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Nehemiah 13:1-31 — Nehemiah's Final Reforms

Neh.13.1-31

¹At that time the Book of Moses was read aloud in the hearing of the people, and it was found written in it that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, ²because they had not met the Israelites with bread and water, but had hired Balaam against them to curse them. Yet our God turned the curse into a blessing. ³So when they heard the law, they separated from Israel everyone of mixed ancestry. ⁴Now before this, Eliashib the priest, who had been assigned over the chamber of the house of our God, being related to Tobiah, ⁵had made for him a large chamber. Formerly they had stored there the grain offering, the frankincense, the vessels, and the tithes of grain, new wine, and oil prescribed for the Levites, the singers, and the gatekeepers, as well as the contribution for the priests. ⁶But during all this I was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon I had gone to the king, and after some time I asked leave from the king. ⁷Then I came to Jerusalem and learned about the evil that Eliashib had done for Tobiah by making a chamber for him in the courts of the house of God. ⁸I was greatly displeased, and I threw all Tobiah's household goods out of the chamber. ⁹Then I gave orders, and they purified the chambers; and I restored there the vessels of the house of God, along with the grain offering and the frankincense. ¹⁰I also learned that the portions for the Levites had not been given, so that the Levites and the singers who did the work had fled, each to his own field. ¹¹So I rebuked the officials and said, “Why has the house of God been neglected?” Then I gathered them together and set them in their posts. ¹²Then all Judah brought the tithe of the grain, the new wine, and the oil into the storehouses. ¹³I appointed as treasurers over the storehouses Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, and Pedaiah of the Levites; and with them was Hanan son of Zaccur, son of Mattaniah, because they were considered trustworthy. Their duty was to distribute to their brothers. ¹⁴“Remember me for this, my God, and do not blot out the deeds of faithful love that I have done for the house of my God and for its services.” ¹⁵In those days I saw in Judah people treading winepresses on the Sabbath, bringing in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys, and also carrying wine, grapes, figs, and every kind of load, bringing them into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. So I warned them on the day they sold food. ¹⁶Tyrians also lived in Jerusalem, bringing in fish and every kind of merchandise, and selling them on the Sabbath to the people of Judah, and in Jerusalem. ¹⁷Then I rebuked the nobles of Judah and said to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the Sabbath day?” ¹⁸“Did not your fathers act this way, so that our God brought all this disaster on us and on this city? Yet you are increasing wrath against Israel by profaning the Sabbath.” ¹⁹When the gates of Jerusalem began to grow dark before the Sabbath, I gave orders that the doors should be shut, and I ordered that they should not be opened until after the Sabbath. And I stationed some of my servants at the gates, so that no load might enter on the Sabbath day. ²⁰So the merchants and sellers of every kind of goods spent the night outside Jerusalem once or twice. ²¹Then I warned them and said to them, “Why are you spending the night in front of the wall? If you do it again, I will lay hands on you.” From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath. ²²And I told the Levites that they should purify themselves and come to guard the gates, to keep the Sabbath day holy. “Remember me for this also, my God, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love.” ²³Also in those days I saw Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. ²⁴Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod, and none of them knew how to speak the language of Judah , but only the language of one people or another. ²⁵So I contended with them and cursed them, and I beat some of the men and pulled out their hair. Then I made them swear by God: “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, and you shall not take any of their daughters for your sons or for yourselves.” ²⁶“Was it not because of such women that Solomon king of Israel sinned? Among the many nations there was no king like him, and he was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. Yet even him foreign women caused to sin.” ²⁷“And should we then listen about you doing all this great evil and acting unfaithfully against our God by marrying foreign women?” ²⁸And one of the sons of Joiada son of Eliashib the high priest was a son-in-law of Sanballat the Horonite, so I drove him away from me. ²⁹“Remember them, my God, because they have defiled the priesthood and the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.” ³⁰So I cleansed them from everything foreign, and I established duties for the priests and for the Levites, each in his work, ³¹and for the wood offering at appointed times, and for the firstfruits. “Remember me, my God, for good.”

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4/11/2026

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