Please, let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I am praying before you by day and by night for your servants, the {Israelites}, and confessing the sins of the {Israelites} that we have sinned against you. I and my father's house have sinned.

So the king said to me, "Why is your face sad since you are not sick? This is nothing but sadness of the heart." And I was very much afraid.

Then the king said to me, "What is your request?" So I prayed to the God of the heavens.

Then I said to the king, "If it pleases the king, and if your servant has [found] favor in your presence, [I ask] that you send me to Judah, to the city of my ancestors' burial sites, so that I may rebuild it."

With the queen sitting beside him, the king said to me, "How long will your journey be and when will you return?" So it pleased the king and he sent me, and I set for him an appointed time.

Also, a letter to Asaph, keeper of the king's land reserve, that he should give me timber for laying the beams for the gates of the citadel of the house and for the walls of the city, and for the house which I will enter." And the king gave [permission] to me, according to the good hand of God on me.

I crossed over to the Fountain Gate and to the King's Pool, but there was no place for {my mount} to cross over.

So I went up by the valley during the night and was examining the wall. Then I returned and came to the Valley Gate and returned.

Then I said to them, "You see the misery that we are in, that Jerusalem is ruined and its gates burned by the fire. Come, build the walls of Jerusalem and we shall no longer be a disgrace."

Shallun son of Col-Hozeh, the commander of the district of Mizpah, repaired the Fountain Gate. He rebuilt it and covered it and erected its doors, its bolts, its bars, and [he built] the wall of the Pool of Shelah of the king's garden, right up to the steps going down from the city of David.

So we rebuilt the wall, and all of the wall was joined up to half [its height]. For the people had a heart to do [it].

So all of them plotted together to come fight against Jerusalem and to make trouble for it.

So we prayed to our God and set up a guard against them day and night.

Then our enemies said, "They will not know nor see until we come upon them and will kill them and stop the work."

So we labored at the work, and half of them were holding the spears from dawn until the stars came out.

At the time I also said to the people, "Let each man and his servant spend the night inside Jerusalem, so that they will be a guard for us in the night and work in the day."

So neither I nor my brothers nor my young men nor the men of the guard who were behind me took off our clothes. Each one [kept] his weapon [even] in the water.

There were those who were saying, "Our sons and daughters, we are many. We must get grain so that we may eat and live."

There were also those saying, "We have pledged our fields and our vineyards and our houses so that we can get grain in the famine."

I thought over this in my heart, and then I quarreled with the nobles and the prefects. I said to them, "You yourselves are taking interest from your own brother!" So I called the great assembly against them,

and I said to them: "We ourselves have bought back our brothers the Jews who were sold to the nations as we were able. But now you yourselves have sold your brothers so they may be sold to us!" They were silent and could not find a word [to say].

So I said, "The thing that you are doing is not good. Should you not walk in the fear of our God [to prevent] the disgrace from the nations, our enemies?

So they said, "We will restore it and will not request [anything more]. So we will do as you say." Then I called the priests and made them take an oath to do this promise.

I also shook out my garment and said, "This is how God will shake out everyone from his house who will not keep this promise. So this is how his possessions will be shaken out and emptied." And all the assembly said, "Amen!" And they praised Yahweh, and the people kept this promise.

The former governors who were before me laid burdens on the people, and they took food and wine from them, besides forty shekels. Also, their servants controlled the people, but I did not do so because of the fear of God.

So I sent messengers to them, saying, "I am doing a great work and I am not able to come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you all?"

So I sent to him saying, "None of these words you have spoken has happened. You are indeed saying [things] created in your own mind"--

But I said, "Should a man like me run away? And would a man like me go into the temple so that he can save his life? I will not go in!"

For this reason he was hired: to frighten [me] so that I would act and sin, so that they would have a bad report so they could taunt me.

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

The descendants of Solomon's servants: the descendants of Sotai, the descendants of Sophereth, the descendants of Perida,

All the temple servants and the descendants of Solomon's servants were three hundred and ninety-two.

These sought their record among those enrolled in the genealogy, but it was not found there, so they were excluded as unclean from the priesthood.

So the governor said to them that they could not eat the most holy food until a priest could come with Urim and Thummim.

So the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, some of the people, the temple servants, and all Israel settled in their cities. When the seventh month came, the {Israelites} [were] in their cities.

So Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly for [each] man and woman to hear with understanding, on the first day of the seventh month.

So they read the book from the law of God, making it clear and giving the meaning so that they could understand the reading.

So the Levites silenced all of the people, saying, "Silence, for this day is holy. Do not be grieved."

So the people went out and brought them and made booths for themselves, each on his roof, in their courtyards, in the courtyards of the house of God, in the public square of the Water Gate, and in the public square of the Gate of Ephraim.

"You saw the misery of our ancestors in Egypt, and you heard their shout at the Red Sea.

And you divided the sea before them, and they passed through the sea on dry ground, but their pursuers you threw into the depths like a stone into mighty waters.

They refused to listen and did not remember your wonders that you did among them. They stiffened their neck and in their rebellion {determined} to return to their slavery. But you are a God of forgiveness, gracious and compassionate, {slow to anger}, abundant in loyal love, so you did not abandon them.

So the children went in and took possession of the land. You subdued before them the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites; you gave them into their hand, and their kings and the nations of the land to do with them according to their pleasure.

You warned them so that they would return to your law. Yet they acted arrogantly and did not listen to your commandments but sinned against your judgments that a person must do so that they may live. They turned a stubborn shoulder and stiffened their neck and would not listen.

You were patient toward them for many years, and you have warned them by your spirit through the hand of your prophets, but they did not listen. So you gave them into the hand of the nations of the lands.

Now the commanders of the people lived in Jerusalem, but the remainder of the people cast lots to bring one out of ten to live in the holy city of Jerusalem, the [other] nine's place [was in] the [other] cities.

These are the heads of the province who lived in Jerusalem, but in the cities of Judah each one lived on his property in their cities: Israel, the priests, the Levites, the temple servants, and the descendants of Solomon's servants.

Zanoah, Adullam and {their settlements}, Lachish and its fields, and Azekah and {its settlements}. So they camped from Beersheba up to [the] Valley [of] Hinnom.

In the days of Eliashib, Jehoiada, Jehohanan, and Jaddua the Levites were recorded as heads of the {families}. So [these were] the priests [during] the reign of Darius the Persian.

So the two choirs stood in the house of God, and I and half of the prefects with me;

So all of Israel in the days of Zerubbabel and in the days of Nehemiah gave the daily food portions of the singers and gatekeepers. And they set apart [that which was for] the Levites, and the Levites set apart [that which was for] the descendants of Aaron.

So it happened when they heard the law that they separated all of the foreign people from Israel.

So I came to Jerusalem. And I came to learn of the wrong that Eliashib had done for Tobiah by making him a room in the courtyard of the house of God.

And then I came to learn that the food of the Levites had not been given to them, so that the Levites and the singers, the doers of the work, had gone back each to his field.

So I quarreled with the prefects, and I said, "Why is the house of God forsaken?" And I gathered them and set them at their station.

So all of Judah brought the tithe of grain, new wine, and olive oil into the storehouses.

In those days I saw in Judah [people] treading the wine press on the Sabbath, bringing in heaps [of grain] and loading them on donkeys along with wine, grapes and figs, and every kind of burden and bringing [it all] to Jerusalem on the day of the Sabbath. And I warned them at that time against selling food.

So I quarreled with the nobles of Judah and said to them, "What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the day of the Sabbath?

So when it became dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I commanded that the doors be shut and said that they should not be opened until after the Sabbath. And I appointed some of my young men over the gates [to prevent] any {goods} being brought in on the day of the Sabbath.

So the merchants and the sellers of merchandise spent the night outside of Jerusalem once or twice.

Also in those days I saw Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab.

So I quarreled with them and cursed them and beat some of their men and pulled out their hair. I made them take an oath by God: "Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons or for yourselves.

So I cleansed them from everything foreign, and I established responsibilities for the priests and Levites, each in his own work,