You Shall Not Marry Foreigners

²³ In those days I also saw that the Jews had ^[a](A)married women from ^(B)Ashdod, ^(C)Ammon, and Moab. ²⁴ As for their children, half spoke in the language of Ashdod, and none of them was able to speak the language of Judah, but only ^[b]the tongue of his own people. ²⁵ So ^(D)I contended with them and cursed them and ^(E)struck some of them and pulled out their hair and ^(F)made them swear by God, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take up their daughters for your sons or for yourselves. ^26 (G)Did not Solomon king of Israel sin regarding these things? ^(H)Yet among the many nations there was no king like him, and ^(I)he was loved by his God, and God gave him to be king over all Israel; nevertheless the foreign women caused even him to sin. ^27 [c]Do we then hear about you that you have done all this great evil ^(J)by acting unfaithfully against our God by ^[d]marrying foreign women?” ²⁸ And even one of the sons of Joiada, the son of Eliashib the high priest, was a son-in-law of ^(K)Sanballat the Horonite, so I made him flee away from me. ^29 (L)Remember them, O my God, ^[e]because they have defiled the priesthood and the ^(M)covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.