Cyrus of Persia Ends the Exile and the Second Temple Is Built
A Persian conqueror lets the exiles go home and rebuild
Quick facts
- Cyrus conquers Babylon
- 539 BCE
- Return authorized
- c. 538 BCE
- Second Temple completed
- 515 BCE
- Later reformers
- Ezra and Nehemiah
What happened
In 539 BCE the Persian king Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon, and the Book of Ezra records that Cyrus issued a proclamation the following year authorizing exiled Jews to return to Judah and rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem, saying his god had charged him with building a house of God there. Returns happened in waves under leaders including Sheshbazzar and Zerubbabel, who oversaw the Temple's reconstruction, completed by 515 BCE. World History Encyclopedia calls this the start of the Second Temple Period. Later reformers Ezra and Nehemiah, arriving from Babylon in the following century, rebuilt Jerusalem's walls and pushed through religious reforms centered on Torah observance.
Why it matters
The return from exile and the Second Temple's construction re-established Jerusalem as a religious center and let Judaism reorganize itself around Torah study and Temple worship rather than the older monarchy-centered religion of the First Temple period, a structure that would last for nearly six centuries until Rome destroyed the Second Temple in turn.
How we know
The return from exile and Temple rebuilding are described in the Book of Ezra, one of the few biblical narratives with some corroboration from the Achaemenid Persian administrative record of the period.
Sources
- Sefaria. Ezra 1:1-4 · Primary source (author-declared)sefaria.org · Cited as a "primary" source (no stronger domain match). · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- World History Encyclopedia. Kingdom of Israel · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
See something wrong? . Corrections with a source get fixed fastest.
Part of a timelineHistory of Judaism26 events · A small highland people, a book that outlasted every empire that tried to erase it, and a faith that survived exile twice and built a state a third timeView all →