²¹ Then the Philistines^(A) seized him, gouged out his eyes^(B) and took him down to Gaza.^(C) Binding him with bronze shackles, they set him to grinding grain^(D) in the prison.

⁴ They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.^(A)

Nehemiah Helps the Poor

5 Now the men and their wives raised a great outcry against their fellow Jews. ² Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous; in order for us to eat and stay alive, we must get grain.”

³ Others were saying, “We are mortgaging our fields,^(A) our vineyards and our homes to get grain during the famine.”^(B)

⁴ Still others were saying, “We have had to borrow money to pay the king’s tax^(C) on our fields and vineyards. ⁵ Although we are of the same flesh and blood^(D) as our fellow Jews and though our children are as good as theirs, yet we have to subject our sons and daughters to slavery.^(E) Some of our daughters have already been enslaved, but we are powerless, because our fields and our vineyards belong to others.”^(F)

⁵ If you see the donkey^(A) of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help them with it.

⁵ Every firstborn^(A) son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the female slave, who is at her hand mill,^(B) and all the firstborn of the cattle as well.