Of course it was a copy, and not the original autograph, which might not be removed from the sanctuary.  It is a natural supposition that other transcripts of the law were made under the direction of the high priest, for the use of pious men, especially pious prophets, princes, and Levites, who needed its directions for the right discharge of their official duties, though on this point we can affirm nothing positively.  As to the prophetical books, we know that Jeremiah had access to the writings of Isaiah, for in repeated instances he borrowed his language.  We know again that Daniel had at hand the prophecies of Jeremiah; for he understood “by books” (literally “by the books,” which may be well understood to mean that collection of sacred books of which the prophecies of Jeremiah formed a part) “the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.”  Dan. 9:2.  The consecration of the Psalms of David and his coadjutors to the public service of the sanctuary must have insured their careful preservation by the Levites who had charge of the temple music; and, in general, the deep reverence of the Jews for their sacred writings is to us a reasonable evidence that they preserved them from loss and mutilation to the captivity, and through that calamitous period.

17.  To Ezra and his coadjutors, the men of the Great Synagogue, the Jews ascribe the completion of the canon of the Old Testament.  Their traditions concerning him are embellished with extravagant fictions; yet we cannot reasonably deny that they are underlaid by a basis of truth.  All the scriptural notices of Ezra attest both his zeal and his ability as “a scribe of the words of the commandments of the Lord, and of his statutes to Israel,” a man who “had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.”  Ezra 7:10, 11.  The work in which he and his associates were engaged was the reestablishment of the Theocracy on its old foundation, the law of Moses, with the ordinances pertaining to the sanctuary-service afterwards added by David; and that too in the vivid consciousness of the fact that disobedience to the divine law had brought upon the nation the calamities of the captivity.  In such circumstances their first solicitude must have been that the people might have the inspired oracles given to their fathers, and be thoroughly instructed in them.  The work, therefore, which Jewish tradition ascribes to Ezra and the men of the Great Synagogue was altogether appropriate to their situation, nor do we know of any man or body of men afterwards so well qualified for its performance, or upon whom it would so naturally have devolved.