And when the builders laid the foundation of the Hĕḵal of יהוה, they appointed the priests in their robes, with trumpets, and the Lĕwites, the sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise יהוה, after the order of Dawiḏ sovereign of Yisra’ĕl.
Then the work of the House of Elah which is at Yerushalayim ceased, and it ceased until the second year of the reign of Dareyawesh sovereign of Persia.
And the lyre and the harp, the tambourine and flute, and wine are in their feasts; but they do not regard the deeds of יהוה, nor see the work of His hands.
Who is wise and understands these words, discerning and knows them? For the ways of יהוה are straight, and the righteous walk in them, but the transgressors stumble in them.
since those days – one came to a heap of twenty ĕphahs, and there were ten; one came to the winepress to draw out fifty baths from the press, and there were twenty –
Consider now from this day forward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, from the day that the foundation of the Hĕḵal of יהוה was laid, consider it:
For before these days there was not a wage for a man, nor a hire for beast, and there was no peace for him who went out or came in, because of his enemies, and I set all men one against another.