Nehemiah 5

¹ There was a great outcry from the people, and from their wives, against their brother Jews.

² Some said, 'We are having to pledge our sons and daughters to get enough grain to eat and keep usalive.'

³ Others said, 'We are having to mortgage our fields, our vineyards and our houses to get grain becauseof the shortage.'

⁴ Stil others said, 'We have had to borrow money on our fields and our vineyards to pay the royal tax;

⁵ and though we belong to the same race as our brothers, and our children are as good as theirs, weshall have to sel our sons and our daughters into slavery; some of our daughters have been sold into slaveryalready. We can do nothing about it, since our fields and our vineyards now belong to others.'

⁶ When I heard their complaints and these words I was very angry.

⁷ Having turned the matter over in my mind, I reprimanded the nobles and the officials as fol ows, 'Eachof you is imposing a burden on his brother.' Summoning a great assembly to deal with them,

⁸ I said to them, 'To the best of our power, we have redeemed our brother Jews who were forced to selthemselves to foreigners, and now you in turn are sel ing your brothers, for them to be bought back by us!' Theywere silent and could find nothing to say.

⁹ 'What you are doing', I went on, 'is wrong. Do you not want to walk in the fear of our God and escapethe sneers of the nations, our enemies?

¹⁰ I too, with my brothers and retainers, have lent them money and grain. Let us cancel these pledges.

¹¹ This very day return them their fields, their vineyards, their olive groves and their houses, and cancelthe claim on the money, grain, new wine and olive oil, which you have lent them.'

¹² 'We shall make restitution,' they replied, 'we shal claim nothing more from them; we shal do as yousay.' Summoning the priests, I then made them swear to do as they had promised.

¹³ Then, shaking out the fold of my garment, I said, 'May God thus shake out of house and possessionsanyone who does not make good this promise; may he be shaken out thus and left empty!' And the wholeassembly answered, 'Amen' and praised Yahweh. And the people kept this promise.

¹⁴ What is more, from the time when the king appointed me to be their governor in Judah, from thetwentieth to the thirty-second year of King Artaxerxes, for twelve years, neither I nor my brothers ever levied thegovernor's subsistence al owance,

¹⁵ whereas the former governors, my predecessors, had been a burden on the people, from whom theytook forty silver shekels a day for food and wine, while their attendants oppressed the people too. But I, fearingGod, never did this.

¹⁶ Also, not acquiring any land, I concentrated on the work of this wal and all my attendants joined in thework together, too.

¹⁷ Furthermore, magistrates and officials to the number of a hundred and fifty ate at my table, not tomention those who came to us from the surrounding nations.

¹⁸ Every day, one ox, six fine sheep, as wel as poultry, were prepared for me; every ten days, skins ofwine were brought in bulk. But even so, I never claimed the governor's subsistence al owance, since the peoplealready had burden enough to bear.

¹⁹ To my credit, my God, remember all I have done for this people.