- verses
- 19
- first named
- 2 Chronicles 36:22
- last named
- Daniel 10:1
- period
- Exile and Return
- tribe
- Persia
Description
Who was Cyrus?
Cyrus, also known as Cyrus the Great, was the Emperor of Persia who played a significant role in the history of Israel. He is mentioned in several books of the Bible, including 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Isaiah, and Daniel.
According to 2Ch.36.22-23 and Ezr.1.1-2, in the first year of his reign, Cyrus issued a proclamation allowing the Jews to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple. This decree fulfilled the prophecy of Jeremiah concerning the end of the Babylonian captivity after 70 years.
Cyrus also returned the articles of the Temple that Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem (Ezr.1.7-8). The returning exiles, led by Zerubbabel, began to rebuild the Temple with the support of Cyrus (Ezr.3.7).
The prophets Isaiah and Daniel both mention Cyrus by name. Isa.44.28 and Isa.45.1 refer to Cyrus as the Lord's "anointed" and the one who would carry out God's purpose in rebuilding Jerusalem and the Temple. Dan.1.21 and Dan.10.1 indicate that Daniel lived until the reign of Cyrus, and Dan.6.28 mentions Cyrus as the king who succeeded Darius the Mede.
Ezr.4.3-5 records the opposition faced by the Jews in rebuilding the Temple during the reigns of Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes. However, Ezr.5.13-17 and Ezr.6.3-14 recount how Cyrus' original decree was rediscovered during the reign of Darius, leading to the completion of the Temple reconstruction.
Historically, Cyrus was the founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire. His conquest of Babylon in 539 BC and his subsequent policy of allowing captive peoples to return to their homelands and rebuild their temples made him a significant figure in Jewish history and a fulfillment of biblical prophecy.
Relations
Direct connections
Every entity the graph places in a stated relation with this one, grouped by the kind of link. Each relation is authored once and its inverse derived, so both ends always agree. Rows marked “registry” come from the identity spine rather than from a verse, and a row marked “which bearer is the source’s decision” is one where the name could have meant more than one person. The last group is not a relation at all — it counts the events two entities stand in together.
The 10 best-attested of 11 are drawn. All 11 are listed below.
Stands in the same events as
- Daniel3 events
- Jerusalem2 events
- Kingdom2 events
- Darius2 events
- Judah1 event
- LORD1 event
- Battle1 event
- Lebanon1 event
- Artaxerxes1 event
- Joppa1 event
- Darius1 event
- Zerubbabel, Joshua, People, Elders, and Sheshbazzar’s rebuilding of House Of God1 event
and 1 more, ordered by how many events they share.
Places
Where this happens
The places the claims about this person reach, drawn where the gazetteer locates them. A point is where a row puts them and never where tradition does; no line joins two points, because the rows state where and not in what order.
The pattern
Where Cyrus is named
Every book of the corpus in the order it is read, each as wide as the chapters it holds. A bar is the verses of that book which write the name, and the flat stretches are as much of the answer as the bars.
19 verses across 4 of 66 books; 62 write the name nowhere. Named in 2 Chronicles (2), Ezra (12), Isaiah (2) and Daniel (3).
Read it
Where to read it
Every verse of the text carried here that names this entity — 19, across 4 books. The name is written 23 times in them.
Onward
Where this page goes
Nothing in the graph stands one hop from this entity yet. These are the best-connected entities of the same type, so the page still ends somewhere. Descriptions by STEPBible TIPNR.
Where they appear
Chapter by chapter
Atlas's reading of each chapter this person appears in, in canonical order. One line per chapter, and each leads to the whole of it.
- 2 Chronicles 36Cyrus sent a written proclamation throughout his kingdom and appointed a house to be built at Jerusalem.
- Ezra 1Cyrus sends a written proclamation throughout Persia and orders the house of the LORD to be rebuilt at Jerusalem.
- Ezra 3Cyrus king of Persia authorized the cedar trade for the house of the LORD.
- Ezra 4Cyrus commanded the people of Israel to build the house for the LORD.
- Ezra 6Cyrus issued the decree for the house of God in Jerusalem to be rebuilt and its costs paid from the royal treasury.
- Isaiah 44Cyrus is named as the LORD’s shepherd, appointed to fulfil all that the LORD desires.
- Isaiah 45Cyrus is called the LORD’s anointed, equipped for battle, and raised up to rebuild the city and free the exiles, though he does not know the LORD.
Sources