Study Desk

And they have already come and are standing behind the wall to fight against you with their arrows; so I divided the force after their families with their swords, their spears, and their bows.

Also at that time I said to the people, Let every one with his servant lodge in the midst of the streets of Jerusalem, and let them guard it in the night and in the day, so that the builders may do the work.

So neither I nor my brethren nor my servants nor the men of the guard who followed me, none of us took off his clothes for many full months, and each one did his duty.

And we said, So may God shake out every man from his house and from his labor who does not perform this promise, even thus shall he be shaken out and emptied. And all the people said, Amen. Then all the people rose up and praised the LORD. And all the people did according to this promise.

But the former governors who had been before me had enslaved the people and taken from them wine and bread, besides forty shekels of silver; also their servants bore rule over the people, and they were subject to them and were tormented by them; but I did not do so, because of the fear of God.

And I sent a messenger to them, saying, I am doing a great work so that I cannot come down, lest the work cease, while I leave it and come down to you.

Therefore he was hired, that I should be afraid and do so and sin, so that I might become to them an evil report, that they might reproach me.

So the wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, in fifty-two days.

So the priests and the Levites and the porters and the attendants and some of the people and the Nethanites and all Israel returned to their own cities; and when the seventh month came, the children of Israel were in their cities.

So they read in the book of the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, so that they understood the reading thereof.

So the Levites stilled all the people, saying. Hold your peace, for the day is holy; and do not weep.

So the people went forth and brought them, and made themselves booths, every one upon the roof of his house and in their courts and in the court of the house of the LORD and in the street of the water gate and in the street of the gate of Ephraim.

And all the people of those who had returned from the captivity made booths and dwelt in the booths; for since the days of Joshua the son of Nun to that day the children of Israel had not done so. And there was a very great gladness.

And didst show signs and wonders upon Pharaoh and upon all his servants and on all the people of his land; for thou knewest that they dealt wrongly with thy people. So didst thou get thee a name, as it is this day.

And thou didst open a passage in the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on the dry land; and their persecutors thou didst throw into the depths of the sea, as a stone that sinks in the mighty waters.

Moreover thou gavest them the kingdoms of the Gentiles, and didst divide to them the land to every man; so they possessed the land of Sihon and the land of the king of Heshbon and the land of Og king of Bashan.

So their children went in and possessed the land, and thou didst defeat before them the inhabitants of the land of the Canaanites, and didst deliver them into their hands with their kings and the people of the land, that they might do with them as they would.

And they captured fortified cities and a fertile land, and possessed houses full of all good things, wells digged, vineyards and olive orchards and fruit trees in abundance; so they did eat and were filled and became rich and delighted themselves in thy great goodness.

But after they had rest, they did evil again before thee; therefore thou didst leave them in the hand of their enemies, so that they had dominion over them; yet when they returned and prayed before thee, thou didst hear them from heaven; and many times didst thou save them according to thy great mercies.

Also that day they offered great sacrifices and rejoiced; for the LORD had made them rejoice with great joy; the wives also and the children rejoiced; so that the joy of Jerusalem was heard even afar off.