Nehemiah 13:1

WHOLESALE APOSTASY OF ISRAEL IN NEHEMIAH'S BRIEF ABSENCE

This is one of the saddest chapters in the Bible, for it relates Israel's prompt rebellion against God's law as soon as Nehemiah's back was turned. Of course, Nehemiah once more attempted to get Israel back on the right track, as related in this chapter; but that great effort on his part may also be viewed as a total failure.

Israel obeyed God only so long as some powerful administrator compelled them to do so. The sadness of this tragic failure of the once Chosen People is emphasized by the fact Nehemiah was their last chance to get right in the sight of God.

After Nehemiah, there would be no more prophets until John the the Immerser; their king had been taken away from them by the Lord; and they would never have another; the whole racial nation, with the exception of a tiny "righteous remnant" sank rapidly and irrevocably into that state of `judicial hardening' foretold by Isaiah. Israel had stopped their ears, closed their eyes, and hardened their hearts; and, from that state of spiritual oblivion, there could be no recovery until the Christ should come; and the vast majority of them failed to seize even that opportunity.

READING OF THE LAW REGARDING THE EXCLUSION OF AMMONITES FROM THE CONGREGATION

"On that day they read in the book of Moses in the audience of the people; and therein was found written that an Ammonite and a Moabite should not enter into the assembly of God for ever, because they met not the children of Israel with bread and with water, but hired Balaam against them, to curse them: howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing. And it came to pass when they heard the law, that they separated from Israel the mixed multitude."

"The book of Moses" (Nehemiah 13:1). "This probably meant the entire Pentateuch."[1]

It is not clear whether this was a special occasion for reading God's law, or if it was connected with the prescribed reading of it at the Feast of Tabernacles, which might have coincided, almost, with Nehemiah's return to Jerusalem, following his absence in Persia. To this writer, it appears most likely to have been a special reading of the law arranged at once by Nehemiah upon his return.

We have already noted that every word of Nehemiah is focused upon providing safety for Jerusalem; and the big thing in this chapter is that of Nehemiah's throwing Tobiah out of the temple; and it could hardly have been an accident that this reading from God's law was pointed squarely at that sinful treatment of Tobiah, an Ammonite enemy of Nehemiah, and of the Israel of God.

This little paragraph is somewhat of a prelude to the chapter. Neither the reading of God's law, nor Nehemiah's entreaties would suffice to correct this abuse. "Judicial proceedings would have to be taken, and the mixed multitude removed by authority."[2]