The Mystery of Ephraim

Many of the prophecies in the Old Testament were meant for the endtime. “But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, even to the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased,” Daniel 12:4. Hence we, at the endtimes, should have better understanding of what and how those prophecies are meant to be fulfilled.

Nehemiah 1

¹ The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came to pass in the month of Chislev, in the twentieth year, as I was in the palace at Shushan, — the words of Nehemiah; or the word used often signifies; that is, the things which Nehemiah did;

— Shushan the palace, or Susa, was the ordinary residence of the Persian kings. “The palace” or acropolis was a distinct quarter of the city, occupying an artificial eminence.

— according to Nehemiah 1:11, Nehemiah was cup-bearer to the Persian king, and was, at his own request, appointed for some time Pecha, that is, governor of Judah.

² that Hanani one of my brethren came, he and certain men of Judah; and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped, who were left behind from the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem.

³ And they said unto me, “The remnant who are left behind from the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned with fire.” — and they said unto me, the remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province; in Judea, now reduced to a province of the Persian empire: are in great affliction and reproach; harassed and distressed, calumniated and vilified by their enemies, the Samaritans:

— the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burnt with fire; that is, its wall and gates were in the same condition in which Nebuchadnezzar had left them, for since his times as yet they had never been set up; for this is not to be understood of what was lately done by their adversaries, which is not at all probable.

⁴ And it came to pass when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept, and mourned certain days and fasted, and prayed before the God of heaven — that I sat down and wept, and mourned certain days; sat down upon the ground in dust and ashes, after the manner of mourners, and wept bitterly, and mourned in a most sorrowful manner; and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven; that made it, and dwells in it.

⁵ and said: “I beseech thee, O Lord God of heaven, the great and fearsome God, who keepeth covenant and mercy for those who love Him and observe His commandments, — and said, I beseech thee. The opening of Nehemiah’s prayer follows so closely the thoughts and words of Daniel’s (Daniel 9:4), that it is almost impossible to suppose that one of the two writers had not the words of the other before him.

⁶ let Thine ear now be attentive and Thine eyes open, that Thou mayest hear the prayer of Thy servant, which I pray before Thee now day and night for the children of Israel Thy servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel which we have sinned against Thee. Both I and my father’s house have sinned. — I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants; this he had continued to do ever since he heard of their trouble and calamity:

— and confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my father’s house have sinned; he considered sin as the cause of all this evil that had befallen his people, and confesses it with sorrow and humiliation, and not their sins only, but his own personal and family sins.

⁷ We have dealt very corruptly against Thee, and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments which Thou commanded Thy servant Moses. — we have dealt very corruptly against thee,…. Corrupted his covenant, laws, and precepts, as well as themselves, ways, and works; all which were against the Lord, contrary to his nature, mind, and will:

— and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou commandedst thy servant Moses; the laws, moral, ceremonial, and judicial.

⁸ Remember, I beseech Thee, the word that Thou commanded Thy servant Moses, saying, ‘If ye transgress, I will scatter you abroad among the nations; — remember, I beseech thee, the word that thou commandedst thy servant Moses; to declare to the children of Israel, Deuteronomy 28:64, saying, if ye transgress; the law of God:

— I will scatter you abroad among the nations; as now they had been among the Assyrians, Chaldeans, Medes, and Persians.

— and those at the endtime, to suffer Judgement by the sword, by famine, by pestilence and spending years in captivity to reflect and repent there (for more see Ezekiel 4 – 390/40 Years and A Sword from the South!).

⁹ but if ye turn unto Me, and keep My commandments and do them, though there were some of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the heaven, yet will I gather them from thence, and will bring them unto the place that I have chosen to set My name there.’ — though there were of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the heaven; that is, the most distant regions; so called, because at the extreme parts of the horizon, the heavens and earth touch each other;

— yet will I gather them from thence and will bring them unto the place that I have chosen to set my name there; that is to Jerusalem where the temple was built, and his name was called upon.

¹⁰ Now these are Thy servants and Thy people, whom Thou hast redeemed by Thy great power and by Thy strong hand. — whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power, and by thy strong hand; touching and moving the heart of Cyrus to proclaim liberty to them.

¹¹ O Lord, I beseech Thee, let now Thine ear be attentive to the prayer of Thy servant, and to the prayer of Thy servants who desire to fear Thy name; and prosper, I pray Thee, Thy servant this day, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man.” For I was the king’s cupbearer. — and prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this day; meaning himself, who was to wait on the king of Persia that day, and, if he had opportunity, intended to lay the case of the Jews before him, and therefore entreats he might meet with success:

— for I was the king’s cupbearer; in the execution of which office he was often in the king’s presence, and hoped to have an opportunity of speaking to him in the behalf of the Jews; this with the Persians was reckoned a very honourable office.

Nehemiah 2

¹ And it came to pass in the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him; and I took up the wine and gave it unto the king. Now I had not before been sad in his presence. — that wine was before the king; it was brought and set in a proper place, from whence it might be taken for his use:

— and Nehemiah took up the wine, and gave it to the king; the cupbearer with the Persians and Medes used to take the wine out of the vessels into the cup, and pour some of it into their left hand, and sup it up, that, if there was any poison in it, the king might not be harmed, and then he delivered it to him upon three fingers;

— now Nehemiah had not been before time sad in his presence; but always pleasant and cheerful, so that the sadness of his countenance was the more taken notice of.

² Therefore the king said unto me, “Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? This is nothing else but sorrow of heart.” Then I was very sore afraid, — the king said, Why is thy countenance sad? – his fasting, joined with inward grief, had made a sensible change in his countenance.

— then Nehemiah was sore afraid; it was an unusual and ungracious thing to come into the king of Persia’s presence with any token of sorrow. And he feared a disappointment, because his request was great and invidious, and odious to most of the Persian courtiers.

³ and said unto the king, “Let the king live for ever. Why should not my countenance be sad when the city, the place of my fathers’ sepulchers, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire?” — and Nehemiah said unto the king, let the king live for ever; which some think he said to take off the king’s suspicion of his having a design upon his life, though it seems to be a common salutation of the kings in those times, see Daniel 6:6,

— why should not my countenance be sad when the city, the place of my fathers’ sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire? a man’s native place, and where his ancestors lie interred, being always reckoned near and dear, the king and his nobles could not object to his being concerned for the desolations thereof.

⁴ Then the king said unto me, “For what dost thou make request?” So I prayed to the God of heaven. —the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad? It was deemed highly unbecoming to appear in the royal presence with any weeds or signs of sorrow (Es 4:2);

— and hence it was no wonder that the king was struck with the dejected air of his cupbearer, while that attendant, on his part, felt his agitation increased by his deep anxiety about the issue of the conversation so abruptly begun;

— but the piety and intense earnestness of the man immediately restored Nehemiah to calm self-possession and enabled him to communicate, first, the cause of his sadness (Neh 2:3), and next, the patriotic wish of his heart to be the honored instrument of reviving the ancient glory of the city of his fathers.

⁵ And I said unto the king, “If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favor in thy sight, that thou wouldest send me unto Judah,unto the city of my fathers’ sepulchers, that I may build it.” — and Nehemiah said unto the king; if it please the king, and if thy servant have found favour in thy sight; Nehemiah submits what he had to say wholly to the pleasure of the king, and puts it upon his unmerited favour, and not on any desert of his own:

— that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my fathers’ sepulchres, that I may build it; the wall of it, and the houses in it; the favour was, that he might have leave to go thither, and set about such a work, for which he was so much concerned.

⁶ And the king said unto me (the queen also sitting by him), “For how long shall thy journey be? And when wilt thou return?” So it pleased the king to send me, and I set him a time. — and the king said unto me, the queen also sitting by him; which it seems was not very common for the queens of Persia to dine with the kings their husbands; as for the providence of God in it, that she having a good respect for Nehemiah and the Jewish nation and forwarded the king in his grant to him:

— so it pleased the king to send me when he promised to return unto him, not in twelve years, which was the time of his government in Judea but in a lesser space, perhaps a year at most, since in less than two months the wall of Jerusalem was finished; and it may be that he then returned to the king of Persia, who sent him again under the character of a governor, finding it was for his interest to have such a man in those parts.

⁷ Moreover I said unto the king, “If it please the king, let letters be given me to the governors beyond the river, that they may convey me over until I come into Judah, — letters be given me to the governors beyond the river; the Persian empire at this time was of vast extent, reaching from the Indus to the Mediterranean. The Euphrates was considered as naturally dividing it into two parts, eastern and western.

⁸ also a letter unto Asaph the keeper of the king’s forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the palace which appertained to the house, and for the wall of the city and for the house that I shall enter into.” And the king granted me, according to the good hand of my God upon me. — the house that I shall enter into; the governor’s residence;

— Nehemiah assumes that the powers for which he asks involve his being appointed governor of Judaea. The king granted Nehemiah, according to the good hand of God upon him. Through God’s special favour towards him, the king was induced to grant his request.

⁹ Then I came to the governors beyond the river, and gave them the king’s letters. Now the king had sent captains of the army and horsemen with me. — on his way to Jerusalem, Nehemiah would pass through the provinces of various Persian satraps and governors;

— to those beyond the Euphrates he carried letters, which he took care to deliver, though by doing so he aroused the hostility of Sanballat. Being accompanied by an escort of Persian soldiers, he experienced neither difficulty nor danger by the way, but effected his journey in about three months, Nehemiah 2:8.

¹⁰ When Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the servant the Ammonite heard of it, it grieved them exceedingly that there had come a man to seek the welfare of the children of Israel. — Sanballat was evidently one of the leaders of the Samaritan community (see on Nehemiah 4:2)

— although Sanballat was the Horonite; so called, either from his family, or from the place of his birth or rule, which is supposed to be Horonaim, an eminent city of Moab, Isaiah 15:5 Jeremiah 48:3. This Sanballat was the person who afterward instigated Alexander the Great to build the temple of Gerizim in order to sow discord among the Jews and their neighbours.

— and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite; who was formerly a slave but now raised from a low mean estate to be governor in the land of Ammon, though still a vassal of the king of Persia:

— heard of it, it grieved them exceedingly that there came a man to seek the welfare of the children of Israel; to which the Moabites and Ammonites were always averse, and ever bore an hatred to Israel, and envied everything that tended to their happiness.

— Sanballat. According to Josephus, Sanballat was “satrap of Samaria” under the Persians, and by descent a Cuthaean, a Samaritan (‘Ant. Jud.,’ 11:7, § 2); whose aim was to corrupt the Jewish high priest by marriage: “so that he willingly gave his daughter, whose name was Nicaso, in marriage to Manasseh, as thinking this alliance by marriage would be a pledge and security that the nation of the Jews should continue their good-will to him.” (more at the end)

¹¹ So I came to Jerusalem and was there three days. — after his arrival at Jerusalem, Nehemiah waited three days before taking any steps. Ezra had done the same (Ezra 8:32). It was necessary to rest after the journey, and to interchange the formalities of Eastern courtesy with the principal people of the city.

¹² And I arose in the night, I and some few men with me. Neither told I any man what my God had put in my heart to do at Jerusalem; neither was there any beast with me, except the beast that I rode upon. — Nehemiah went out ‘by night’ with only a few attendants. He did not wish to excite the curiosity of the people or to arouse the suspicion of his foes with respect to his intended project.

¹³ And I went out by night by the Gate of the Valley, even before the Dragon Well and to the dung port, and viewed the walls of Jerusalem which were broken down, and the gates thereof were consumed with fire. — and viewed the walls of Jerusalem: in what condition they were, what was necessary to be wholly taken down, and where to begin to build: it must have been a moonlight night or he could not have taken a view; for to have carried torches or lamps with them would have discovered them:

— and the gates thereof were consumed with fire; nothing of them remained.

¹⁴ Then I went on to the Gate of the Fountain and to the King’s Pool, but there was no place for the beast that was under me to pass. — but there was no place for the beast that was under me to pass; because of the heaps of rubbish that lay there; blocking the way. The animal could not proceed. Nehemiah therefore dismounted, and “in the night, dark as it was, pursued his way on foot.”

¹⁵ Then went I up in the night by the brook and viewed the wall, and turned back and entered by the Gate of the Valley, and so returned. — by the brook; “The brook Kidron” which skirted the city on the east.

— from this he would be able to “look up at the eastern wall” along its whole length, and see its condition. Following the brook, he was brought to the north-eastern angle of the city; on reaching which he seems to have “turned back” towards the point from which he had started, and skirting the northern wall, to have re-entered by the gate of the valley.

¹⁶ And the rulers knew not whither I went or what I did; neither had I as yet told it to the Jews, nor to the priests, nor to the nobles, nor to the rulers, nor to the rest who did the work. — and the rulers knew not whither I went, or what I did; the rulers of the city of Jerusalem, who seem to be officers of the king of Persia, since they are distinguished from Jewish rulers;

— neither had I as yet told it to the Jews; what he came about and designed to do: nor to the priests, nor to the nobles, nor to the rulers; the principal men among the Jews, both ecclesiastical and civil: nor to the rest that did the work; of building and repairing; neither those that were employed in it, nor those that overlooked it.

¹⁷ Then said I unto them, “Ye see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lieth waste, and the gates thereof are burned with fire. Come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach.” — come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem that we be no more a reproach; to their neighbours about them, who scoffed at them as a defenceless people and frequently came in upon them, and spoiled and plundered them of their goods and substance.

¹⁸ Then I told them of the hand of my God which was good upon me, as also the king’s words that he had spoken unto me. And they said, “Let us rise up and build.” So they strengthened their hands for this good work. — then I told them of the hand of my God which was good upon me; of the kind providence of God in exalting him in the court of the king of Persia, in giving him an opportunity of laying the sad case of Jerusalem before him, and in inclining his heart to show favour to him, and grant his request:

— as also the king’s words that he had spoken to me; what passed between them on this subject, the commission he gave him, and the letters he sent by him to his governors on this side the river: and they said, let us rise up and build; encouraged by this account of things, they proposed to set about the work immediately:

— so they strengthened their hands for this good work; animated and encouraged one another to proceed to it at once with cheerfulness, and to go on in it with spirit and resolution.

¹⁹ But when Sanballat the Horonite, and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite, and Geshem the Arabian heard it, they laughed us to scorn and despised us, and said, “What is this thing that ye do? Will ye rebel against the king?” — as established in Nehemiah 2-4,” for their adversaries were surrounding the Jewish community on all sides: Sanballat and the Samaritans on the north, Tobiah and the Ammonites on the east, Geshem the chief among the Arabians on the south, and the Philistines (Ashdodites) on the west;”

— the enmity and hatred of serpent’s seed against the cause of God is confined to no age or nation; the application from then to the latter days are plain.

²⁰ Then answered I them and said unto them, “The God of heaven, He will prosper us. Therefore we His servants will arise and build; but ye have no portion, nor right, nor memorial in Jerusalem.” — you have no portion nor right; do not trouble yourselves about this matter, who have no possession among us, no authority over us, nor interest in our affairs or state; nor memorial in Jerusalem;

— no testimony or monument either of your relation to us by birth or religion, or of your kindness to us or to this place, but you are aliens from the children of Israel: therefore mind your own business and do not meddle with ours.

~~~

THE SAMARITANS

— the Samaritans are adversaries to the returning Jews because of (a) difference in defining what time at ben ha’arbayim when the Pascha lamb should be killed: the Jewish definition of ben ha’arbayim “between the two evenings” is “after noon and until nightfall,” whereas the Samaritans is sunset or dusk; (b) when is omer, which translated to English is rendered “wave sheaf” offering to be made: the Jews definition has it on the annual Sabbath after Pascha, whereas the Samaritans has it the day after the weekly Sabbath during the days of unleavened bread;

— (c) after counting seven weeks after the omer, on what day Shavuot is to be kept: the Jews have it on Sivan 6th, whereas the Samaritans always have it on a weekly Sabbath; (d) the three annual feasts are to be kept in Jerusalem, whereas the Samaritans have their feasts on Mount Gerizim, which they consider a sacred mountain; and (e) once in roughly three years, the Samaritan calendar starts one month later than the Jewish calendar.

Here is what Wikipedia says about the Samaritans: “There has been a history of genetic disorders within the group due to the small gene pool,” such as high incidence of austisics and cripples within their community but of course they manage to deflect from mentioning the truth of God’s curses upon those who show hostilities to the rebuilding of the house of God in Jerusalem.

~ by Joel Huan on May 20, 2022.

Posted in Nehemiah