Nehemiah Prays for His People

1 The words of ^(A)Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah.

It came to pass in the month of Chislev, in the ^(B)twentieth year, as I was in ^(C)Shushan^[a] the ^[b]citadel, ² that ^(D)Hanani one of my brethren came with men from Judah; and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped, who had survived the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem. ³ And they said to me, “The survivors who are left from the captivity in the ^(E)province are there in great distress and ^(F)reproach. ^(G)The wall of Jerusalem ^(H)is also broken down, and its gates are burned with fire.”

⁴ So it was, when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept, and mourned for many days; I was fasting and praying before the God of heaven.

⁵ And I said: “I pray, ^(I)Lord God of heaven, O great and ^(J)awesome God, ^(K)You who keep Your covenant and mercy with those who love ^[c]You and observe ^[d]Your commandments, ⁶ please let Your ear be attentive and ^(L)Your eyes open, that You may hear the prayer of Your servant which I pray before You now, day and night, for the children of Israel Your servants, and ^(M)confess the sins of the children of Israel which we have sinned against You. Both my father’s house and I have sinned. ^7 (N)We have acted very corruptly against You, and have ^(O)not kept the commandments, the statutes, nor the ordinances which You commanded Your servant Moses. ⁸ Remember, I pray, the word that You commanded Your servant Moses, saying, ^(P)‘If you ^[e]are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the nations; ^9 (Q)but if you return to Me, and keep My commandments and do them, ^(R)though some of you were cast out to the farthest part of the heavens, yet I will gather them from there, and bring them to the place which I have chosen as a dwelling for My name.’ ^10 (S)Now these are Your servants and Your people, whom You have redeemed by Your great power, and by Your strong hand. ¹¹ O Lord, I pray, please ^(T)let Your ear be attentive to the prayer of Your servant, and to the prayer of Your servants who ^(U)desire to fear Your name; and let Your servant prosper this day, I pray, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man.”

For I was the king’s ^(V)cupbearer.

Nehemiah Sent to Judah

2 And it came to pass in the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of ^(A)King ^[a]Artaxerxes, when wine was before him, that ^(B)I took the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had never been sad in his presence before. ² Therefore the king said to me, “Why is your face sad, since you are not sick? This is nothing but ^(C)sorrow of heart.”

So I became ^[b]dreadfully afraid, ³ and said to the king, ^(D)“May the king live forever! Why should my face not be sad, when ^(E)the city, the place of my fathers’ tombs, lies waste, and its gates are burned with ^(F)fire?”

⁴ Then the king said to me, “What do you request?”

So I ^(G)prayed to the God of heaven. ⁵ And I said to the king, “If it pleases the king, and if your servant has found favor in your sight, I ask that you send me to Judah, to the city of my fathers’ tombs, that I may rebuild it.”

⁶ Then the king said to me (the queen also sitting beside him), “How long will your journey be? And when will you return?” So it pleased the king to send me; and I set him ^(H)a time.

⁷ Furthermore I said to the king, “If it pleases the king, let letters be given to me for the ^(I)governors of the region beyond ^[c]the River, that they must permit me to pass through till I come to Judah, ⁸ and a letter to Asaph the keeper of the king’s forest, that he must give me timber to make beams for the gates of the ^[d]citadel which pertains ^(J)to the ^[e]temple, for the city wall, and for the house that I will occupy.” And the king granted them to me ^(K)according to the good hand of my God upon me.

⁹ Then I went to the governors in the region beyond the River, and gave them the king’s letters. Now the king had sent captains of the army and horsemen with me. ¹⁰ When ^(L)Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite ^[f]official heard of it, they were deeply disturbed that a man had come to seek the well-being of the children of Israel.

Nehemiah Views the Wall of Jerusalem

¹¹ So I ^(M)came to Jerusalem and was there three days. ¹² Then I arose in the night, I and a few men with me; I told no one what my God had put in my heart to do at Jerusalem; nor was there any animal with me, except the one on which I rode. ¹³ And I went out by night ^(N)through the Valley Gate to the Serpent Well and the ^[g]Refuse Gate, and ^[h]viewed the walls of Jerusalem which were ^(O)broken down and its gates which were burned with fire. ¹⁴ Then I went on to the ^(P)Fountain Gate and to the ^(Q)King’s Pool, but there was no room for the animal under me to pass. ¹⁵ So I went up in the night by the ^(R)valley,^[i] and ^[j]viewed the wall; then I turned back and entered by the Valley Gate, and so returned. ¹⁶ And the officials did not know where I had gone or what I had done; I had not yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, or the others who did the work.

¹⁷ Then I said to them, “You see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lies ^[k]waste, and its gates are burned with fire. Come and let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer be ^(S)a reproach.” ¹⁸ And I told them of ^(T)the hand of my God which had been good upon me, and also of the king’s words that he had spoken to me.

So they said, “Let us rise up and build.” Then they ^(U)set^[l] their hands to this good work.

¹⁹ But when Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official, and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they laughed at us and despised us, and said, “What is this thing that you are doing? ^(V)Will you rebel against the king?”

²⁰ So I answered them, and said to them, “The God of heaven Himself will prosper us; therefore we His servants will arise and build, ^(W)but you have no heritage or right or memorial in Jerusalem.”