* On the cupbearer see Rawlinson, Ezra and Neh. (Men of the Bible), 86; Ewald, HJ ν. 148; Xen. Cyrop. . 3. 8; and art. CUPBEARER.
t From the queen's presence Cheyne and others suppose that Neh. was a eunuch (/ntrod, to Js. $11), Some hold that Ps 13° was directed against Nehemiah.
t On the motives of Artaxerxes see Stanley, Jewish Ch, il! 111.
508 NEHEMIAH
his plans, as Gritz supposes, but ta secure his
ssage through the country, his letters to them wing virtually passports. At the outset he learned of the hostility of Sanballat and Tobiah, who were troubled at the news that a man had come from Persia to seek the welfare of the laraelites (27>).
Neh. waited for three days (2") to study the situa- tion, then without disclosing his plans to any one (24) he made a night inspection* of the walls attended only by his guard, or by Hanani and a few others who had come with him from Susa. ‘A city was in antiquity a city in the full sense of the word only if it preserved its walls’ (Stade). An exilic poet had cried, ‘ build thou the walls of Jerusalem’ (Ps 51"*), and Neh. was determined now to remove Jerusalem's reproach.t Accordingly he assembled the leaders and said to them, ‘ You see the evil plight we are in, in that Jerus. is in ruins, and its gates burned with fire’ (2'), at the same time informing them of the powers which the king had conferred og him, and of his pur- pose to restore the walls. The ho saw the opportunity, and responded readily to the call. Sanballat and Tobiah, joined now by Geshem, or Gosham as Wellbausen says it should be read (sr. Gesch.* 169), insinua the charge of rebel- lion against Neh.; but the charge neither intimi- dated him nor checked the zeal of the people.
It is impossible to tell how extensive the damage to the cats was. The word used by Neh. in 15 and 2" (rp) implies that there were only breaches to repair; but these were evidently of wide extent. Neh. was fortunate in securing the aid of the whole eicaper of Jerus., and of several companies rom other parts of Judah. There were men from Jericho, Tekoa, Gibeon, Mizpah, Zanoah, and Keilah. Men of every class laboured at the walls with their own hands: it is said to the discredit of the nobles of Tekoa, as if it were an exceptional case, that they refused to put their neck to the work (3°); we find express mention of priests, Levites, goldsmiths, and perfumers (or apothe- caries) among the labourers. Neh. divided the work among the various bodies with characteristic insight; we read of five cases in which men were working at the breaches close by their own dwellings (319. 33. 2-9),
Some serious difficulties had to be met, however, before all the breaches could be closed. Sanballat, finding that his insinuation of rebellion had been ineffective, and that the Jews were evidently serious in their purpose to rebuild, tried to rouse the army stationed in Samaria; Tobiah indulged freely in ridicule, trying to persuade himself that the labour of the Jews could not accomplish Neh.’s pur ‘If a fox should go up on their stone wall, he would break it down’ (3% Eng. 41%), The people did not heed the scoffing, but continued their work with a will. When the breaches were closed with a wall half its proper height, Sanballat and his allies, augmented now by guer- illa bands of Arabians, Ammonites, and Ashdod- ites, realized that prompt and vigorous action was necessary if the almost incredible progress of the wall was to be stopped. They resolved to march secretly to Jerus. and stop the restoration by force of arms (4°, Eng. 4"). Meanwhile the working under
* On Neh.’s night ride see Stanley, op. cit. tii. 112; Wright, JBL, 1896, 129-134, and PEFSt, April 1896. The last two articles give the important light from Bliss’s recent excava-
t ‘ Accompany Neh. on his lonely ride around the burned walls of Jerus., and listen to Sanballat mocking at the Jews for reser A to revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish ;
en recognize the occasion of this psalm [102], and sympathize with the plaintive words— ‘ For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, And it pitieth them to see her in the dust’ (10214) Bamp. Lect. 701
NEHEMIAH
high pressure was telling upon men unused to such ἜΝ as laying a massive stone wall, especially when the clearing away of the rubbish was so difficult and laborious a part of the task. But their burdens could not be lightened yet; in fact, the activity of the enemy now added much to their hardships. Reports came in of the intended attack, and Neh. at once armed his workmen for resistance.* He was acting according to the authority vested in him by the king, while his enemies were taking the law into their own hands. The Jews exchanged the trowel for the sword, and were stationed to defend the most unprotected places in the wall. The enemy had counted upon a surprise. When they saw the Jews armed and drawn up for battle, they abandoned their pur- pose to attack, and the builders resumed their work. But the enemy evidently remained in the neighbourhood waiting a chance to take the Jews at a disadvantage, so that the labourers on the wall kept their swords by their side, and a part of the men were detailed to hold the larger weapons and defensive armour in readiness. Neh. kept a trumpeter by him to give warning of the point of Gane (4°7, Eng. 48). The people were all now obliged to remain in the city at night, for the enemy held possession of the outlying country, and the city could not be left for a single hour without vigilant defenders; so critical was the time, that Neh. and the people alike slept in their clothes. Yet there is no record of an actual battle, and such silence is a pretty sure indication that the Samaritans and their allies never ventured on an open attack, and never found the coveted opportunity for a surprise; but the vigilance and precautions of Neh. show plainly that the canger was for a long time imminent.