1Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the children of Israel were assembled with fasting, in sackcloth, and earth upon them. 2Then the seed of Israel separated themselves from the children of the foreigners; and they stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. 3And they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of Jehovah their God for a fourth part of the day; and for another fourth they confessed and prostrated themselves before Jehovah their God. 4Then Jeshua, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani stood on the stairs of the Levites and cried out with a loud voice to Jehovah their God. 5And the Levites, Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabniah, Sherebiah, Hodijah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said: Stand up and bless Jehovah your God forever and ever! Blessed is Your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise! 6You alone are Jehovah; You have made the heavens, the Heaven of the heavens, with all their host, the earth and everything on it, the seas and all that is in them, and You preserve them all alive. The host of the Heavens bow down before You. 7You are Jehovah God, who chose Abram, and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans, and placed upon him the name Abraham; 8You found his heart faithful before You, and made a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, and the Girgashites; to give it to his seed. You have performed Your words, for You are just. 9You saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heard their cry by the Red Sea. 10You gave signs and wonders upon Pharaoh, upon all his servants, and upon all the people of his land. For You knew that they had acted proudly against them. So You made a name for Yourself, as it is this day. 11And You divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on the dry land; and those pursuing them You threw into the deep, as a stone into the mighty waters. 12Moreover You led them by day with a cloudy pillar, and by night with a pillar of fire, to give them light on the way which they should travel. 13You came down also on Mount Sinai, and spoke with them from the heavens, and gave them just ordinances and true laws, good statutes and commandments. 14You made known to them Your holy Sabbath, and commanded them precepts, statutes and Laws, by the hand of Your servant Moses. 15You gave them bread from the heavens for their hunger, and brought forth water for them out of the rock for their thirst, and intended for them to go in to possess the land which You had raised Your hand and sworn to give them. 16But they and our fathers acted presumptuously, hardened their necks, and did not heed Your commandments, 17and refused to obey, and they were not mindful of Your wonders that You did among them. But they hardened their necks, and in their rebellion they appointed a leader to return to their bondage. But You are God, ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abundant in kindness; and did not forsake them. 18Even when they made a molten calf for themselves, and said, This is your god that brought you up out of Egypt, and worked great blasphemies; 19yet in Your manifold mercies You did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of the cloud did not depart from them by day, to lead them on the road; nor the pillar of fire by night, to show them light, and the way they should go. 20You also gave Your good Spirit to teach them, and did not withhold Your manna from their mouth, and gave them water for their thirst. 21Forty years You sustained them in the wilderness. They lacked nothing; their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell. 22Moreover You gave them kingdoms and nations, and divided them into districts. So they took possession of the land of Sihon, the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og king of Bashan. 23You also multiplied their children as the stars of the heavens, and brought them into the land which You had commanded their fathers to go in and possess it. 24So the people went in and possessed the land; You subdued before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them into their hands, with their kings and the people of the land, that they might do with them as they pleased. 25And they captured strong cities and a rich land, and took possession of houses full of all goods, wells already dug, vineyards, olive groves, and fruit trees in abundance. So they ate and were filled and grew fat, and lived luxuriously in Your great goodness. 26Nevertheless they were disobedient and rebelled against You, cast Your Law behind their backs and killed Your prophets, who testified against them to turn them to Yourself; and they worked great blasphemies. 27Therefore You delivered them into the hand of their enemies, who distressed them; and in the time of their trouble, when they cried out to You, You heard from Heaven; and according to Your abundant mercies You gave them deliverers who saved them out of the hand of their enemies. 28But after they had rest, they returned to doing evil before You. Therefore You left them in the hand of their enemies, so that they had dominion over them; yet when they returned and cried out to You, You heard from Heaven; and many times You delivered them according to Your mercies, 29and testified against them, that You might bring them back to Your Law. Yet they acted presumptuously, and did not heed Your commandments, but sinned against Your judgments, which if a man does, he shall live by them. And they shrugged their shoulders, stiffened their necks, and would not obey. 30Yet for many years You had patience with them, and testified against them by Your Spirit by the hand of Your prophets. Yet they would not listen; therefore You gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. 31Nevertheless in Your great mercy You did not annihilate them nor forsake them; for You are the Mighty God, gracious and merciful. 32Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and awesome Mighty God, who keeps covenant and mercy: Do not let all the trouble seem small before You that has found us, our kings and our rulers, our priests and our prophets, our fathers and all Your people, since the days of the kings of Assyria until this day. 33However You are just in all that has come upon us; for You have dealt faithfully, but we have done wickedly. 34Neither our kings nor our princes, our priests nor our fathers, have kept Your Law, nor paid attention to Your commandments and Your testimonies, with which You testified against them. 35For they have not served You in their kingdom, nor in the great goodness that You gave them, nor in the large and rich land which You set before them; nor did they turn from their evil works. 36Here we are, servants this day! And the land that You gave to our fathers, to eat its fruit and its bounty; behold, we are servants in it. 37And it yields much increase to the kings You have set over us, because of our sins; also they have dominion over our bodies and our cattle at their pleasure; and we are in great distress. 38And because of all this, we are making a covenant in good faith, and writing it; sealed by our rulers, our Levites, and our priests.
Jamieson Fausset Brown Bible Commentary 1 A SOLEMN FAST AND REPENTANCE OF THE PEOPLE. (
Neh 9:1-
Neh 9:3)
Now in the twenty and fourth day of this month--that is, on the second day after the close of the feast of tabernacles, which commenced on the fourteenth and terminated on the twenty-second (
Lev 23:34-
Lev 23:37). The day immediately after that feast, the twenty-third, had been occupied in separating the delinquents from their unlawful wives, as well, perhaps, as in taking steps for keeping aloof in future from unnecessary intercourse with the heathen around them. For although this necessary measure of reformation had been begun formerly by Ezra (Ezra 10:1-17), and satisfactorily accomplished at that time (in so far as he had information of the existing abuses, or possessed the power of correcting them) yet it appears that this reformatory work of Ezra had been only partial and imperfect. Many cases of delinquency had escaped, or new defaulters had appeared who had contracted those forbidden alliances; and there was an urgent necessity for Nehemiah again to take vigorous measures for the removal of a social evil which threatened the most disastrous consequences to the character and prosperity of the chosen people. A solemn fast was now observed for the expression of those penitential and sorrowful feelings which the reading of the law had produced, but which had been suppressed during the celebration of the feast; and the sincerity of their repentance was evinced by the decisive steps taken for the correction of existing abuses in the matter of marriage.
2 confessed their sins, and the iniquities of their fathers--Not only did they read in their recent sufferings a punishment of the national apostasy and guilt, but they had made themselves partakers of their fathers' sins by following the same evil ways.
3 they . . . read in the book of the law--Their extraordinary zeal led them to continue this as before.
one fourth part of the day--that is, for three hours, twelve hours being the acknowledged length of the Jewish day (
John 11:9). This solemn diet of worship, which probably commenced at the morning sacrifice, was continued for six hours, that is, till the time of the evening sacrifice. The worship which they gave to the Lord their God, at this season of solemn national humiliation, consisted in acknowledging and adoring His great mercy in the forgiveness of their great and multiplied offenses, in delivering them from the merited judgments which they had already experienced or which they had reason to apprehend, in continuing amongst them the light and blessings of His word and worship, and in supplicating the extension of His grace and protection.
4 THE LEVITES CONFESS GOD'S MANIFOLD GOODNESS, AND THEIR OWN WICKEDNESS. (Neh. 9:4-38)
Then stood up upon the stairs--the scaffolds or pulpits, whence the Levites usually addressed the people. There were probably several placed at convenient distances, to prevent confusion and the voice of one drowning those of the others.
cried with a loud voice unto the Lord--Such an exertion, of course, was indispensably necessary, in order that the speakers might be heard by the vast multitude congregated in the open air. But these speakers were then engaged in expressing their deep sense of sin, as well as fervently imploring the forgiving mercy of God; and "crying with a loud voice" was a natural accompaniment of this extraordinary prayer meeting, as violent gestures and vehement tones are always the way in which the Jews, and other people in the East, have been accustomed to give utterance to deep and earnest feelings.
5 Then the Levites . . . said, Stand up and bless the Lord your God--If this prayer was uttered by all these Levites in common, it must have been prepared and adopted beforehand, perhaps, by Ezra; but it may only embody the substance of the confession and thanksgiving.
6 Thou, even thou, art Lord alone, &c.--In this solemn and impressive prayer, in which they make public confession of their sins, and deprecate the judgments due to the transgressions of their fathers, they begin with a profound adoration of God, whose supreme majesty and omnipotence is acknowledged in the creation, preservation, and government of all. Then they proceed to enumerate His mercies and distinguished favors to them as a nation, from the period of the call of their great ancestor and the gracious promise intimated to him in the divinely bestowed name of Abraham, a promise which implied that he was to be the Father of the faithful, the ancestor of the Messiah, and the honored individual in whose seed all the families of the earth should be blessed. Tracing in full and minute detail the signal instances of divine interposition for their deliverance and their interest--in their deliverance from Egyptian bondage--their miraculous passage through the Red Sea--the promulgation of His law--the forbearance and long-suffering shown them amid their frequent rebellions--the signal triumphs given them over their enemies--their happy settlement in the promised land--and all the extraordinary blessings, both in the form of temporal prosperity and of religious privilege, with which His paternal goodness had favored them above all other people, they charge themselves with making a miserable requital. They confess their numerous and determined acts of disobedience. They read, in the loss of their national independence and their long captivity, the severe punishment of their sins. They acknowledge that, in all heavy and continued judgments upon their nation, God had done right, but they had done wickedly. And in throwing themselves on His mercy, they express their purpose of entering into a national covenant, by which they pledge themselves to dutiful obedience in future.
22 Moreover thou gavest them kingdoms and nations--that is, put them in possession of a rich country, of an extensive territory, which had been once occupied by a variety of princes and people.
and didst divide them into corners--that is, into tribes. The propriety of the expression arose from the various districts touching at points or angles on each other.
the land of Sihon, and the land of the king of Heshbon--Heshbon being the capital city, the passage should run thus: "the land of Sihon or the land of the king of Heshbon."
32 Now therefore, our God . . . who keepest covenant and mercy--God's fidelity to His covenant is prominently acknowledged, and well it might; for their whole national history bore testimony to it. But as this could afford them little ground of comfort or of hope while they were so painfully conscious of having violated it, they were driven to seek refuge in the riches of divine grace; and hence the peculiar style of invocation here adopted: "Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the terrible God, who keepest covenant and mercy."
36 Behold, we are servants this day--Notwithstanding their happy restoration to their native land, they were still tributaries of a foreign prince whose officers ruled them. They were not, like their fathers, free tenants of the land which God gave them.
37 it yieldeth much increase unto the kings whom thou hast set over us because of our sins--Our agricultural labors have been resumed in the land--we plough, and sow, and till, and Thou blessest the work of our hands with a plentiful return; but this increase is not for ourselves, as once it was, but for our foreign masters, to whom we have to pay large and oppressive tribute.
they have dominion over our bodies--Their persons were liable to be pressed, at the mandate of their Assyrian conqueror, into the service of his empire, either in war or in public works. And our beasts are taken to do their pleasure.
38 we make a sure covenant, and write--that is, subscribe or sign it. This written document would exercise a wholesome influence in restraining their backslidings or in animating them to duty, by being a witness against them if in the future they were unfaithful to their engagements.