King Darius does as Tattenai’s letter suggests: he orders a search to see if Cyrus really has issued such a decree (Ezra 6). We would expect the decree to be found in the archives at Babylon or in Susa, the Persian capital. However, the document is found in Ecbatana, the summer capital of the Persian kings. It is written on a scroll rather than on a tablet. Since they were now writing their official documents in Aramaic, they used parchment.

Darius’s reply first quotes a copy of the decree archived in the treasury. The variation in some details between Cyrus’s decree in Ezra 1 and this document means this copy was likely a résumé used for the records of the treasury. Cyrus and Darius both were concerned that their subject peoples could correctly celebrate their religious rites. Cyrus put…