Darius I Consolidates the Persian Empire

The event

After a violent succession crisis — which Darius I recorded in his own words on the towering Behistun Inscription — he secured the Persian throne and set about reorganizing the empire on a scale never before attempted. He divided the realm into satrapies (provinces) under governors, standardized coinage with the gold daric, and built the Royal Road connecting Susa to Sardis, along with a magnificent new ceremonial capital at Persepolis. This administrative genius let the Persian Empire endure for another two centuries.

Darius's reign also brings one of the most encouraging turns in the post-exilic story. When local officials in the province petitioned to halt the Jews' rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple, Darius ordered a search of the royal archives at Ecbatana — and found the original scroll of Cyrus's decree. Rather than side with the opposition, Darius commanded that the work continue at once, with expenses paid from the royal treasury and even provisions supplied for the daily sacrifices (Ezra 6:1-12). Spurred on by the preaching of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, the people finished the Second Temple in Darius's sixth year, 516 BC (Ezra 6:15).

It is a recurring biblical pattern: 'The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will' (Proverbs 21:1). Two successive pagan emperors of the world's greatest empire, Cyrus and then Darius, become unwitting patrons of God's house in Jerusalem.