3 and they say to me, `Those left, who have been left of the captivity there in the province, `are' in great evil, and in reproach, and the wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burnt with fire.'
and I say unto them, `Ye are seeing the evil that we are in, in that Jerusalem `is' waste, and its gates have been burnt with fire; come and we build the wall of Jerusalem, and we are not any more a reproach.'
and the walls of Jerusalem round about have all the forces of the Chaldeans, who `are' with the chief of the executioners, broken down.
And I go out through the gate of the valley by night, and unto the front of the fountain of the dragon, and unto the gate of the dunghill, and I am measuring about the walls of Jerusalem, that are broken down, and its gates consumed with fire.
and say to the king, `Let the king to the age live! wherefore should not my face be sad, when the city, the place of the graves of my fathers, `is' a waste, and its gates have been consumed with fire?'
Remember, O Jehovah, what hath befallen us, Look attentively, and see our reproach.
Thou hast heard their reproach, O Jehovah, All their thoughts against me,
Remembered hath Jerusalem `In' the days of her affliction and her mournings, all her desirable things that were from the days of old, In the falling of her people into the hand of an adversary, And she hath no helper; Seen her have adversaries, They have laughed at her cessation.
and all the walls of Jerusalem round about broken down have all the forces of the Chaldeans that `are' with the chief of the executioners.
by provoking Me to anger by the works of your hands, by making perfume to other gods in the land of Egypt, whither ye are going in to sojourn, so as to cut yourselves off, and so as to your being for a reviling and for a reproach among all nations of the earth? `Have ye forgotten the wickedness of your fathers, and the wickedness of the kings of Judah, and the wickedness of their wives, and your own wickedness, and the wickedness of your wives, that they have done in the land of Judah, and in streets of Jerusalem? They have not been humbled unto this day, nor have they been afraid, nor have they walked in My law, and in My statutes, that I have set before you and before your fathers. `Therefore, thus said Jehovah of Hosts, God of Israel: Lo, I am setting my face against you for evil, even to cut off all Judah, and I have taken the remnant of Judah, who have set their faces to enter the land of Egypt to sojourn there, and they have all been consumed in the land of Egypt; they fall by sword, by famine they are consumed, from the least even unto the greatest, by sword and by famine they die, and they have been for an execration, for an astonishment, and for a reviling, and for a reproach.
for thus said Jehovah of Hosts, God of Israel: As poured out hath been Mine anger and My fury on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so poured out is My fury upon you in your entering Egypt, and ye have been for an execration, and for an astonishment, and for a reviling, and for a reproach, and ye do not see any more this place.
And the house of the king, and the house of the people, have the Chaldeans burnt with fire, and the walls of Jerusalem they have broken down.
And I have pursued after them with sword, with famine, and with pestilence, and have given them for a trembling to all kingdoms of the earth, for a curse and for an astonishment, and for a hissing, and for a reproach among all the nations whither I have driven them,
Go ye up on her walls, and destroy, And a completion make not, Turn aside her branches, for they `are' not Jehovah's,
Thy holy cities have been a wilderness, Zion a wilderness hath been, Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and our beautiful house, Where praise Thee did our fathers, Hath become burnt with fire, And all our desirable things have become a waste.
Women, easy ones, rise, hear my voice, Daughters, confident ones, give ear `to' my saying, Days and a year ye are troubled, O confident ones, For consumed hath been harvest, The gathering cometh not. Tremble ye women, ye easy ones, Be troubled, ye confident ones, Strip and make bare, with a girdle on the loins, For breasts they are lamenting, For fields of desire, for the fruitful vine. Over the ground of my people thorn -- brier goeth up, Surely over all houses of joy of the exulting city, Surely the palace hath been left, The multitude of the city forsaken, Fort and watch-tower hath been for dens unto the age, A joy of wild asses -- a pasture of herds;
And now, pray, let me cause you to know, That which I am doing to my vineyard, To turn aside its hedge, And it hath been for consumption, To break down its wall, And it hath been for a treading-place.
We have been a reproach to our neighbours, A scorn and a derision to our surrounders.
Thou makest us food like sheep, And among nations Thou hast scattered us. Thou sellest Thy people -- without wealth, And hast not become great by their price. Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, A scorn and a reproach to our surrounders. Thou makest us a simile among nations, A shaking of the head among peoples.
And these `are' heads of the province who have dwelt in Jerusalem, and in cities of Judah, they have dwelt each in his possession in their cities; Israel, the priests, and the Levites, and the Nethinim, and the sons of the servants of Solomon.
`Lo, we -- to-day -- `are' servants, and the land that Thou hast given to our fathers, to eat its fruit and its good -- lo, we `are' servants on it, and its increase it is multiplying to the kings whom Thou hast set over us in our sins; and over our bodies they are ruling, and over our cattle, according to their pleasure, and we `are' in great distress.
`To Darius the king, all peace! be it known to the king that we have gone to the province of Judah, to the great house of God, and it is built `with' rolled stones, and wood is placed in the walls, and this work is done speedily, and prospering in their hand.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Nehemiah 1
Commentary on Nehemiah 1 Matthew Henry Commentary
An Exposition, With Practical Observations, of
The Book of Nehemiah
Chapter 1
Here we first meet with Nehemiah at the Persian court, where we find him,
Such is the rise of this great man, by piety, not by policy.
Neh 1:1-4
What a tribe Nehemiah was of does nowhere appear; but, if it be true (which we are told by the author of the Maccabees, 2 Mac. 1:18) that he offered sacrifice, we must conclude him to have been a priest. Observe,
Neh 1:5-11
We have here Nehemiah's prayer, a prayer that has reference to all the prayers which he had for some time before been putting up to God day and night, while he continued his sorrows for the desolations of Jerusalem, and withal to the petition he was now intending to present to the king his master for his favour to Jerusalem. We may observe in this prayer,