This is a copy of the letter which they sent to Artaxerxes the king: Your servants living across the river send these words:

We give news to the king that the Jews who came from you have come to us at Jerusalem; they are building up again that uncontrolled and evil town; the walls are complete and they are joining up the bases.

The king may be certain that when the building of this town and its walls is complete, they will give no tax or payment in goods or forced payments, and in the end it will be a cause of loss to the kings.

Further, there have been great kings in Jerusalem, ruling over all the country across the river, to whom they gave taxes and payments in goods and forced payments.

Then they said these words to them: What are the names of the men who are at work on this building?

But the eye of their God was on the chiefs of the Jews, and they did not make them give up working till the question had been put before Darius and an answer had come by letter about it.

They sent him a letter saying, To Darius the king, all peace:

This is to give the king word that we went into the land of Judah, to the house of the great God, which is made of great stones, and has its walls supported with wood, and the work is going on with industry, and they are doing it well.

And they made answer to us, saying, We are the servants of the God of heaven and earth, and we are building the house which was put up in times long past and was designed and made complete by a great king of Israel.

And at Achmetha, in the great house of the king in the land of Media, they came across a roll, in which this statement was put on record:

In the first year of Cyrus the king, Cyrus the king made an order: In connection with the house of God at Jerusalem, let the house be put up, the place where they make offerings, and let the earth for the bases be put in place; let it be sixty cubits high and sixty cubits wide;

And whatever they have need of, young oxen and sheep and lambs, for burned offerings to the God of heaven, grain, salt, wine, and oil, whatever the priests in Jerusalem say is necessary, is to be given to them day by day regularly:

So that they may make offerings of a sweet smell to the God of heaven, with prayers for the life of the king and of his sons.

And the responsible men of the Jews went on with their building, and did well, helped by the teaching of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah, the son of Iddo. They went on building till it was complete, in keeping with the word of the God of Israel, and the orders given by Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes, king of Persia.

And they gave as offerings at the opening of this house of God a hundred oxen, two hundred sheep, four hundred lambs; and for a sin-offering for all Israel, twelve he-goats, being the number of the tribes of Israel.

And they put the priests in their divisions and the Levites in their order, for the worship of God at Jerusalem; as it is recorded in the book of Moses.

For the priests and the Levites had made themselves clean together; they were all clean: and they put the Passover lamb to death for all those who had come back, and for their brothers the priests and for themselves.

And I sent them to Iddo the chief at the place Casiphia, and gave them orders what to say to Iddo and his brothers the Nethinim at the place Casiphia, so that they might come back to us with men to do the work of the house of our God.

And by the help of our God they got for us Ish-sechel, one of the sons of Mahli, the son of Levi, the son of Israel; and Sherebiah with his sons and brothers, eighteen;

And they gave the king's orders to the king's captains and the rulers across the river, and they gave the people and the house of God the help which was needed.

For they have taken their daughters for themselves and for their sons, so that the holy seed has been mixed with the peoples of the lands; and in fact the captains and rulers have been the first to do this evil.

Then Ezra got up, and made the chiefs of the priests and the Levites and all Israel take an oath that they would do this. So they took an oath.

And they made a public statement through all Judah and Jerusalem, to all those who had come back, that they were to come together to Jerusalem;

So those who had come back did so. And Ezra the priest, with certain heads of families, by their fathers' families, all of them by their names, were marked out; and on the first day of the tenth month they took their places to go into the question with care.

And they got to the end of all the men who were married to strange women by the first day of the first month.

And they gave their word that they would put away their wives; and for their sin, they gave an offering of a male sheep of the flock.

All these had taken strange wives; and some of them had wives by whom they had offspring.

They said to me, The small band of Jews now living there in the land are in great trouble and shame: the wall of Jerusalem has been broken down, and its doorways burned with fire.

Further, I said to the king, If it is the king's pleasure, let letters be given to me for the rulers across the river, so that they may let me go through till I come to Judah;

Then I gave them an account of how the hand of my God was on me, helping me; and of the king's words which he had said to me. And they said, Let us get to work on the building. So they made their hands strong for the good work.

Then Eliashib, the chief priest, got up with his brothers the priests, and took in hand the building of the sheep doorway; they made it holy and put its doors in position; as far as the tower of Hammeah they made it holy, even to the tower of Hananel.

The sons of Hassenaah were the builders of the fish doorway; they put its boards in place and put up its doors, with their locks and rods.

Joiada, the son of Paseah, and Meshullam, the son of Besodeiah, made good the old doorway; they put its boards in place and put up its doors, with their locks and rods.

Hanun and the people of Zanoah were working on the doorway of the valley; they put it up and put up its doors, with their locks and rods, and a thousand cubits of wall as far as the doorway where the waste material was placed.

And in the hearing of his countrymen and the army of Samaria he said, What are these feeble Jews doing? will they make themselves strong? will they make offerings? will they get the work done in a day? will they make the stones which have been burned come again out of the dust?

Give ear, O our God, for we are looked down on: let their words of shame be turned back on themselves, and let them be given up to wasting in a land where they are prisoners:

Let not their wrongdoing be covered or their sin washed away from before you: for they have made you angry before the builders.

But when it came to the ears of Sanballat and Tobiah and the Arabians and the Ammonites and the Ashdodites, that the building of the walls of Jerusalem was going forward and the broken places were being made good, they were full of wrath;

And they made designs, all of them together, to come and make an attack on Jerusalem, causing trouble there.

And it came about that when the Jews who were living near them came, they said to us ten times, From all directions they are coming against us.

And at the same time I said to the people, Let everyone with his servant come inside Jerusalem for the night, so that at night they may keep watch for us, and go on working by day.

And on hearing their outcry and what they said I was very angry.

And I said to them, We have given whatever we were able to give, to make our brothers the Jews free, who were servants and prisoners of the nations: and would you now give up your brothers for a price, and are they to become our property? Then they said nothing, answering not a word.

Then they said, We will give them back, and take nothing for them; we will do as you say. Then I sent for the priests and made them take an oath that they would keep this agreement.

And shaking out the folds of my robe, I said, So may God send out from his house and his work every man who does not keep this agreement; even so let him be sent out and made as nothing. And all the meeting of the people said, So be it, and gave praise to the Lord. And the people did as they had said.

And four times they sent to me in this way, and I sent them the same answer.

And in it these words were recorded: It is said among the nations, and Geshem says so, that you and the Jews are hoping to make yourselves free from the king's authority; and that this is why you are building the wall: and they say that it is your purpose to be their king;

Then I sent to him, saying, No such things as you say are being done, they are only a fiction you have made up yourself.

For they were hoping to put fear in us, saying, Their hands will become feeble and give up the work so that it may not get done. But now, O God, make my hands strong.

And I went to the house of Shemaiah, the son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabel, who was shut up; and he said, Let us have a meeting in the house of God, inside the Temple, and let the doors be shut: for they will come to put you to death; truly, in the night they will come to put you to death.

For this reason they had given him money, in order that I might be overcome by fear and do what he said and do wrong, and so they would have reason to say evil about me and put shame on me.

Keep in mind, O my God, Tobiah and Sanballat and what they did, and Noadiah, the woman prophet, and the rest of the prophets whose purpose was to put fear into me.

And when our haters had news of this, all the nations round about us were full of fear and were greatly shamed, for they saw that this work had been done by our God.

And they said much before me of the good he had done, and gave him accounts of my words. And Tobiah sent letters with the purpose of causing me fear.

And my God put it into my heart to get together the rulers and the chiefs and the people so that they might be listed by families. And I came across a record of the names of those who came up at the first, and in it I saw these words:

All these were the people who went up from Tel-melah, Tel-harsha, Cherub, Addon, and Immer; but because they had no knowledge of their fathers' families or offspring, it was not certain if they were Israelites:

They made search for their record among the lists of families, but their names were nowhere to be seen, so they were looked on as unclean and no longer priests.

And the Tirshatha said that they were not to have the most holy things for their food, till a priest came to give decision by the Urim and Thummim.

As well as their men-servants and their women-servants, of whom there were seven thousand, three hundred and thirty-seven; and they had two hundred and forty-five men and women to make music.

They had seven hundred and thirty-six horses, two hundred and forty-five transport beasts;

And when the seventh month came, the children of Israel were in their towns. And all the people came together like one man into the wide place in front of the water-doorway; and they made a request to Ezra the scribe that he would put before them the book of the law of Moses which the Lord had given to Israel.

And Ezra the scribe took his place on a tower of wood which they had made for the purpose; and by his side were placed Mattithiah and Shema and Anaiah and Uriah and Hilkiah and Maaseiah on the right; and on the left, Pedaiah and Mishael and Malchijah and Hashum and Hashbaddanah, Zechariah and Meshullam.

And Ezra gave praise to the Lord, the great God. And all the people in answer said, So be it, so be it; lifting up their hands; and with bent heads they gave worship to the Lord, going down on their faces to the earth.

And they gave out the words of the book the law of God, clearly, and gave the sense of it, so that their minds were able to take it in.

And they saw that it was recorded in the law that the Lord had given orders by Moses, that the children of Israel were to have tents for their living-places in the feast of the seventh month:

And that they were to give out an order, and make it public in all their towns and in Jerusalem, saying, Go out to the mountain and get olive branches and branches of field olives and of myrtle, and palm branches and branches of thick trees, to make tents, as it says in the book.

And day by day, from the first day till the last, he was reading from the book of the law of God. And they kept the feast for seven days: and on the eighth day there was a holy meeting, as it is ordered in the law.

And for a fourth part of the day, upright in their places, they were reading from the book of the law of their God; and for a fourth part of the day they were requesting forgiveness and worshipping the Lord their God.

And you did signs and wonders on Pharaoh and all his servants and all the people of his land; for you saw how cruel they were to them. So you got yourself a name as it is today.

By you the sea was parted before them, so that they went through the sea on dry land; and those who went after them went down into the deep, like a stone into great waters.

And you went before them by day in a pillar of cloud, and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light on the way they were to go.

And you gave them bread from heaven when they were in need, and made water come out of the rock for their drink, and gave them orders to go in and take for their heritage the land which your hand had been lifted up to give them.

But they and our fathers, in their pride, made their necks stiff, and gave no attention to your orders,

Even when they had made for themselves an ox of metal, and said, This is your God who took you up out of Egypt, and had done so much to make you angry;

Even then, in your great mercy, you did not give them up in the waste land: the pillar of cloud still went before them by day, guiding them on their way, and the pillar of fire by night, to give them light, and make clear the way they were to go.

And you gave your good spirit to be their teacher, and did not keep back your manna from their mouths, and gave them water when they had need of it.

Truly, for forty years you were their support in the waste land, and they were in need of nothing; their clothing did not get old or their feet become tired.

And you gave them kingdoms and peoples, making distribution to them in every part of the land: so they took for their heritage the land of Sihon, even the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og, king of Bashan.

And you made their children as great in number as the stars of heaven, and took them into the land, of which you had said to their fathers that they were to go in and take it for themselves.

So the children went in and took the land, and you overcame before them the people of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them up into their hands, with their kings and the people of the land, so that they might do with them whatever it was their pleasure to do.

And they took walled towns and a fat land, and became the owners of houses full of all good things, water-holes cut in the rock, vine-gardens and olive-gardens and a wealth of fruit-trees: so they had food enough and became fat, and had joy in the good you gave them.

But they were hard-hearted, and went against your authority, turning their backs on your law, and putting to death your prophets, who gave witness against them with the purpose of turning them back again to you, and they did much to make you angry.

And so you gave them up into the hands of their haters who were cruel to them: and in the time of their trouble, when they made their prayer to you, you gave ear to them from heaven; and in your great mercy gave them saviours, who made them free from the hands of their haters.

But when they had rest, they did evil again before you: so you gave them into the hands of their haters, who had rule over them: but when they came back and made their prayer to you, you gave ear to them from heaven; again and again, in your mercy, you gave them salvation;

And gave witness against them so that you might make them come back again to your law: but their hearts were lifted up, and they gave no attention to your orders and went against your decisions (which, if a man keeps them, will be life to him), and turning their backs on you, made their necks stiff and did not give ear.

Year after year you put up with them, and gave witness against them by your spirit through your prophets: still they did not give ear: and so you gave them up into the hands of the peoples of the lands.

For they have not been your servants in their kingdom, and in all the good things you gave them, and in the great and fat land you gave them, and they have not been turned away from their evil-doing.

And it gives much increase to the kings whom you have put over us because of our sins: and they have power over our bodies and over our cattle at their pleasure, and we are in great trouble.

They were united with their brothers, their rulers, and put themselves under a curse and an oath, to keep their steps in the way of God's law, which was given by Moses, the servant of God, and to keep and do all the orders of the Lord, our Lord, and his decisions and his rules;

And that we would take the first of our rough meal, and our lifted offerings, and the fruit of every sort of tree, and wine and oil, to the priests, to the rooms of the house of our God; and the tenth of the produce of our land to the Levites; for they, the Levites, take a tenth in all the towns of our ploughed land.

Zanoah, Adullam and their daughter-towns, Lachish and its fields, Azekah and its daughter-towns. So they were living from Beer-sheba to the valley of Hinnom.

And when the time came for the wall of Jerusalem to be made holy, they sent for the Levites out of all their places to come to Jerusalem, to keep the feast with joy, and with praise and melody, with brass and corded instruments of music.

And the priests and the Levites made themselves clean; and they made the people clean, and the doorways and the wall.

And by the doorway of the fountain and straight in front of them, they went up by the steps of the town of David, at the slope up of the wall, over the house of David, as far as the water-doorway to the east.

And over the doorway of Ephraim and by the old door and the fish door and the tower of Hananel and the tower of Hammeah, as far as the sheep door: and at the doorway of the watchmen they came to a stop.

And on that day they made great offerings and were glad; for God had made them glad with great joy; and the women and the children were glad with them: so that the joy of Jerusalem came to the ears of those who were far off.

And they kept the watch of their God, and were responsible for making things clean, and so did the music-makers and the door-keepers, as it was ordered by David and Solomon his son.

And all Israel in the days of Zerubbabel and in the days of Nehemiah gave what was needed by the music-makers and the door-keepers day by day: and they made the offerings holy for the Levites; and the Levites did the same for the sons of Aaron.

On that day there was a reading from the book of Moses in the hearing of the people; and they saw that it said in the book that no Ammonite or Moabite might ever come into the meeting of God;

Because they did not give the children of Israel bread and water when they came to them, but got Balaam to put a curse on them: though the curse was turned into a blessing by our God.