please let Your ear be attentive and Your eyes open to hear the prayer of Your servant which I am praying before You, day and night, on behalf of Your servants, the sons (descendants) of Israel (Jacob), confessing the sins of the sons of Israel which we have committed against You; I and my father’s house have sinned.

We have acted very corruptly against You and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the ordinances which You commanded Your servant Moses.

but if you return to Me and keep My commandments and do them, though those of you who have been scattered are in the most remote part of the heavens, I will gather them from there and will bring them to the place where I have chosen for My Name to dwell.’

Now they are Your servants and Your people whom You have redeemed by Your great power and by Your strong hand.

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.”

Do not forgive their wrongdoing and do not let their sin be wiped out before You, for they have offended the builders [and provoked You].

There were also others who were saying, “We have borrowed money on our fields and vineyards for the [Persian] king’s [heavy] tax.

Now our flesh (skin) is the same as that of our brothers (relatives), and our children are like their children, yet here we are forcing (selling) our sons and our daughters to be slaves; and some of our daughters are forced into bondage already, and we are powerless [to redeem them] because our fields and vineyards belong to others.”

I said to them, “According to our ability we have redeemed (purchased back) our Jewish brothers who were sold to the [Gentile] nations; now would you even sell your brothers, that they might be sold to us?” Then they were silent and could not find a [single] word to say.

Please, give back to them this very day their fields, their vineyards, their olive groves, and their houses, and also a hundredth part of the money, the grain, the new wine, and the oil that you are lending them.”

Remember me, O my God, for good, according to all I have done for this people.

Also [it is reported that] you have appointed prophets to make a proclamation concerning you in Jerusalem, saying, ‘There is a king in Judah!’ And now these things will be reported to the [Persian] king. So come now, and let us consult together.”

I sent a message to him, saying, “Such things as you are saying have not been done; you are inventing them in your own mind.”

He was hired for this reason, that I would be frightened and do as he said and sin, so that they would have [grounds to make] a malicious report in order to censure and disgrace me.

Remember, O My God, Tobiah and Sanballat in regard to these actions of theirs, and also [remember] the prophetess Noadiah and the rest of the prophets who were trying to frighten me.

[And Ezra said],
“You are the Lord, You alone;
You have made the heavens,
The heaven of heavens with all their host (the heavenly bodies),
The earth and everything that is on it,
The seas and everything that is in them.
You give life to all of them,
And the heavenly host is bowing down [in worship] to You.

“You found his heart to be faithful before You,
And You made a covenant with him
To give him the land of the Canaanite,
Of the Hittite, of the Amorite,
Of the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Girgashite—
To give it to his descendants.
And You have fulfilled Your promise,
For You are righteous and just.

“However, You are just and righteous in everything that has come upon us;
For You have dealt faithfully, but we have acted wickedly.

Our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept Your law
Or paid attention to Your commandments and Your warnings which You have given them.

“Its abundant produce is for the kings
Whom You have set over us because of our sins;
They also rule over our bodies
And over our cattle as they please,
So we are in great distress.

O my God, remember them, because they have defiled the priesthood and the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.