Nehemiah 13:10-30

10I also 1discovered that 2the portions of the Levites had not been given to them, so the Levites and the singers who performed the service had 3gone away, 4each to his own field. 11So I 56reprimanded the officials and said, “7Why has the house of God been neglected?” Then I gathered them together and stationed them at their posts. 12All Judah then brought 8the tithe of the grain, wine, and oil into the storehouses. 13To be in charge of the storehouses, I appointed Shelemiah the priest, Zadok the scribe, and Pedaiah from the Levites, and in addition to them was Hanan the son of Zaccur, the son of Mattaniah; for 9they were considered reliable, and it was 10their task to distribute to their kinsmen. 1411Remember me for this, my God, and do not wipe out my loyal deeds which I have performed for the house of my God and its services.

15In those days I saw in Judah people who were treading wine presses 12on the Sabbath, and bringing in sacks of grain and loading them on donkeys, as well as wine, grapes, figs, and every kind of load, 13and they were bringing them into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. So 14I admonished them on the day they sold food. 16Also people of Tyre were living 15there who imported fish and all kinds of merchandise, and sold them to the sons of Judah on the Sabbath, even in Jerusalem. 17Then 16I 17reprimanded the nobles of Judah and said to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, 18by profaning the Sabbath day? 1819Did your fathers not do the same, so that our God brought on us and on this city all this trouble? Yet you are adding to the wrath against Israel by profaning the Sabbath.”

19And 20it came about that just as it became dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I ordered that the doors be shut, 21and that they were not to open them until after the Sabbath. Then I stationed some of my servants at the gates so that no load would enter on the Sabbath day. 20Once or twice the traders and merchants of every kind of merchandise spent the night outside Jerusalem. 21Then 22I warned them and said to them, “Why do you spend the night in front of the wall? If you do so again, I will 23use force against you.” From that time on they did not come on the Sabbath. 22And I ordered the Levites that 24they were to purify themselves and come as gatekeepers to sanctify the Sabbath day. For this also 25remember me, my God, and have compassion on me according to the greatness of Your mercy.

23In those days I also saw that the Jews had 2627married women from 28Ashdod, 29Ammon, and Moab. 24As for their children, half spoke in the language of Ashdod, and none of them knew how to speak the language of Judah, but 30only the language of his own people. 25So 31I quarreled with them and cursed them, and 32struck some of them and pulled out their hair, and 33made them swear by God, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take any of their daughters for your sons or for yourselves. 2634Did Solomon the king of Israel not sin regarding these things? 35Yet among the many nations there was no king like him, and 36he was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel; yet the foreign women caused even him to sin. 27Has it not then been reported about you that you have committed all this great evil 37by acting unfaithfully against our God, by 38marrying foreign women?” 28Even one of the sons of Joiada, the son of Eliashib the high priest, became a son-in-law of 39Sanballat the Horonite, so I chased him away from me. 2940Remember them, my God, 41because they have defiled the priesthood and the 42covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.

3043So I purified them from everything foreign, and assigned duties to the priests and the Levites, each in his work,