Nehemiah 5:5

5:5 And now, though we share the same flesh and blood as our fellow countrymen, ¹  and our children are just like their children, ²  still we have found it necessary to subject our sons and daughters to slavery. ³  Some of our daughters have been subjected to slavery, while we are powerless to help, ⁴  since our fields and vineyards now belong to other people.” ⁵ 

Nehemiah 5:7

5:7 I considered these things carefully ⁶  and then registered a complaint with the wealthy ⁷  and the officials. I said to them, “Each one of you is seizing the collateral ⁸  from your own countrymen!” ⁹  Because of them I called for ¹⁰  a great public assembly.

Nehemiah 9:26

9:26 “Nonetheless they grew disobedient and rebelled against you; they disregarded your law. ¹¹  They killed your prophets who had solemnly admonished them in order to cause them to return to you. They committed atrocious blasphemies.

Nehemiah 10:37

10:37 We will also bring the first of our coarse meal, of our contributions, of the fruit of every tree, of new wine, and of olive oil to the priests at the storerooms of the temple of our God, along with a tenth of the produce ¹²  of our land to the Levites, for the Levites are the ones who collect the tithes in all the cities where we work. ¹³ 

¹ tn Heb “according to the flesh of our brothers is our flesh.”

² tn Heb “like their children, our children.”

³ tn Heb “to become slaves” (also later in this verse).

⁴ tn Heb “there is not power for our hand.” The Hebrew expression used here is rather difficult.

⁵ sn The poor among the returned exiles were being exploited by their rich countrymen. Moneylenders were loaning large amounts of money, and not only collecting interest on loans which was illegal (Lev 25:36-37; Deut 23:19-20), but also seizing pledges as collateral (Neh 5:3) which was allowed (Deut 24:10). When the debtors missed a payment, the moneylenders would seize their collateral: their fields, vineyards and homes. With no other means of income, the debtors were forced to sell their children into slavery, a common practice at this time (Neh 5:5). Nehemiah himself was one of the moneylenders (Neh 5:10), but he insisted that seizure of collateral from fellow Jewish countrymen was ethically wrong (Neh 5:9).

⁶ tn Heb “my heart was advised upon me.”

⁷ tn Heb “nobles.”

⁸ tn Heb “taking a creditor’s debt.” The Hebrew noun מַשָּׁא (masha’) means “interest; debt” and probably refers to the collateral (pledge) collected by a creditor (HALOT 641-42 s.v.). This particular noun form appears only in Nehemiah (5:7, 10; 10:32); however, it is related to מַשָּׁאָה (masha’ah, “contractual loan; debt; collateral”) which appears elsewhere (Deut 24:10; Prov 22:26; cf. Neh 5:11). See the note on the word “people” at the end of v. 5. The BHS editors suggest emending the MT to מָשָׂא (masa’, “burden”), following several medieval Hebrew MSS; however, the result is not entirely clear: “you are bearing a burden, a man with his brothers.”

⁹ tn Heb “his brothers.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “I gave.”

¹¹ tn Heb “they cast your law behind their backs.”

¹⁶ tn Heb “a tithe of our land.”

¹⁷ tn Heb “of our work.”