Nehemiah 13:1–31

¹ At that time the Book of Moses was read aloud in the hearing of the people, and in it they found the passage stating that no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God, ² because they had not met the Israelites with food and water, but had hired Balaam to call down a curse against them (although our God had turned the curse into a blessing). ³ As soon as the people heard this law, they excluded from Israel all of foreign descent. ⁴ Now before this, Eliashib the priest, a relative of Tobiah, had been put in charge of the storerooms of the house of our God ⁵ and had prepared for Tobiah a large room where they had previously stored the grain offerings, the frankincense, the temple articles, and the tithes of grain, new wine, and oil prescribed for the Levites, singers, and gatekeepers, along with the contributions for the priests. ⁶ While all this was happening, I was not in Jerusalem, because I had returned to Artaxerxes king of Babylon in the thirty-second year of his reign. Some time later I obtained leave from the king ⁷ to return to Jerusalem. Then I discovered the evil that Eliashib had done on behalf of Tobiah by providing him a room in the courts of the house of God. ⁸ And I was greatly displeased and threw all of Tobiah’s household goods out of the room. ⁹ Then I ordered that the rooms be purified, and I had the articles of the house of God restored to them, along with the grain offerings and frankincense. ¹⁰ I also learned that because the portions for the Levites had not been given to them, all the Levites and singers responsible for performing the service had gone back to their own fields. ¹¹ So I rebuked the officials and asked, “Why has the house of God been neglected?” Then I gathered the Levites and singers together and stationed them at their posts, ¹² and all Judah brought a tenth of the grain, new wine, and oil into the storerooms. ¹³ I appointed as treasurers over the storerooms Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, and Pedaiah of the Levites, with Hanan son of Zaccur, the son of Mattaniah, to assist them, because they were considered trustworthy. They were responsible for distributing the supplies to their fellow Levites. ¹⁴ Remember me for this, O my God, and do not blot out my deeds of loving devotion for the house of my God and for its services. ¹⁵ In those days I saw people in Judah treading winepresses on the Sabbath and bringing in grain and loading it on donkeys, along with wine, grapes, and figs. All kinds of goods were being brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. So I warned them against selling food on that day. ¹⁶ Additionally, men of Tyre who lived there…