Cyrus the Persian

Cyrus befriended the Jews, and admitted that God had instructed him to do this. He recognised Jehovah as the God of Israel — not as his God, necessarily; and though we read of him as God’s “anointed”, and though we read of his brave hosts as God’s “sanctified ones”, it does not follow from that, that they were employed more than for just the work they had to do; it does not by any means necessarily imply that they were ordained to eternal life, but that they were set apart or selected by God for that work only; and Cyrus recognised that all he did was not of his own purpose, but the God of Israel had commanded him to do it — to let the Jews go to Jerusalem, and to build the house of the Lord which was in Jerusalem.

S. A. Garside