In the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was placed before him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had not [previously] been sad in his presence.

So I came to Jerusalem and was there for three days.

So I went out at night by the Valley Gate toward the Dragon’s Well and to the Refuse Gate and inspected the walls of Jerusalem which were broken down and its gates which were consumed by fire.

Now our flesh (skin) is the same as that of our brothers (relatives), and our children are like their children, yet here we are forcing (selling) our sons and our daughters to be slaves; and some of our daughters are forced into bondage already, and we are powerless [to redeem them] because our fields and vineyards belong to others.”

I sent a message to him, saying, “Such things as you are saying have not been done; you are inventing them in your own mind.”

Now when the wall had been rebuilt and I had set up the doors, and the gatekeepers, singers, and Levites had been appointed,

I also discovered that the portions due the Levites had not been given to them, so that the Levites and the singers who did the work had gone away, each one back to his own field.