Nehemiah 6 Study Notes

6:1-19 In chap. 6 the focus returns to construction of the wall and three attempts to thwart it by “intimidating” (see vv. 9,14,19; Hb piel of yara’, “make afraid”) Nehemiah and the workers.

6:1-4 News that the wall was completed (but not the gates) brought on a new attempt by Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem the Arab to stop construction, this time by focusing on Nehemiah himself. This translation follows the ancient versions in reading the Hebrew text as kepharim (villages) and not the Masoretic Text, which has kephirim (Kephirim). The versions leave us wondering which village was the proposed meeting place—perhaps it was different each of the four times. The Masoretic Text specifies a location unknown to us. The Ono Valley, on the far northwest corner of Judah, may have been a neutral area between Judah and Samaria. Nehemiah recognized the offer to meet as a trap.

6:5-7 After four rejected invitations, Sanballat increased the pressure by trying to blackmail Nehemiah. The open letter in the hand of his aide made clear that Sanballat’s accusations against Nehemiah were for everyone to read. The letter charged Nehemiah with treason against King Artaxerxes, a charge that Sanballat knew had worked before to stop construction in Jerusalem (Ezr 4:7-16).

6:8-9 Nehemiah was not cowed by their slander. This translation of the end of v. 9, like most English translations, takes Nehemiah’s words to be a brief prayer. However, the phrase my God (Hb ’elohay) does not actually appear here as it does in the other brief prayers of Nehemiah (v. 14; 5:19; 13:14,22). Also, none of the early ancient versions (Gk, Lat, Syr) understood the closing phrase to be a prayer. With this in mind, a possible translation would be, “So now I increased my efforts.”

6:10 Shemaiah (“Yahweh Has Heard”) is a common OT name shared by more than twenty different people. Why Shemaiah was restricted or restrained is not clear. While he is not referred to as a prophet in this verse, his message to Nehemiah is called a prophecy in v. 12. Shemaiah tried a religious approach to trap Nehemiah, urging him to flee to the temple to save himself from assassination.

6:11-13 Nehemiah saw through this religious ruse intended to intimidate and discredit him. Moreover, had he entered the temple he could have been executed since by law only the priests could enter the temple (Nm 18:7).

6:14 Nehemiah knew that behind Shemaiah’s “prophecy” were Tobiah and Sanballat, who evidently had persuaded others to do their bidding. Noadiah is mentioned only here in the OT.

6:15-16 In spite of myriad problems, the wall was completed in fifty-two days. The date of the twenty-fifth day of the month of Elul probably was October 2, 445 BC. In less than six months, Nehemiah had traveled from Susa in Persia (modern-day Iran) to Jerusalem and had completed his mission of restoring the wall around the city. While Nehemiah’s enemies had tried to intimidate him (vv. 9,14,19), they themselves were intimidated. They reluctantly understood that the completion of such a formidable task was due to God’s help.

6:17-19 During those days suggests that this third attempt to intimidate Nehemiah may have been parallel to the other actions of intimidation. Verse 17 also explains why Nehemiah’s enemies were so well informed of conditions within Jerusalem, because the nobles of Judah sent many letters to Tobiah. The term letters (Hb ’iggereth, from Akk egirtu) occurs only a dozen times in the OT, all in postexilic texts. These “nobles” were bound by oath (Hb ba‘alay-shevu‘ah; lit “masters of the oath”) to Tobiah through marriage. Those aligned with Tobiah tried to convince Nehemiah of Tobiah’s good deeds, yet his letters were an attempt to intimidate Nehemiah.