Cyrus Meaning in the Bible

Cyrus is the Greek Kyros, from Old Persian Kūruš, of debated meaning — 'sun,' 'young,' or possibly 'humiliator of the enemy.' The Hebrew form is Koresh (כּוֹרֶשׁ). It is the name of the founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, Cyrus the Great, who took Babylon in 539 BC.

What Scripture does with him is remarkable. Isaiah 44:28 has God say of Cyrus, 'He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure: even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and to the temple, Thy foundation shall be laid.' Then Isaiah 45:1 goes further: 'Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden.' The word translated 'anointed' is mashiach — messiah. It is the only time in the Hebrew Bible that term is applied to a foreign, non-worshipping ruler.

The next verses explain why without softening it: 'I girded thee, though thou hast not known me' (Isaiah 45:5). God's claim is that He directs the career of a pagan emperor who has no idea he is being directed, for the sake of a people that emperor has never met. Ezra 1:1–4 records the decree itself, and the Cyrus Cylinder, now in the British Museum, independently attests his policy of returning displaced peoples and restoring their sanctuaries.

As a name, Cyrus is two syllables, ends in the fashionable -us, and has quiet nineteenth-century American usage behind it. It is one of very few names that is simultaneously biblical, historically documented outside the Bible, and uncommon.