I said to the king, “If it pleases the king, let him give me letters for the governors of Trans-Euphrates that will enable me to pass through until I arrive in Judah,
“Now then, Tattenai, governor of Trans-Euphrates, Shethar-bozenai, and their colleagues, officials of Trans-Euphrates, all of you stay away from there.
“I, King Artaxerxes, hereby issue a decree to all the treasurers of Trans-Euphrates to diligently provide all that Ezra the kohen, scribe of the Law of the God of heaven, may ask of you—
For I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and cavalry to protect us from the enemy along the way, because we had spoken to the king saying, “The gracious hand of our God is upon everyone who seeks Him, but His great anger is against everyone who forsakes Him.”
Then they delivered the decrees of the king to the king’s Persian governors and to the governors of Trans-Euphrates, who then gave help to the people and the House of God.
Adjacent to them worked Melatiah the Gibeonite and Jadon the Meronothite, men from Gibeon and Mizpah who are under the jurisdiction of the governor of Trans-Euphrates.