And thou, Ezra, after the wisdom of thy God, which is in thy hand, set magistrates and judges who may judge all the people that are beyond the river, all such as know the laws of thy God; and teach ye him that knows [them] not.
Ezra goes back to Jerusalem with a letter from a Persian king. It gives him power to set up judges over God's people and to teach God's law to anyone who does not know it. The surprise is the standard the king uses: "the wisdom of your God that is in your hand."
The words come from Artaxerxes, yet he keeps pointing to the will of Israel's God rather than his own:
You cannot help noticing that this non-Jewish king refers everything to the will of God. To put it more exactly, he directs that everything should be ordered in submission to that will. Though he was not an Israelite, he almost seems to be in full agreement with Ezra's aim... The lesson lies on the surface. God is sovereign in the choice of His instruments. He does according to His will among the people of the earth as in the army of heaven. None can stop His hand, or say to Him, What are you doing? Our chapter illustrates this. "Artaxerxes, king of kings," and "Ezra the priest, a scribe of the law of God," stand yoked together to carry out God's thoughts for His people and for His house in Jerusalem.
The king gained something from this too. One writer points out what Ezra's appointment secured for the throne:
He shows great confidence in Ezra, a man of God. He puts the appointing of magistrates and judges for the region beyond the river into Ezra's hand (v. 25). He knows very well that godly Ezra will not choose anyone who rebels against the royal authority. He wants this man to instruct the ignorant, and for him this is the guarantee of peace for his reign (v. 25).
The king credited Ezra too with God-given wisdom. Ezra was to appoint magistrates and judges in the region west of the River, men who knew the laws of God, so as to teach the people (v. 25). So the king recognised that the land of Israel had a special place in the eyes of the God of heaven and earth. He wanted that country to give God's honour its due. He rightly saw that his whole empire would benefit if Israel gave God His place.
Why did God send a scribe with the law rather than a show of power? One writer sees loving-kindness in that choice:
The way God stepped in through Ezra's mission is, I think, a touching proof of His loving-kindness. It was exactly suited to the needs of the people. It was not power. That had been moved elsewhere. It was the knowledge of the will and the ordinances of God — of the mind of God in the word. The king himself recognised this (Ezra 7:25).
Half the commission is remedial: people who do not know the law are to be taught it, not simply judged by it. Ezra could carry that out because nothing in him competed with the word he handled:
In him we find no miraculous gift and no prophetic gift, such as the prophets Haggai and Zechariah had. There is no extraordinary display of divine power. He has nothing that goes beyond the common measure and ordinary resources. But his heart is devoted to the honour of the lovely name of the Lord, and he cares about the prosperity of the people. Above all, his mark is his understanding of the law of Moses, of the written Word. The Word directs him in everything, and his faith rests on the Word. He insists on the principles the Word presents. He puts them into practice, and he lets no one depart from them. In this way he earns the confidence even of the king, and this is also the only source of his authority.
- Hand. Ezra governs and teaches out of "the wisdom of your God that is in your hand." The wisdom is given to him, not his own.
- King. A foreign ruler bends his whole decree to the will of God. God is sovereign in choosing His instruments.
- Word, not power. Ezra brings no miracle and no display of power. What suits the people's need is the mind of God in His word, and the king himself recognises it.
- Reach. Ezra appoints judges who already know God's laws for all the people beyond the River, and he teaches those who do not.
- Authority. The Word directs Ezra, and he practises what he insists on. That wins even the king's confidence, and it is his only authority.
And whosoever will not do the law of thy God and the law of the king, let judgment be executed diligently upon him, whether unto death, or to banishment, or to confiscation of goods, or to imprisonment.
This verse closes the letter that the Persian king Artaxerxes hands to Ezra. It puts the king's power behind God's law, and it names four penalties for anyone who refuses to obey: death, banishment, loss of property, or prison. Why did God's law need a foreign king's backing, and what does that say about the state of His people?
Through the whole letter the king keeps naming the God of Israel. In this last verse that respect turns into law.
History tells us that Artaxerxes let each people keep their idols, yet he had none himself... but in his decree he goes further: he acknowledges the God of Ezra (v. 14), the God of Israel (v. 15), and the God of Jerusalem (v. 19). He also acknowledges that he is responsible to this God, whose anger is to be feared (v. 23)... Lastly, he orders severe measures against those who break the law of God and of the king, because in his mind these two laws are one and the same (v. 26).
Commentators differ on how the king ranked the two laws. Another writer reads it the other way: the king put his own law second, under God's. That reading also brings out how fast the sentences were to fall.
Finally, he ordered that the law of God should be fully enforced. Anyone who would not keep it, and the law of the king (which he ranked below the law of God), would face judgment without delay. The case might call for death, banishment from Israel, loss of property or prison (v. 26). Where guilt was proved beyond question, this is good government. It is not like so many cases today, dragged out for months without reason.
The penalties do not stand alone. The verse before it tells Ezra to appoint judges and to teach those who do not know the law. So the threat of punishment comes tied to a duty to teach.
The king is generous, and not without a certain fear of God... Ezra is given power, "according to the wisdom of your God that is in your hand," to appoint magistrates and judges to judge all the people, "all such as know the laws of your God," and to teach the one who did not know them. All this stands under the grave penalties of death, banishment, confiscation, or imprisonment (verses 25, 26).
Power like this needed a man whose own life matched the law he enforced. Ezra had done that work long before the king's letter arrived.
He prepared his heart to seek the law first of all, and then to do it, for in his own case he did not separate practice from knowledge. He was not like those teachers of the law who, in the days of Jesus, loaded people with "burdens hard to bear," while they themselves did not touch "the burdens with one of [their] fingers" (Luke 11:46). The precepts of the Word he fed on soaked right through his daily life. And it was only after this that he set his heart "to teach in Israel statutes and the ordinance" (v. 10). In a word, his life and his conduct were in complete agreement with his teaching.
A foreign emperor enforcing God's law says less about Persia than about the God who chooses His instruments.
The king provides for the carrying out of Ezra's mission in every possible way, and at the same time he entrusted Ezra with the government of his people "according to the wisdom of God." Finally, he attached penalties to disobedience to the law of God and to the law of the king, rising even to death itself. The lesson lies on the surface: God is sovereign in the choice of His instruments... Our chapter shows it, in that "Artaxerxes, king of kings," and "Ezra the priest, a scribe of the law of God," are yoked together to carry out God's thoughts for His people and for His house in Jerusalem.
Yet a decree like this has a sad side. Israel once had its own king. Now even its freedom to serve its own God came by a foreign ruler's permission.
The people were now under the Gentile's power. They owed the Gentile for permission to live in the land of their fathers, and to keep the laws and do the service of their God. They were subjects of the Persian, and their own ruler was only his deputy.
- Decree — The king puts real force behind God's law: death, banishment, loss of property, prison — and no delay.
- Rank — Writers differ. Did the king make the two laws one, or put his own law second? Either way, he names a God he fears.
- Teaching — The same letter that appoints judges also orders teaching, so those who do not know the law can learn it.
- Character — Ezra sought the law, then did it, then taught it. His life matched his message before any king trusted him.
- Hand — God yokes a foreign emperor to a Jewish scribe to do His will. Yet the borrowed sword shows a people who now live by a foreign king's permission.