The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came to pass in the month Chislev, in the twentieth year, as I was in Shushan the fortress,

And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him, and I took up the wine and gave it to the king. Now, I had never been sad in his presence.

Moreover from the time that I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year even to the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes the king, twelve years, I and my brethren have not eaten the bread of the governor.

Yea, also I applied myself to this work of the wall, and we bought no fields; and all my servants were gathered thither for the work.

Yea, when they had made them a molten calf, and said, This is thy god that brought thee up out of Egypt! and they had wrought great provocation,

Yea, forty years didst thou sustain them in the wilderness; they lacked nothing; their clothes grew not old, and their feet swelled not.

and that if the peoples of the land brought wares or any grain on the sabbath day to sell, we would not take it of them on the sabbath, or on any holy day; and that we would leave the land uncultivated the seventh year, and the exaction of every debt.

And we cast the lots among the priests, the Levites, and the people, for the wood-offering, to bring it into the house of our God, according to our fathers' houses, at times appointed year by year, to burn upon the altar of Jehovah our God, as it is written in the law;

and to bring the first-fruits of our land, and the first-fruits of all fruit of all trees, year by year to the house of Jehovah,

And during all that time I was not at Jerusalem; for in the two-and-thirtieth year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon I came to the king; and after some time I obtained leave of the king.