Nehemiah 13:1-9

1At 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,1 2because 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).

3As soon as the people heard this law, they excluded from Israel all of foreign descent.

4Now before this, Eliashib the priest, a relative of Tobiah, had been put in charge of the storerooms of the house of our God 5and 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.

6While all this was happening, I was not in Jerusalem, because I had returned to Artaxerxes king of Babylon2 in the thirty-second year of his reign. Some time later I obtained leave from the king 7to 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.

8And I was greatly displeased and threw all of Tobiah’s household goods out of the room. 9Then 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.