All the officers and warriors, as well as all of King David’s sons, pledged their allegiance to King Solomon. ¹ 

King Rehoboam made bronze shields to replace them and assigned them to the officers of the royal guard ¹  who protected the entrance to the royal palace.

He placed troops in all of Judah’s fortified cities and posted garrisons ¹  throughout the land of Judah and in the cities of Ephraim that his father Asa had seized.

(Wicked Athaliah and her sons had broken into God’s temple and used all the holy items of the Lord’s temple in their worship of the Baals.)

After Jehoiada died, the officials of Judah visited the king and declared their loyalty to him. ¹  The king listened to their advice. ² 

He appointed military officers over the army ¹  and assembled them in the square at the city gate. He encouraged them, ²  saying,

He carried away to Babylon all the items in God’s temple, whether large or small, as well as what was in the treasuries of the Lord’s temple and in the treasuries of the king and his officials.

When they came to the Lord’s temple in Jerusalem, some of the family leaders ¹  offered voluntary offerings for the temple of God in order to rebuild ²  it on its site.

From ¹  Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their colleagues – the judges, the rulers, the officials, the secretaries, the Erechites, the Babylonians, the people of Susa (that is, ²  the Elamites),

The king sent the following response: “To Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their colleagues who live in Samaria and other parts of Trans-Euphrates: Greetings! ¹ 

But God was watching over ¹  the elders of Judah, and they were not stopped ²  until a report could be dispatched ³  to Darius and a letter could be sent back concerning this.

These are the leaders ¹  and those enrolled with them by genealogy who were coming up with me from Babylon during the reign of King Artaxerxes:

After him Baruch son of Zabbai worked on another section, from the buttress to the door of the house of Eliashib the high priest.

I said to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people, “The work is demanding ¹  and extensive, and we are spread out on the wall, far removed from one another.

In those days the aristocrats of Judah repeatedly sent letters to Tobiah, and responses from Tobiah were repeatedly coming to them.

I then put in charge over Jerusalem ¹  my brother Hanani and Hananiah ²  the chief of the citadel, for he was a faithful man and feared God more than many do.

Some of the family leaders gave to the project treasury 20,000 gold drachmas and 2,200 silver minas.

On the second day of the month the family leaders ¹  met with ²  Ezra the scribe, together with all the people, the priests, and the Levites, to consider the words of the law.

As for the Levites, ¹  in the days of Eliashib, Joiada, Johanan and Jaddua the heads of families were recorded, as were the priests during the reign of Darius the Persian.

The descendants of Levi were recorded in the Book of the Chronicles ¹  as heads of families up to the days of Johanan son of Eliashib.