Judith 6:3

Jerome's Latin Vulgate

Misi ergo ad eos nuntios, dicens: Opus grande ego facio, et non possum descendere, ne forte negligatur cum venero, et descendero ad vos.

Parallel Translations

Clementine Latin Vulgate (1592)
Anno primo Cyri regis, Cyrus rex decrevit ut domus Dei ædificaretur, quæ est in Jerusalem, in loco ubi immolent hostias, et ut ponant fundamenta supportantia altitudinem cubitorum sexaginta, et latitudinem cubitorum sexaginta,

Nova Vulgata (1979)
Misi ergo ad eos nuntios dicens: "Opus grande ego facio et non possum descendere; cur cessare oportet opus, si desistero et descendero ad vos?".

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

And I sent: Proverbs 14:15, Matthew 10:16

I am doing: Ecclesiastes 9:10, Luke 14:30, John 9:4, 1 Timothy 4:15, 1 Timothy 4:16

Reciprocal: Ezra 4:24 - So Nehemiah 6:11 - Should such Acts 6:2 - we should Acts 8:1 - except

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And I sent messengers unto them,.... He did not show any open contempt of them, nor did he even return answer by the messenger that came from them, but sent some of his own people to them:

saying, I am doing a great work; was about an affair of great importance, very busy, and not at leisure to give them a meeting:

so that I cannot come down; Jerusalem being built on an eminence, and the place proposed to meet at in a plain, going thither is expressed by coming down:

why should the work cease, while I leave it, and come down to you? signifying that it would cease if he left it; and it being of greater consequence than anything they could have to converse about, he argues it would be wrong to relinquish it on such an account; this was the reason he thought fit to give, but was not the only, nor the principal reason, which is suggested in the preceding verse.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Nehemiah 6:3. I am doing a great work — Though he knew their design, he does not think it prudent to mention it. Had he done so, they would probably have gone to extremities, finding that they were discovered; and perhaps in a formidable body attacked Jerusalem, when ill provided to sustain such a shock. They wished to effect their purpose rather by treachery than by open violence. I know not any language which a man who is employed on important labours can use more suitably, as an answer to the thousand invitations and provocations he may have to remit his work, enter into useless or trivial conferences, or notice weak, wicked, and malicious attacks on his work and his motives: "I am doing a great work, so I cannot stoop to your nonsense, or notice your malevolence. Why should the work cease, while I leave it, and come down to such as you?"