This aid Nehemiah was anxious to give, but felt apprehensive of difficulties in the way; not the difficulty of quitting the pleasures and luxuries of the magnificent palace in which he held so honourable a place, but that of obtaining the consent of his royal master to his departure for the land of Judea. It is said that the nearest way to reach any heart is through Heaven; such had been the experience of Esther, such now was the experience of Nehemiah. Fervently and humbly he entreated the Lord to give him favour in the sight of the king.
The anxiety which oppressed the noble Jew, expressed itself in his countenance, when, in accordance with his office, he placed the wine-cup in the hand of Artaxerxes. The king noticed his servant’s look of depression, and inquired its cause.
“Let the king live for ever,” replied Nehemiah; “why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my father’s sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire?”
Then said the king to him, “For what dost thou make request?”
Nehemiah silently lifted up his heart in prayer ere he made his reply to the monarch:—“If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favour in thy sight, that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my father’s sepulchres, that I may build it.”
Artaxerxes received the petition with favour. He not only permitted the departure of Nehemiah, but provided for him an escort, and gave him letters to the officers of government on the other side of the Euphrates, 457 b.c. It is from the year in which the Persian monarch issued his decree, permitting the rebuilding of Jerusalem, that is dated the commencement of the weeks of prophetic years, at the close of which the Lord Jesus was crucified (Dan. ix. 25).
Nehemiah soon found, on his arrival at Jerusalem, that his position there would be one of great difficulty, requiring both judgment and courage. The enemies of the Jews, especially Sanballat the Horonite, and Tobiah the Ammonite, were possessed of power, cunning, and the most determined resolution to prevent the rebuilding of the ruined wall.
It was in the stillness of night that a single horseman, accompanied by a few attendants on foot, passed out through the gate of the valley. Thoughtfully he rode on where in ancient and happier times the bulwarks of Jerusalem had stood. He gazed sorrowfully on the blackened ruins over which the Assyrian conquerors had passed. But it was not to mourn in unavailing woe over the desolation of his country that Nehemiah made that midnight survey. That which was ruined he resolved to repair, and, with the blessing of God, to encircle the city once more with a protecting wall.
By his words, and yet more by his example, Nehemiah animated his countrymen to exertion. The circuit of Jerusalem was portioned out to the most zealous of the people, and each in his own division set heartily to work. In vain Sanballat and Tobiah tried to discourage the builders by representing their patriotic efforts as rebellion against Persia. In vain, time after time, they endeavoured to entice Nehemiah into a village, that they might deprive the Jews of him who was the life and soul of their undertaking. “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down,” was Nehemiah’s answer to their insidious proposals. A yet deeper snare was laid. Nehemiah was warned of a plot to assassinate him, and was urged to fly to the temple. But again the brave leader’s self-devotion defeated the schemes of his enemies. “Should such a man as I flee?” he exclaimed; “and who is he that being as I am, would go into the temple to save his life?”
The adversaries tried the effect of mockery and scorn. As they viewed the unceasing labours of the builders, “Will they,” cried Sanballat, “revive the stones out of the rubbish that is burned?” “If a fox come up,” rejoined the insolent Tobiah, “he shall even break down their stone wall.” But notwithstanding this hatred and scorn, the wall rose higher and higher. Then the bitter adversaries of the Jews resolved to use weapons more formidable than words, and conspired to attack the builders. The peril was great, but Nehemiah and his followers were equal to the occasion. A watch was kept both by night and by day; they that builded the wall, and they that bare burdens, each with one hand wrought in the work, and with the other grasped a weapon for defence. Nehemiah, ever on the watch against the foe, changed not his garments, but lay down night after night in his daily attire, prepared to start up at the first sound of danger. He kept a trumpeter at his side, and said to the nobles and the people, “The work is great and large, and we are separated one far from another; in what place therefore that ye hear the sound of the trumpet, resort ye thither unto us: our God shall fight for us!”