"were sold to the heathen; and will you sell your bre

thren, or shall they be sold to us?" This was so home a truth upon the oppressing Jews, that they could make no reply and Nehemiah, taking the advantage of their confusion, told them they did ill in these things, and made themselves a scandal to the heathen their enemies, advising them to desist from these base practices of usury, and restore to their oppressed brethren their lands, vineyards, olive-yards and houses, and the hundredth part of the money, corn, oil and wine, which they had exacted from them. The accusation being true, and all that Nehemiah had urged, matter of fact, they promised to restore them, and require, nothing more of them; but to stand to what Nehemiah should decree. Then Nehemiah, to hold them to their promise, made them swear to observe it; and to oblige them to a strict performance of their oath, he shook* the middle part of his vest, by way of imprecation, and said, "So God shake out every man from his house, and from his service, "that performeth not this promise; even thus let him "be shaken out, and be made empty." To this they all agreed, and praised God, and did according to their promise:

Nehemiah, the more powerfully to enforce his admonitions and precepts, did not, after the example of the former governors, his predecessors, exact the daily

* Shook. It was customary with the prophets, as Isaiah, Jeremiah, &c. not only to address themselves to the people by words, but by signs. Thus here, Nehem. V. 13, the shaking of his lap, was an emblem, that they who violated this oath should be shaken off from the protection of God, as he shook his lap, by which action nothing could remain there. And this was a just judgment against the covetous usurers, who with great difficulty could be persuaded to give any thing of their great abundance to the support of the poor: but God, by some hidden, or unforeseen punishment or accident, could shake out their wealth, though against their will, to the relief of the needy.

Empty. That is, shall be deprived of all the fruit and product of his labour and income, as a garment, when it is shaken, has nothing in it.

revenue of forty shekels* of silver, and the constant furniture of his table with provisions; but remitted them, and all other advantages, which might be burdensome and chargeable to the people: and, during the whole time of his government, which was twelve years, he was so far from purchasing any land, or reaping any benefit at the expence of the people, that he not only refused the allowance which was due to him, as governor, from the people, but at his own charge kept open house, entertaining daily at his table an hundred and fifty of the Jews and their rulers, besides strangers; for which he constantly allowed one ox, six fat sheep, besides fowl in proportion, and every tenth day wine of all sorts. This generous treatment of Nehemiah so gained the favour of the Jews, that they went on cheerfully with the work, and finished the wall, only the gates were not yet hung.

The successful management of Nehemiah in carrying on, and finishing this mighty wall, set the restless minds of Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem at work; who, concluding, that so long as he lived, the Jews would be too powerful for their neighbours, resolve, by some stratagem or other, to take him off, which they knew by open force they were unable to accomplish. Intending therefore by an outward shew of civility to betray him, they sent to invite him to a conference in one of the villages in the plain of Ono, a place belonging to the tribe of Benjamin, designing, when they had him there, to do him a mischief. But whether Nehemiah suspected their malice in this, or not, it is certain he excused himself upon the account of the great work he had in hand, which must stop if he should be absent: and therefore he sent word that he was not at leisure. This message they four times repeated, and he as often returned them the same answer; but at last, Sanballat, perceiving that Nehemiah was too cautious to be ensnared by a general invitation, resolves to try him by

Forty Shekels. That is, fifty shillings.

a more personal expedient, that should immediately concern him, and on pretence of clearing himself from an accusation, of no less than treason, oblige him to come to him. Therefore the fifth time he sent his servant with a letter in his hand, but open, to this purpose: "It is "reported among the heathen, and Geshem affirms it, "That thou and the Jews intend to rebel; for which "cause thou hast built this wall, that thou mayest be "their king. And thou hast also appointed prophets to "preach of thee at Jerusalem; and to say, There is a

king in Judah. These things thou mayest expect, "will come to the king's ear: wherefore come now, and "let us consult what is fit to be done." Nehemiah, conscious of his own innocence, easily saw through this shallow contrivance, and being resolved to make an end of the work which he had so successfully begun and carried on, returned this short and contemptuous answer to the perfidious Sanballat: "There are no such things "done as thou sayest, but they are the inventions of thine "own heart.'

Sanballat and his friends are resolved to try some other way to betray the good Nehemiah; and therefore, bribing to their interest Shemajah, the son of Delajah the priest, who was a friend of Nehemiah, they doubted not to succeed at last. To his house Shemajah repaired, after he had given Sanballat his last answer; but found him shut up, under pretence of a vow, as he said, for the safety of Nehemiah; and pretending to prophesy that his enemies would make an attempt to murder him that night, he would have persuaded Nehemiah to go with him into the inner part of the temple, and secure* themselves by shutting the doors. Nehemiah did not at first apprehend false She. majah's design;t however, from a sense of religion and honour he declared he would not quit his station,

Secure. The. temple was much stronger than the city, because as yet the gates were not hung.

+ Design. Shemajah might do this to render Nehemiah contemptible to his friends, if he had through fear gone into the temple: or he might

telling Shemajah with disdain, it did not become a man in his post to take refuge. After this Nehemiah discovered the whole plot, and that Shemajah, had been bribed by Sanballat and his party; and God preserving him from all their treachery, he in two* and fifty days completed the whole work; which so affected the enemies of the Jews with fear, that they concluded that a work so great could not have been effected, in such a short space of time, but by the peculiar providence of the God of the Jews.

Good Nehemiah, though he had continually surmounted all the difficulties which were thrown in his way, was still exercised with fresh troubles and dangers ; for the princes of Judah held a correspondence with To

have a design to seize Nehemiah's person when once he had him within the temple, and with the help of other conspirators deliver him up to the enemy. Or that by his thus hiding himself he might encourage the enemy, and discourage the Jews, who by these means would leave the work unfinished.

Two and Fifty. Interpreters have not yet agreed from whence to begin this computation. Tremellius and Junius would begin these two and fifty days, after the stone wall was built. Others, that they began after Nehemiah had sent his answer to Sanballat, which is less probable than the other. I rather incline to think, that the whole work, considering the many hands that were employed, and the diligence that was used in it, was begun and ended in two and fifty days; nor can there be much more time allowed for it for it was in the first month, called by the Jews Nisan, that Nehemiah was in Babylon. See Nehem. ii. 1, and ob tained of the king leave to go to Jerusalem. And though we have not an express account what time he spent in his journey, and when he arrived at Jerusalem, yet if we may make conjecture from the time Ezra spent in the same journey, when he came from Babylon to Jerusalem, (allowing for the delay Ezra had at the river Ahava, when he first set out, Ezra viii. 15 and 31,) it is not probable that Nehemiah arrived at Jerusalem till about the end of the fourth month; for though Ezra set out from Babylon on the first day of the first month, he did not reach Jerusalem till the first day of the fifth month: and from thence to the twenty-fifth day of the sixth month may make out the two and fifty days, and Nehemiah's three days' rest before he began, or thereabout.

biah, as they had all along done, which he, by intermarriages had so improved, that they not only gave him an account of what passed at Jerusalem, but had confirmed this correspondence and friendship by oath. Tobiah, by these means, having gained a strong party to his interest, they had the audacity to commend him in the presence of Nehemiah, though they knew him to be an avowed enemy; and, what was still worse, they discovered Nehemiah's counsels to him, which so elevated the vain Ammonite, that he thought by his blustering letters to alarm Nehemiah.

These things increased his care, but not his fear; and therefore to prevent any treachery from his enemies within or without the city, he gave the charge of the gates to his brother Hanani, and to Hananiah, marshal of the palace, two men, in whom he knew he could confide; commanding them not to suffer the gates to be opened till some time after sun-rising; to see them safely barred at night; and to set the watch, which should consist of settled house-keepers, that were diligent men. After this, having found a register of the families of those who came from Babylon first, he assembled the nobility, rulers and people, to make a muster* of them by their genealogies. By this register some were at a great loss, not knowing their father's pedigree: and some of the priests also were at a loss to prove their genealogy by this register, and not being able to ascertain it, were deposed from their office, as polluted; Nehemiah not permitting them to eat of the holy things, till there should appear a priest, who by divine inspiration should determine, whether they were of the priestly race or not. And now, considering that the city was large,

* Muster. There is some diversity in the account of families given in Ezra ii. and Nehemiah vii. The reason of which difference is by some supposed to be, that the register a cat dogue in Ezra was made at Babylon, before they set forward: the other, which Nehemiah found, was made at Jerusalem,after they had arrived there; and alterations might happen in their families in so long a journey.