And I said to the king, If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favor in thy sight, that thou would send me to Judah, to the city of my fathers' sepulchers, that I may build it.

And I said to them, According to our ability we have redeemed our brothers the Jews, who were sold to the nations, and would ye even sell your brothers, and should they be sold to us? Then they were silent, and found not a word.

Then they said, We will restore them, and will require nothing of them, so will we do, even as thou say. Then I called the priests, and took an oath from them that they would do according to this promise.

in which was written, It is reported among the nations, and Gashmu says it, that thou and the Jews think to rebel, for which cause thou are building the wall. And thou would be their king according to these words.

For they all would have made us afraid, saying, Their hands shall be weakened from the work that it not be done. But now, [O God], strengthen thou my hands.

And I said, Should such a man as I flee? And who is there, that, being such as I, would go into the temple to save his life? I will not go in.

Remember, O my God, Tobiah and Sanballat according to these their works, and also the prophetess Noadiah, and the rest of the prophets, who would have put me in fear.

Yet many years thou bore with them, and testified against them by thy Spirit through thy prophets. Yet they would not give ear. Therefore thou gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands.

And that we would not give our daughters to the peoples of the land, nor take their daughters for our sons.

And if the peoples of the land bring wares or any grain on the Sabbath day to sell, that we would not buy from them on the Sabbath, or on a holy day. And that we would forego the seventh year, and the exaction of every debt.