"There were two important areas of concern for any ancient city: Spiritual protection and physical protection. Large cities were marked by their defensive walls and gates that protected citizens in times of war. In order to stay spiritually protected the people of a city needed to have an allegiance with a god or deity. This could be expressed in personal shrines, public shrines, high places, and special temples. In Israel, worship was supposed to have been centralized first at the place of the Tabernacle and then at the Jerusalem Temple. Failure to follow God diligently in this had led to the fall of Jerusalem in the first place, but now Jerusalem was back. It had both a Temple and walls. Now the struggle was to get the city occupied. Returned exiles were living in their own territory farming the land. To move to Jerusalem would be inconvenient and came with a stigma. Enemies of the Jews would strike here first.

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