Then in the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought to me, ¹  I took the wine and gave it to the king. Previously ²  I had not been depressed ³  in the king’s presence. ⁴ 

So the king said to me, “Why do you appear to be depressed when you aren’t sick? What can this be other than sadness of heart?” This made me very fearful.

He had been hired to scare me so that I would do this and thereby sin. They would thus bring reproach on me and I ¹  would be discredited. ² 

“Then, when they were at rest again, they went back to doing evil before you. Then you abandoned them to ¹  their enemies, and they gained dominion over them. When they again cried out to you, in your compassion you heard from heaven and rescued them time and again.