. 8 f.). It is evident that the story of Ezra, whatever its origin, is badly dislocated: the chapters which now stand in Neh. 8-10 have no business there, and, as has been noticed above, in 1 Esdras the reading of the law immediately follows Ezra 10. On the other hand, there is a gap at the end of Ezra 6; chapter 9 cannot well be its original sequel. And, lastly, Neh. 9 f. does not seem naturally to follow c. 8. The most probable restoration of the order is Ezra 8; Neh. vii. 70-73; 8; Ezra 9-10; Neh. 9-10. This arrangement gives a continuous and consistent story, and the numerous dates fall into sequence. Incidentally another connection is thus restored, Neh. 11 follows vii. 5^a. The list (Neh. vii. 5^b-60) of the exiles who returned with Zerubbabel and his company ( = Ezra 2) is obviously not what is required here. The dismemberment of the story of Ezra is not to be attributed to the Chronicler, but to misadventures of copying such as are not infrequent in ancient manuscripts.

The extract from the Memoirs of Nehemiah breaks off with Neh. 6; though perhaps in vii. 1-4; xi. 1-3 the Chronicler has utilized in his own way some further sentences. In Neh. xii. 27-43, the procession at the dedication of the walls is described, ostensibly by Nehemiah in the first person, and the passage has on this ground been taken for an extract from the Memoirs. It is, however, an unmistakable piece of the Chronicler's own composition. In c. 13, also, Nehemiah, in the first person, gives an account of his reforming enterprises on a second visit to Jerusalem. An unaltered extract from the Memoirs, however, the chapter cannot well be; the Chronicler's vein crops out in too many places.

It does not belong to our present task to discuss the historical value of these sources; but it may not be amiss to say that the authority of the Memoirs of Nehemiah alone is unimpeached. The question is of peculiar interest in the case of the supposed Memoirs of Ezra, because Neh. 8 has been generally understood by recent critics to be the account of the formal introduction of a new, or newly codified, law, the Priests' Code or the Pentateuch, which Ezra brought up from Babylonia.