Commentaria in I Esdrae
You will say: Why did the Jews not have recourse to Cyrus, who favoured them, and disclose to him the frauds and tricks of the Samaritans and Prefects? I answer: Because, as Josephus testifies, Cyrus had left home, having gone to war against the rebellious Lydians, and then against the Scythians, where he also perished in the following year. Cyrus being absent, Cambyses governed at home; whose counsellors the Samaritans corrupted with gifts, that they might hinder the building of the temple. This lasted two years, as the third book of Esdras has, chapter 5, last verse. That Artaxerxes is not in the Hebrew is plain from the Septuagint. For what are here said to be written to Assuerus are there read as given to Artaxerxes: indeed some Codices here, verse 6, read thus: “In the reign of Assuerus, who is Artaxerxes (so the Complutensian, and it is plain from the end of the chapter, last verse), until Darius”; for Cambyses alone after Cyrus intervened as lawful king until Darius. The same is plain from Josephus: for Esdras, being about to set down, says Cajetan, the manner in which the prefects wrote to the king, resumes in the Hebrew manner the time at which they wrote, naming the same king by another name, namely the Persian, which he used to prefix to his letters. For Esdras seems to have copied from the public chronicles and diaries of the Persians the letter of the Samaritans with its own title, which was: “And in the days of Artaxerxes,” so that him whom Esdras calls “Assuerus” the Persian chronicles called by the Persian name “Artaxerxes.” Otherwise Christopher a Castro on Aggeus 1, near the beginning, who holds that Assuerus is Cambyses, but Artaxerxes is Smerdes the magian, who succeeded Cambyses and thrust himself into the kingdom by fraud. Worse, Scaliger holds that Assuerus is Xerxes, and Artaxerxes Longimanus the son of Xerxes, of whom more on verse 24. A like resumption of speech
Cambyses was an enemy of the Jews, whence he was called by them a second Nabuchodonosor, as Eusebius testifies in the Chronicle: for Cambyses was a despiser of the gods, sacrilegious and a parricide: his own brother he killed, says Justin; but his sister he took to wife, whom he afterwards killed. Hence by the just vengeance of the divinity he killed himself; for as he leapt upon his horse, the sheath of his sword fell off, and the naked sword was thrust into his thigh, of which wound he died soon after, say Herodotus and Justin. The years that are given to the reign of Cambyses are to be begun from the time when, his father Cyrus being occupied among the Lydians and Massagetae, he himself presided at home over the affairs of the empire. For after two years, Cyrus being killed, Cambyses alone reigned only six years. See Josephus.
6. In the reign of Assuerus—that is, of Cambyses.
Assuerus is Cambyses, who succeeded Cyrus in the kingdom. Note: Assuerus in Chaldaic, in Persian Artaxerxes, was a name common to the kings of the Persians and Babylonians, as Pharao was the common name of the Egyptian kings, and afterwards Ptolemy, and of the Romans Caesar. That this is so is plain from this chapter, and from Esther 1:1, compared with chapter 13:4 and chapter 16:4. Assuerus, or as it is said in Chaldaic, Achasueros, is derived from achas, that is, great, and ros, that is, head, that is, great head, namely great king and prince. Hence the same letters, with the vowels changed, carried into another language, are called in Greek Oxyares, that is, keen Mars, martial, warlike; and Xerxes, a word which in Greek, says Herodotus book 6, signifies warrior; and Artaxerxes, great warrior. Whence Scaliger and other experts in languages assert that these names are almost the same and signify the same: namely Oxyares, Ochosoerces, Ochsoarses, Xerxes, Assuerus, Arxares, Artaxerxes, or as the Persians pronounce them, Xestes, Artuxestes, or Artaxata. Cajetan notes that although the Samaritans under Cyrus hindered the building of the temple through counsellors, at public and royal expense, the Jews nevertheless did not cease from the building, but went on with it at their own private expense; whence this also they hindered, by letters given to Cambyses.
7. In the days of Artaxerxes.—He is the same Cambyses, who in Chaldaic is called Assuerus, in Persian Artaxerxes.
8. Beelteem—is the name of an office signifying prefect of reckoning, or master of wisdom, says Lyranus. Arias, however, will have it a proper name, signifying possessor of taste, or sense, or reason, or eloquence; for teem in Hebrew and Chaldaic is taste, savour, and metaphorically wisdom; Baal in Hebrew and beel in Chaldaic is lord, possessor, president; “Beelteem,” or as the Hebrews pronounce it Baaltaam, is therefore the same as president of reason and counsel, which was debated in the senate and council, that is, Chancellor: for it was his office to refer all that was done to the king, and to set it down in writing in the public tablets, and to seal it with his own hand and seal. So Josephus.
10. Asenaphar.—This is Asarhaddon, or Sennacherib, or some other of his kinsmen or relatives.
13. If that city (Jerusalem, which the Jews are building) be built and the walls thereof repaired, they will not pay tribute, etc.—because, trusting in their walls, they will rebel and assert themselves into liberty (of which they are most greedy). Hence it is plain that the Jews, though freed from Babylon, nevertheless remained tributaries and subject to Cyrus and the Persians. Again, Cyrus gave the Jews leave to rebuild not only the temple but also the city.
14. Now we, remembering the salt which we have eaten in the palace—as if to say: We are mindful of the sustenance and pay (for this is so called from salt) which thou gavest us in the court, and in order to show a grateful mind towards thee who feedest us, we warn thee of the danger which threatens thee from the building of the city of Jerusalem, that thou mayst hinder it. So Pythagoras by the symbol “Pass not by salt and table” admonished his followers of gratitude, as if to say: In prosperity let not the gratitude due to friends who made thee a partaker of their salt and table fall out of memory. For salt denotes a banquet, because in it all things are seasoned with salt that they may have savour. In the Hebrew it is, because we are salted with the salt of the palace. So the Septuagint, that is, because we have been brought up in thy palace. It can also be rendered: With salt we have destroyed the temple, that is, we have utterly destroyed it; for of old, when they wished to make a place desolate, they sowed salt in it.