In this verse the king is warned about the danger that will come from the completion of the rebuilding of Jerusalem.
Be it known to the king may be a fixed formula for introducing reports. It occurs in both this verse and the following one. An equivalent formula is “It should be made known to the king” (Traduction œcuménique de la Bible; similarly Bible de Jérusalem) or more formally, “May the king now please be informed” (New Jerusalem Bible). Other more direct forms may be used, such as “We want Your Majesty to know” (Good News Translation) or “Majesty, we inform you” (Bible en français courant). The content of the report will be introduced in some languages as an indirect quotation.
This is the first time in Ezra that those who returned from Babylonia are referred to as Jews. Technically, this term refers to the descendants of Judah and the inhabitants of the province of Judah, but it is used here for the whole community of the people of Israel. It may be translated “ones of Judah” or a borrowed form may be adopted to refer to the Jews. For example, in Persian the word for Jews is “Yahudian,” which means “people of Judah.” Translators should be careful to avoid using a term that has negative connotations in today’s usage.
Who came up from you to us: The same verb “to come/go up” is used here as was used in Ezra 1.3, perhaps because they traveled in a northerly direction (see the comments on 1.3). But this expression also emphasizes relationships (from you to us), as though subtly implying a certain blame. In some languages translators will need to use a pronoun of politeness in referring to the king, such as a plural “you” or an honorific pronoun.
They are rebuilding that rebellious and wicked city: Jerusalem is identified as a city, and it is described by two adjectives that are near synonyms. The first adjective is from a verb that relates to action, meaning “to rebel.” The second is from a verb that describes a characteristic, literally “to smell bad” and therefore “to be hateful” or “evil” (Good News Translation). The city of Jerusalem is used here figuratively to represent the people who have lived or who live in it. For some receptor cultures the translator may retain the figure of speech, but in others it may be helpful to describe the inhabitants of the city as people who rebel and who are evil. Good News Translation has reversed the order of the adjectives by placing “evil” first, perhaps because “evil” is more general than “rebellious.”
They are finishing the walls and repairing the foundations: The topics of walls and foundations are important in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. The walls around a city represent safety and protection for the people who live there. The foundations of the walls represent permanence and stability (see Ezra 3.6). In Ezra-Nehemiah the walls and foundations were made of large rocks that had been hewn in order to fit together and on top of each other. The Aramaic word that is used here for walls occurs only three times in Ezra (4.12, 13, 16). Chouraqui and Osty-Trinquet translate it as “ramparts,” but most translations consider it to be related to Hebrew words meaning “walls” (see Neh 1.3). The vocabulary of some languages will require the translator to distinguish between walls that are a fortification around a city and walls that are a part of buildings.
Although the letter is written in prose form, the reference to walls and foundations shows parallelism in the two clauses of this sentence, which are literally “and the walls they complete, and the foundations they repair.” Chouraqui says “they are finishing the ramparts, they are reinforcing the foundations.” Bible en français courant restructures the sentence for the logical sequence of events, but loses the rhythm: “They are raising the walls again after repairing the foundations.” The reference to finishing the walls places this report in the time of Nehemiah who led the people in the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem.
The basic meaning of the verb finishing is to complete or to bring to perfection. An appropriate verb must be used for the work on the walls, such as “completing” (New English Bible, New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh), “restoring” (New International Version), or “raising” (Traduction œcuménique de la Bible). The Aramaic has “are finishing” or “are completing” (Revised Standard Version and Hebrew Old Testament Text Project with a B rating) and is recommended to translators. A proposed emendation of the text with the meaning “have begun to finish” is the basis of the Good News Translation translation. At the same time it interprets the repairing of the foundations to be the near completion of the walls.
Quoted with permission from Noss, Philip A. and Thomas, Kenneth J. A Handbook on Ezra. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2005. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .