security of the fortress. Nehelllil\ll speaks Ver. 1.-The porters and the singer■ and here of his having set up the doors (ver. 1) ; the Levites. The porters nnd the singers but it appears from eh. iii. that the actue.l were themselves Levites, but nre often dis• tinguished from their brethren, who had no work of so doing was intrusted, like the such special office (see Ezra ii. 40-42, 70; repairs of the wall, to the various working vii. 24 ; x. 23, 24; Neh. vii. 43-46, 73; pe.rties. Eliashib, with his brethren the x. 28, &c.). Nehemiah's choice of Levites priests, set up the doors of the sheep gate to guard the gates of Jerusalem mny seem (eh. iii. 1) ; the sons of Hassenaah those of strange ; but we must remember-I. That the priests and Levites formed nearly one the fish gate (ihi,d. ver. 3), &c. Nehemiah had half the population of Jerusalem (eh. xi. only the general superintendence, and saw 6-19 compared with 1 Chron. ix. 9-22). that all was properly executed. But the 2. That the office of guarding the temple entire work being at length accomplished, it gates had always been discharged by Levites devolved upon him to make the necessary (1 Chron. ix. 17-22; xxvi. 12-19). arrangements for the security of what had Ver. 2.-Hanani and Hananiah. This appointment of two municipal officers to now become a first-rate fortress. Accord- have charge of Jerusalem recalls the mention ingly, he seems himself to have assigned the of two "rulers" in eh. iii. 9, 12, each of guard of the gates to certain bodies of Levites whom had authority over half the district (ver. 1), as being experienced in the business dependent on Jerusalem, and amounts to an of keeping watch ; after which he committed '' undesigned coincidence." The ruler of the palace. Rather, "the commandant of the task of appointing other guards to his the fort," i e. the officer in charge of the brother Hanani, and to a certain Hananiah, temple fortress (see above, eh. ii. 8). already the commandant of the Birah, or Ver. 3.-Let not the gates be opened temple tower (ver. 2). They devised a until the sun be hot. The gates of towns system by which the adult male inhabitants in the East are usually opened at sunrise ; were made to partition the watch of the but this cannot be the intention here. Some extra precaution is signified-not, however, wall among themselves, each on the part so much as Dathe supposes, who renders which was nearest t.o his own house (ver. 3). ante teinpus m-eridianum, " before noon ; " At the sa.me time, it was ordered, for greater but rather something intermediate between precaution, that all the gates shonld be this and the ordinary practice. closed at night, and none of them opened Ver. 4.-The city was large. Literally, "broad every way." The houses were not "until the sun was hot" (i,bi,d. ), i. e. until builded. Much of the city consisted of open some hoUIS after sunrise. The city was spaces, in which uo houses had been as yet thus made as secure as the circumstances built. admitted ; but in the coUISe of the arrange- Ver. 5.-And my God put into mine heart ments it became clear, at any rate to Nehe- to gather together the nobles, &c. As Nehemiah contemplated the vast empty miah, that the popnlation of the city was spaces within the city walls, and considered too scanty for its size (ver. 4), and that with himself how they might best be peopled, some steps onght to be taken to augment the thou~ht came to him-and he hailed it the number of inhabitants. AB a first step, as a Divine inspiration-that by taking a n necessary preliminary before he could lay census of the people he might ],>ave the way for some transfer of the inhabitants of the any definite proposal before the "rnlers," conntry districts into the capital, which the governor thought it necessary to make a would at any rate strengthen the latter, and census of the entire people (ver. 5). It seems lessen the desolate appearance of its streets to have been in the course of his prepara- and squares, which had so pained him. The tions for this purpose that he " found a census would show what proportion the country and town populations bore to cnch register of the genealogy of them which other, and would point out which were the came up at the first." The list in vers. 7- places in the country districts that could 69 has been regarded as the result of his best afford to lose a portion of their inhabit• own census ; but reasons have been already ants. A census therefore was resolved upon, given against this view in the comment upon and, according to ordinary Jewish usage (Num. i. 17-47; l Chron. xxi 6, 6; Ezra Ezra; and it would seem to be most probable ii. 3-62), it was genealogical. 'fhe tribes that we have the actual resnlt of Nehemiah's of Judah, Benjamin, and Levi we~e numbe~ed census, so far as he thought fit to give it to separately (eh. xi. 4-19); and m the tnbe ua, iu eh. xi 3-36. of Judah the children of Pharrz were reckoned OH. VII. 1-o.] THE BOOK OF NEHEMIAH. 78
apart from those of Zerah (1 Chron. ix. 4, pa.rations for this censua, perha.ps in sea.rch• 6). No doubt the genealogical principle mg for precedents, that Nehemiah found was acted upon throughout, but further evi- the " register of the genealogy of them dence upon the point is wanting. It would which ea.me up at the fuat," which is the seem to have been in the course of his pre- subject of the next section.