and answered the king, “If it pleases the king, and if your servant has found favor with you, send me to Judah and to the city where my ancestors are buried, so that I may rebuild it.”

Then my God put it into my mind to assemble the nobles, the officials, and the people to be registered by genealogy. I found the genealogical record of those who came back first, and I found the following written in it:

These searched for their entries in the genealogical records, but they could not be found, so they were disqualified from the priesthood.

They found written in the law how the Lord had commanded through Moses that the Israelites should dwell in booths during the festival of the seventh month.

You found his heart faithful in Your sight,
and made a covenant with him
to give the land of the Canaanites,
Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites,
Jebusites, and Girgashites—
to give it to his descendants.
You have kept Your promise,
for You are righteous.

At that time the book of Moses was read publicly to the people. The command was found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God,

I also found out that because the portions for the Levites had not been given, each of the Levites and the singers performing the service had gone back to his own field.