I answered them, “The God of heaven [has appointed us for His purpose and] will give us success; therefore we His servants will arise and build, but you have no portion, right, or memorial in Jerusalem.”

For there were some who were saying, “We, along with our sons and our daughters, are many; therefore allow us to get grain, so that we may eat and survive.”

In it was written, “It is reported among the [neighboring] nations, and Gashmu is saying that you and the Jews are planning to revolt, and that is the reason you are rebuilding the wall. And according to these reports, you are to be their king.

“Therefore You handed them over to their enemies who oppressed them.
But when they cried out to You in the time of their suffering and distress,
You heard them from heaven, and according to Your great compassion You gave them people to rescue them.
Who rescued them from the hand of their enemies.

“But as soon as they had rest, they again did evil before You;
Therefore You abandoned them into the hand of their enemies, so that they ruled over them.
Yet when they turned and cried out again to You, You heard them from heaven,
And You rescued them many times in accordance with Your compassion,

“Yet You were patient with them for many years,
And admonished them and warned them by Your Spirit through Your prophets;
Still they would not listen.
Therefore You gave them into the hand (power) of the peoples of the lands.

“Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps the covenant and lovingkindness,
Do not let all the hardship seem insignificant before You,
Which has come upon us, our kings, our princes, our priests, our prophets, our fathers and on all Your people,
Since the time of the kings of Assyria to this day.

One of the sons of Joiada, the son of Eliashib the high priest, was a son-in-law of Sanballat the Horonite, so I chased him away from me.