Wikipedia Entries On The Books Of The Old Testament -9.x

Wikipedia entries on the books of the Old Testament.  Click on verse 1 of each chapter to see entry.  Created for use with e-sword and may not be sold.  

Excerpt:

Ezr 1:1  The Book of Ezra is a book of the Bible in the Old Testament and Hebrew Tanakh. This book is the record of events occurring at the close of the Babylonian captivity. At one time, it included the book of Nehemiah, the Jews regarding them as one volume. The two are still distinguished in the Vulgate version as I and II Esdras.

The book is divided into two principal parts:
The history of the first return of exiles, in the first year of Cyrus the Great (536 BC), till the completion and dedication of the new temple, in the sixth year of Darius (515 BC), ch. 1-6. From the close of the sixth to the opening of the seventh chapter there is a blank in the history of about sixty years. Some argue that this "gap" is an invention of prophetic necessity more so than actual Scriptural fact. This 60 year gap was inserted into the natural chronological flow of Ezra in order to prove that Jesus was the promised Messiah of Daniel chapter 9. (see Prophecy of Seventy Weeks)
The history of the second return under Ezra, in the seventh year of Artaxerxes Longimanus, and of the events that took place at Jerusalem after Ezra's arrival there (7-10).
The book thus contains memorabilia connected with the Jews, from the decree of Cyrus (B.C. 536) to the reformation by Ezra (B.C. 456), extending over a period of about eighty years.
Ezra was probably the author of this book, at least of the greater part of it (comp. 7:27, 28; 8:1, etc.), as he was also of the Books of Chronicles, the close of which forms the opening passage of Ezra.