Nehemiah 2:8

8. Keeper of the king’s forest The Hebrew word here rendered forest, is פרדס , pardes, a Persian word, from which comes (through the Greek) the word paradise. It occurs in only two other passages, Ecclesiastes 2:5, and Song of Solomon 4:13, and seems to designate an inclosed garden or park, planted with trees and shrubs. “A wide open park, inclosed against injury, yet with its natural beauty unspoiled, with stately forest trees, many of them bearing fruit, watered by clear streams on whose banks roved large herds of antelopes or sheep this was the scenery which connected itself in the mind of the Greek traveller with the word paradise, and for which his own language supplied no precise equivalent.” SMITH’S Bib. Dict. The forest, or paradise, mentioned in this verse was one from which Nehemiah wished to procure timber for building purposes, and must have been somewhere in Palestine, and probably not far from Jerusalem. There is no evidence that Nehemiah went as far as Lebanon for materials. Some suggest that the king’s forest may mean the beautiful and well watered gardens which Josephus (viii, 7, 3) mentions as being at Etham, about fifty furlongs from Jerusalem, to which Solomon was wont to ride out in the morning. But the reference may be to all the groves and forests of Palestine, which seem to have been at that time carefully guarded by the kings of Persia, who appointed a special officer to guard them, and see that they were not wantonly destroyed.

The palace which appertained to the house That is, the palace, fortress, or castle, which was connected with the temple. Not the palace of Solomon, which probably stood on the southern slope of Ophel, and from which that king had a magnificent ascent to the temple, (1 Kings 10:5,) for we have elsewhere no hint of any attempt to rebuild the royal palace at Jerusalem, and least of all would Nehemiah have proposed at such a time to build it, for that would look like a design to re-establish the kingdom of Judah. But this palace of the temple, which Nehemiah proposed to build, was probably some such fortress or citadel as that subsequently known as Antonia, called also Baris, ( Βαρις seems to have come from בירה , birah, here rendered palace, and includes the meaning both of fortress and palace,) and used under the Asmonean princes as a depository for the vestments of the high priest. Josephus, 15:11, 4.

For the wall Timber would be used for building the gates of the wall.

The house that I shall enter into His own residence, or headquarters, while he superintended the building of the wall and gates of the city.

According to the good hand Compare Ezra 7:6, note.