{N}THE CAPTIVITY AND THE RETURN{/}

{K}CAPTURE AND BURNING OF JERUSALEM{/}
The intrigues of the princes of Jerusalem only contributed to attract twice in ten years the chaldean armies: in the years 596 and in 587. The second time the city was captured, its palaces demolished and the Temple burned down.
The{N} Babylonians{/} proceeded with the assyrian politics with respect to defeated countries: they transferred the nation's elite to other provinces and replaced them with foreigners in order to make revolt impossible. They incorporated the metal work artisans with the leaders for the deportation. The incessant campaigns of the kings of Babylon to maintain Egypt in line, to subdue the Phoenicians of Tyre, to control the route between Syria and Palestine, to contain the {N}Medes{/} and the {N}Persians{/} inside the iranian plateau, and to punish any and all intentions of rebellion, needed a continuous renovation of armament, whose fabrication these same artisans who had been deported participated in.
Therefrom the peasant population and the small town people of the cities remained free, and the elimination of the jewish elite class allowed the canaanite fraction of the country to lift up their heads.

{K}BABYLON THE GREAT{/}
Recuperating the project that his father Nabopolasar had started, {N}Nabuchodonosor{/} wanted to make Babylon the queen of cities. The technical progress, the economic development, fruit of a rigorous and creative administration, the contribution of the riches from the conquered territories, all doted Nabuchodonosor with the necessary recourses to realize his plan. He ordered that cedar be brought from the forests of Lebanon for the construction of the new royal palace and proceeded with the repair and decoration of the Sacred Avenue. The restored temples were adorned with varnished bricks and their furniture was made of gold and precious stones. One of the Seven Wonders of the World registered by Strabo, the famous hanging gardens, were designed and executed for love to the queen. In a word, all talents were utilized for the glory of Babylon, and many of the children of Israel contributed without a doubt, with better or worse will, to the making of this enormous enterprise.
Many of them had emigrated to foreign lands before the Exile. They stayed in the countries where they had arrived: Egypt or Persia. Some of the others who had been deported, succeeded in helping each other among themselves, to get out of their miserable situation: some even came to occupy the most important positions of the royal administration; while others, such as the family of the Egibi, contributed to the development of the banking system from the reign of Nabonida. The books fictitiously attributed to {N}Daniel{/}, {N}Tobias{/} and {N}Esther{/}, though actually written some centuries later, did not fool us when telling of this ascension.

{K}A TEST AND A CHALLENGE{/}
The captivity must have lasted officially around fifty-six years. It was a privileged time towards the maturity of the faith of Israel. Among the deported peoples in Babylon, the prophet {N}Ezekiel{/} is found, who announced that the captives who had been converted by the test would return to their country and reconstruct the nation in justice. A letter addressed by Jeremiah to the deported Jews in {N}Chaldea{/} indicates both the duration of the test and the leaving or escape that God was going to give it.
{C}Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all exiles whom I exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon: "Build houses to dwell in; plant gardens and eat their fruits; ... find wives for your sons and give your daughters husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters.. Then you must increase in number, not decrease. Promote the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the Lord, for upon its welfare depends your own" (Jer 29,4-9).{/}

{K}THE JEWISH COMMUNITY GETS ORGANIZED{/}
Contrary to those who had been deported by the Assyrians after the fall of Samaria in the year 721, or to those who had taken refuge in Egypt before the chaldean threat, the Israelites that had gone as captives to Babylon knew how to conserve and deepen their spiritual patrimony and their uniqueness in the middle of the pagan nations. Several reasons can explain this faithfulness. Nowadays it seems evident that when they left for Babylon, the first draft of the Torah and prophetic oracles had been received; so therefore the exiled did not leave with empty hands and the writings they took with them served to help them recuperate their faith. Besides, those who headed the deported were the nation's elite, who were more learned and better prepared to get organized among themselves; those Jews, deprived of their temple and their worship, knew how to close ranks around the Law and the prophetic writings, and in this way gave the start to a movement that was going to expand itself after the return when the synagogue becomes the basic cell of the jewish society.
Finally, it motivated them towards a deep conviction: were they not the Small Remainder who had survived the disaster and to whom God had now entrusted the responsibility to maintain against wind and tide, the hope of Israel? Could they then, forget about God's promises?

{K}THE SALVATION COMES FROM THE PERSIANS{/}
In Babylon the king {N}Nabonida{/}, son of Nabuchodonosor, was lead by his desire to accumulate, even went so far as to loot the temples of Marduk, the great god of the Chaldeans. In this way he alienated himself against his own people and its clergy. He did however have sufficient lucidity to capture the danger that the empire of the {N}Medes{/} represented at his backside. He did not hesitate to then favor in the rebellion, {N}Cyrus{/}, king of the {N}Persians {/}and the vassal of the Medes. At the end of several years of rebellion (556-550) the young prince finally defeated Astyages, the king of the Medes. Preoccupied with his success, Croesus, king of Lydia, famous for his fabulous riches, committed the mistake of attacking Cyrus. He suffered a great loss and had to deliver his kingdom to Persia. With some other new victories in the east of his kingdom, Cyrus had the whole of Asia Minor in his hands as well as the iranian plateau. The deported Jews in Babylon perceived that these political troubles were an early sign of their liberation: the end of the babylonian empire was near.
One of Cyrus' generals defeated Nabonida's armies in the year 539 (the king himself perished in the battle) and the new owner of the Near East made his victorious entrance into Babylon. There he was acclaimed by the clergy of Marduk and the Babylonians who had borne the yoke of the conquered until then.

{K}CYRUS' NEW POLICY{/}
Cyrus refused to continue Assyria's and Babylonia' practice of exiling conquered peoples. Instead, his policy for maintaining peace in his vast empire was to respect the language, religion, and traditions of those he conquered. In keeping with that policy, he sent out all official decrees in three languages, one of which was the language spoken in the province to which the decree was directed. He chose Aramaic as the official language of administration for the ancient kingdoms of Syria-Palestine. For Aramaic to fulfill this new role, its grammatical forms and orthography had to be clarified and standardized, thus giving birth to what later would be called, "Aramaic of the Empire."

{K}RECONSTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE{/}
In the area of religion, Cyrus' policy was also directly opposite to that of the Babylonians. The latter's practice of destroying temples and religious profanations had awakened great indignation among conquered peoples. In contrast King Cyrus, in the first year of his reign, issued the following decree of Ecbatana concerning the House of God in Jerusalem: Let the Temple be reconstructed as a place for offering sacrifice. The cost of the reconstruction shall be paid from the royal treasury. Moreover, all golden and silver objects taken from the Temple of God shall be returned [Ezra_6,3].
