Nehemiah 2

¹ And it comes to pass, in the month of Nisan, the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, wine [is] before him, and I lift up the wine, and give to the king, and I had not been sad before him; ² and the king said to me, "Wherefore [is] your face sad, and you not sick? this is nothing except sadness of heart"; and I fear very much, ³ and say to the king, "Let the king to the eon live! wherefore should not my face be sad, when the city, the place of the graves of my fathers, [is] a waste, and its gates have been consumed with fire?" ⁴ And the king said to me, "For what are you seeking?" and I pray unto the Elohim of the heavens, ⁵ and say to the king, "If to the king [it be] good, and if your servant be pleasing before you, that you send me unto Judah, unto the city of the graves of my fathers, and I built it." ⁶ And the king said to me (and the queen is sitting near him), "How long is your journey? and when do you return?" and it is good before the king, and he sends me away, and I set to him a time. ⁷ And I say to the king, "If to the king [it be] good, letters let be given to me for the governors beyond the River, that they let me pass over till that I come in unto Judah. ⁸ and a letter unto Asaph, keeper of the paradise that the king has, that he give to me trees for beams [for] the gates of the palace that the house has, and for the wall of the city, and for the house into which I enter"; and the king gives to me, according to the good hand of my Elohim upon me. ⁹ And I come in unto the governors beyond the River, and give to them the letters of the king; and the king sends with me heads of a force, and horsemen; ¹⁰ and Sanballat the Horonite hears, and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite, and it is evil to them - a great evil - that a man has come in to seek good for the sons of Israel. ¹¹ And I come in unto Jerusalem, and I am there three days, ¹² and I rise by night, I and a few men with me, and have not declared to a man what my Elohim is giving unto my heart to do for Jerusalem, and there is no beast with me except the beast on which I am riding. ¹³ And I go out through the gate of the valley by night, and unto the front of the fountain of the dragon, and unto the gate of the dunghill, and I am measuring about the walls of Jerusalem, that are broken down, and its gates consumed with fire. ¹⁴ And I pass over unto the gate of the fountain, and unto the pool of the king, and there is no place for the beast under me to pass over, ¹⁵ and I am going up through the brook by night, and am measuring about the wall, and turn back, and come in through the gate of the valley, and turn back. ¹⁶ And the prefects have not known whither I have gone, and what I am doing; and to the Jews, and to the priests, and to the freemen, and to the prefects, and to the rest of those doing the work, hitherto I have not declared [it]; ¹⁷ and I say unto them, "You are seeing the evil that we are in, in that Jerusalem [is] waste, and its gates have been burnt with fire; come and we build the wall of Jerusalem, and we are not any more a reproach." ¹⁸ And I declare to them the hand of my Elohim that is good upon me, and also the words of the king that he said to me, and they say, "Let us rise, and we have built"; and they strengthen their hands for good. ¹⁹ And Sanballat the Horonite hears, and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite, and Geshem the Arabian, and they mock at us, and despise us, and say, "What [is] this thing that you are doing? against the king are you rebelling?. ²⁰ And I return them word, and say to them, "The Elohim of the heavens - He does give prosperity to us, and we His servants rise and have built; and to you there is no portion, and right, and memorial in Jerusalem."