groundless rumours. By such accusations in an open letter, which might be read by any one, Sanballat thought to oblige Nehemiah to come and clear himself from suspicion by an interview.
Verse 8
Nehemiah, however, saw through his stratagem, and sent word to him by a messenger: “There are no such things done as thou sayest, but thou feignest them out of thine own heart.” בּודאם, a contraction of בּודאם, from בּדא, which occurs again only in 1Ki 12:33, to invent, to feign, especially evil things.
Verse 9
Neh 6:9 “For,” adds Nehemiah when writing of these things, “they all desired to make us afraid, thinking (לאמר) their hands will cease from the work, that it be not done.” The last words, “And now strengthen my hands,” are to be explained by the fact that Nehemiah hastily transports himself into the situation and feelings of those days when he prayed to God for strength. To make this request fit into the train of thought, we must supply: I however thought, or said, Strengthen, O God, my hands. חזּק is imperative. The translation, in the first pers. sing. of the imperfect, “I strengthened” (lxx, Vulg., Syr.), is only an attempt to fit into their context words not understood by the translators.
A false prophet, hired by Tobiah and Sanballat, also sought, by prophesying that the enemies of Nehemiah would kill him in the night, to cause him to flee with him into the holy place of the temple, and to protect his life from the machinations of his enemies by closing the temple doors. His purpose was, as Nehemiah subsequently learned, to seduce him into taking an illegal step, and so give occasion for speaking evil of him.
Verse 10
Neh 6:10 “And I came into the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabeel, who was shut up.” Nothing further is known of this prophet Shemaiah. From what is here related we learn, that he was one of the lying prophets employed by Sanballat and Tobiah to ruin Nehemiah. We are not told what induced or caused Nehemiah to go into the house of Shemaiah; he merely recounts what the latter was hired by his enemies to effect. From the accessory clause, “and he was shut up,” we may perhaps infer that Shemaiah in some
