God’s intention with Israel was to have on earth a divinely constituted people to be His testimony. However, most of those who had returned to Jerusalem from the captivity in Babylon had been born and raised not in Israel but in Babylon. The Babylonian element had been wrought into them and constituted into their being. Therefore, after they returned to the land of their fathers to be citizens of the nation of Israel, they needed to be reconstituted. In order to be reconstituted, they needed to come back to God by coming back to His law, that is, His word. Under Ezra and Nehemiah the returned people of Israel were collectively constituted by and with God through His word to be a nation as God’s testimony. See note Neh. 13:30¹, par. 1.

In order to reconstitute the people of God, there is the need to educate them with the word that comes out of the mouth of God and which expresses God. To reconstitute the people of God is to educate them by putting them into the Word of God that they may be saturated with the word. The word of God is one with the Spirit (John 6:63; Eph. 6:17). Through our daily reading of the divine Word, the word of God works within us, and the Spirit, through the word, spontaneously dispenses God’s nature with God’s element into our being, causing us to be constituted with God.

For the reconstituting of God’s people, Ezra was very useful, for he was one through whom the people could be reconstituted with the word of God. See note Ezra 7:1¹.

This indicates that rebellious Israel had been fully convinced and fully subdued by the word of God spoken through Moses.

Insight here refers to apprehending the intrinsic significance of the words of the law.

Or, tabernacles. So throughout this chapter.

Israel did everything according to the complete law, with the commandments, the statutes, and the ordinances (see note Luke 1:6⁴). They had a revival and became a new nation, constituted through and with the word of God.