© Charles Chandler

 

He freed the Jewish exiles. On their return to the Levant, they re-established Judaism as the dominant religion (i.e., the Priestly version of it), and began building the Second Temple. Cyrus relied on local political and/or religious leaders for the legal administration of provinces in his empire, and he looked to the Levites for establishing a canon that would maintain law & order in Judea, which prompted the redactions of the Tanakh during the Second Temple Period.