40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Nehemiah 7:5-8:12 (Episode 366)

Episode Date: July 5, 2023

Nehemiah includes the genealogy of those who came out of exile. Ezra stands on a platform and reads the Book of the Law of Moses to all the people. The people are told not to weep and to instead rejoice and eat. Chad and Daniel discuss all of this. Have a listen! Show Notes: Support the Podcast Network Fundraiser 1517 Podcasts The 1517 Podcast Network on Apple Podcasts 1517 on Youtube  What's New from 1517: The New Quest for Paul and His Reading of the Old Testament by Timo Laato Finding God in the Darkness: Hopeful Reflections from the Pits of Depression, Despair, and Disappointment by Bradley Gray  More from the hosts: Daniel Emery Price Chad Bird

Welcome to another episode of 40 Minutes in the Old Testament. 40 Minutes in the Old Testament is a 1517 Podcast Network podcast. You can go to 1517.org slash podcast and check out all the other podcasts that are living over there. while you're over there, make sure you check out everything else that 1517 is doing. I know for a fact that we've got some new academies being filmed right now, and so there's going to be new academies for you to take advantage of,

which, that's exciting, because the academies are free. You know, Chad's done a couple of academies. I've even done an academy. They were desperate that particular season, and there I went in. Gave you a little overview of the Gospel of Luke. And so, you know what? You can do those academies, take those academies, for nothing.

That's the whole thing, is they're free. I know there's some ones that we've got coming up. We've got a Faith and Reason Academy coming up, if that's something you're interested in. Also, Bruce Hillman, I think I might take this academy just because I find this stuff interesting. He's going to be doing a Patristics Academy, so we're going to do some Church Fathers, Chad.

It's been a little while since my Church Father brush-up days. I might have to see what old Bruce has to say so I can feel smart after I take this free academy. Yeah, I'm with you. I'll sign up alongside you. Yeah, yeah. good stuff. You know, take eight classes and then feel like I really know something about those church fathers, and that would be, that's the benefit of doing these things. So keep an eye

out for those, and while you're waiting for those, there's a whole bunch of other academies that you could take. So there's your academy pitch. I picked something, I pitched it, it's academies, check them out. We are in Nehemiah chapter 7, and we are going to get into a lot of numbers, man. These numbers seem familiar. Some of this, I'm getting some deja vu as I was reading this this morning yeah i was thinking the same thing what day are we going on here haven't we read this like a few weeks ago yeah yeah so well we we in the last podcast we covered the first four verses of nehemiah 7 but yeah once we get to the fifth verse uh it's going to seem very familiar not exact i mean if you put these side by side you're going to see a few differences

uh but you are dealing here with centuries upon centuries upon centuries of hand copying manuscripts so are you going to come up with a few uh a few differences between manuscripts when it comes to a list in ezra 2 and in a list in nehemiah 7 of course of course you're going to you know and uh compare matthew mark and luke the synoptic gospels do you have the exact same accounts of the same stories no no there's gonna be there's gonna be differences so anyway that's what's going on here uh it's kind of interesting that he includes it here though So Nehemiah 7, 5 starts out, and this is part of where Nehemiah is speaking in first person. It's called the Nehemiah Memoir, typically.

Then God put into my heart to assemble the nobles and the officials and the people to be enrolled by genealogy. A very Israel thing to do, and we love our genealogies. And yeah, well, not just Israel, not just the Old Testament thing. That's how Matthew begins the New Testament, right? Yeah. with it, with the genealogy. So Nehemiah, he's going to do a genealogy. He's going to roll everybody. But while he's, I guess, you know, getting the stuff together to do this, he finds an old genealogy. So verse five concludes, and I found the book of the genealogy of those who came

up at the first. And here's what I found written in that genealogy. And then verse six begins with this list, it's basically a replica of what we read back in Ezra chapter two. Now, you might be saying to yourself, hey, you know, I've heard that scrolls are kind of hard to come by and expensive. So why in the world would, you know, a good size portion of this scroll be used up with something which has already been recorded in Ezra chapter two? Well, I don't have like the, you know, the fail-proof answer to that. But I can tell you, theologically at least, why this seems to have been inserted here. And that reason is because it seems to me that Nehemiah is wanting to underscore the fact that there is a continuity between those who first showed up, whose names are

recorded in Ezra 2 and which are re-recorded here in Nehemiah chapter 7. There's a theological continuity between those guys and gals who first showed up with these people who are now here in Nehemiah's time. They showed up, what they wanted to do was rebuild the temple, get everything going, and these people, their genealogy, which I'm recording here, and the genealogy which I'm about to put together,

Nehemiah says, we're all in a common cause here. Yeah, I think, too, you have to understand that it wasn't like the Bible was slowly being compiled and they were adding books to it. It's like, ooh, I wrote another one. Tack it on. A new chapter. Tack it on to the end. And so Nehemiah is writing a historical account of what's happening while he's there. This is what's being conveyed. And he finds something that is a historical document that has got genealogy and stuff in it.

and for us we'll be like whatevs we just read that but that's not the case for other people he obviously had never even seen it before and like he sees this and he's like oh well here's some historical historical data so i'm going to stick this into my book so while we might be like well what a waste of scroll and space dude it's in this other book well our book's not like floating around everywhere it's not like part of the bible that everyone's got in their house this is like if you ran across something that you felt was verifiable that explained the history of the thing that you're trying to do, of course you're going to include it. You're like, hey, this is where we started. This is how this got started right here. So of course I'm going to copy and

paste that over because that's relevant to someone who would read this book because Nehemiah, again, is not assuming that someone is going to read Ezra before they read Nehemiah. He's writing a separate thing now we have it all together but that's that's not how it worked yeah yeah i mean it it is good sometimes often in fact to pause and to take your your bible as a book to set it aside and just think okay so how did this come to be you know we're so used to thinking about a book or an app now but we'll go back into the old-fashioned our book that we can easily kind to lull ourselves into a uh over a over simplistic view of how the scriptures uh worked and how they were compiled in in in days before the books came along yeah i mean i think yeah i think him running

across a bunch of of names and numbers of people would have actually probably been a pretty exciting thing like he he's got like a the history of what he's trying to do like right there in front of him i mean to us it's the most boring part of this book but for him it was probably pretty exciting yeah well yeah i mean it's like hey i know this person's uh relative right son grandson whatever whatever it might be yeah so it is highly significant for them and yeah i mean you you had as i just often pointed out the bible is a library of books it's not one book it's a whole library of books and physically literally that meant that in some places yeah you've got a couple of books other places you got two or three books probably the only place in israel where you had

all the books for sure was a temple in jerusalem i mean maybe some synagogues had them all uh but i'm not i'm not even sure about that uh but the temple for sure had all all the scrolls in one place but it was a long long time it would be centuries after when you finally begin to have a book with all the old testament books and then eventually all the new testament books actually under the same cover you had to first of all you had to have a codex invented by early christians the book form and then eventually had to have all the not only all the new testament written but it all kind of finally gathered together into one place so this was a long long process so anyway this is one example of how this worked historically and i don't really think there's

any more that i have to say about uh about this list uh other than there's a whole lot of names and a whole lot of groupings that are there and this is nehemiah's way of recording this to establish this continuity between those who came before and the folks who are there there now so i said we jump down to the end of the chapter end of nehemiah chapter seven and this is one of these places which we've encountered multiple times in the podcast where our friends who put together our chapter divisions messed up i mean this is a this is like a blatantly obvious mistake because the the last half of the last verse of nehemiah 7 obviously is the introduction to nehemiah chapter 8 right so you get so so this is the last verse of nehemiah 7 so the priest

the levites the gatekeepers the singers some of the people the temple servants and all israel lived in their towns period that should be the end of the chapter and this should be the beginning of chapter eight and when the seventh month had come the people of israel were in their towns and then it goes into the rest of what's talked about chapter eight but anyway that's one of these places where uh our chapter divisions are uh just a few words off so beginning of beginning of uh of chapter eight of of nehemiah kind of picking up with that language at the end of chapter seven you got a seventh month everybody's in their towns and then it goes on to say all the people gathered as one man which of course is just a idiomatic way of saying they were all

together as a group they gather together into the square before the water gate i'm assuming that so that's where the water is i like didn't i like these gate names they're very like no one's getting creative dungate water gate it's good uh temple these are the very practical kind of names you know it's not named after somebody and not named after something kind of abstract uh the righteous gate or something like that it's like no the dung gate that's where the dung is taken out that's right the water gate which in this case uh the water gate is uh is is a great name for it because it's as far as we can tell it's on the east side of the city and it gave access to the spring you home so of course that's where you go out to get your water at the spring and then

you come you come back in now this is actually it's actually interesting because as we're going to hear in just a minute this is going to be a public reading of the torah with all these people gathered together now if you were to ask me hey hd uh if there's going to be like a whole gathering of the israelites in one place and they're going to set up this like pulpit basically this wooden tower as it's called big big uh structure and there's gonna be like ezra up there and his helpers and they're gonna be reading from the torah and all this stuff's gonna be going on where's that going to happen well my immediate response would have been well the temple courts obviously that's where it's you know that's where you're gonna have this taking place no actually

that's not where this takes place the the water gate on the east side of the city is outside the temple courts so whatever the reason might be maybe it's a practicality maybe you know there were so many people you needed a bigger space uh or as some people have conjectured this was purposely done to focus on the fact that the torah has its importance not just inside the temple but outside the temple as well yeah so it's as if by by choosing this space they were also making a statement but yes of course the torah is connected to the temple but the torah also has importance and significance outside of outside of the temple courts so whatever the reason might be that's where they're at they're at this water gate they're all gathered together beginning of the seventh month

which is important because the seventh month the the first day of the seventh month is uh well today jews celebrated as rosh hashanah beginning of the year uh but in leviticus you have the first day of the first month being for the belonging of trump it's a holy it's a holy convocation we're not told a lot about it but it is a special day it's it's one of the holy one of the holy days and the seventh month is kind of the it's the big month because you've got you got this uh this day of trumpets on the first and then on the 10th seventh month 10th day is yom kippur day of atonement which of course is a is an obligatory fast day for the old testament israelites and then a few days later the 15th is when uh booth or tabernacles begins which in we know

from other old testament scriptures is like it's called uh the feast it's like the most popular feast so it's one where everybody wants to be there so first day of the month is trumpets uh later rosh hashanah 10th day of the month is is yom kippur 15th day of the month is the beginning of tabernacles or booths and that lasts for seven seven days so seventh the seventh month is a big month a lot of stuff going on there and there's gonna be a lot of stuff going on with uh chapter eight and and nine and ten as well in the seventh month so they're all together and uh they told ezra the scribe who's also in the next verse described as ezra the priest so he's both of He's a, he's a, what today we would call a, a, a scholar of, a biblical scholar.

He's a scribe and he's also a priest. And we heard all about Ezra in the book named after him a few, a few weeks ago. So they told Ezra the scribe to bring the book, literally the scroll of the Torah of Moses before the assembly, both men and women and all or anyone who could understand what they heard that's probably indication that so you got you got adults but you also have any children who were old enough to understand that's probably what is meant by this other group all who could understand it's worth pointing out something which is kind of easily skimmed over it says he brought out the scroll of the torah of moses and that's pointing out because there's a a very very

widespread opinion especially in the more left-leaning part of the academic world that it was around the time of ezra that the torah of of moses just named after him supposedly came into being so i mean it's a pretty widespread assumption in in the academic world especially those who are center or or left of center theologically that moses is not the moses had nothing to do with the torah uh and that ezra really was the guy that kind of came up with this uh kind of a pious fraud idea and there's nothing in of course there's nothing in scriptures to suggest that whatsoever. This is based upon presumptions and assumptions, which we don't have time to get into the weeds on. But anyways, it's worth pointing out that when it comes to what Nehemiah is writing

here, there's no question whatsoever that this is the scroll of the Torah of Moses, just like Christians and Jews have always confessed to be the truth. I think what's interesting is that all the time, certainly if you live in the West or you live in places like we live, Chad, But the Bible, like the scriptures, they are approached in a way that was impossible to approach them, you know, in the last, really in the last 500 years. But I had someone ask me one time, you know, hey, do you think it's a sin, you know, to not read your Bible every day? Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't read your Bible. But to me, this is like a historically sort of like ignorant question. Because like for so much of the people of God's history, like this would have been an impossibility.

Maybe suddenly it's a sin because you have access to it. I don't know. But think about a place and a time where it wasn't like you had a Bible on your phone or a Bible on your shelf. You didn't have the first five books of the Old Testament just lying around in a dozen different places where you had access to them. Somebody was going to come out and say, I'm going to read the words of Moses. And you get like everybody all gathered up, and he's just going to read.

And this is what's going to happen. He's going to read. And you start to realize how important, as God set this up, he gives you his word, but in this way, even though not necessarily is Ezra preaching a sermon, he's just reading, but he is the preacher in this scenario. He's the one who is going to read the word of the Lord, right? And this is actually how this whole thing was supposed to work.

It's great if I read the Bible, Chad reads the Bible, I read it on my own. But it's not the same thing as gathering together and saying, hey, the Word of the Lord is going to be read among us. This is not the same as you reading it on your own. And so for that reason, sort of the question of like, you know, when you feel this, or someone's putting this pious sort of obligation, you got to be in your Word, you got to be in your Word. And I'm not saying you shouldn't be reading the Bible on your own. don't hear what I'm not saying. But that is not at all the same thing as someone standing up in the assembly and reading the Word of the Lord to the people. This is actually the way that God sets

it up to, like, accomplish things. So you should be a student of the Bible, a student of the Word, that's all great, and obviously Chad and I wouldn't tell you not to do that. We do that. But I'm also not confused with my personal reading of the Bible and think that that somehow is in any way the same thing as what happens on sunday morning or what's happening here yeah well it's a recognition of the original purpose for which the scriptures were given yeah yeah they were they were in they were these were not private books these were public books and they were read and they were taught publicly and so when we still do that today we are acting in conformity with the way in which they were were designed now you know you have israelites gathering together they're hearing

the word of God, does that mean that as soon as they leave that gathering, that no more mention is made of the word of God? Of course not. I mean, you take what you heard, maybe word for word, maybe the stories, and maybe just the commandments, and you do what Deuteronomy talks about. You talk about them when you sit down, when you rise up, when you're walking on the road, when you're doing this and that. Yeah, of course you have that going on. But it wasn't like a Jewish dad walking along with his son, had his Bible open in front of him and reading it to his son. That's That's not the way this works. He opens up his app as they're going along and begins to read from Deuteronomy.

That, of course, is anachronistic. That's an impossibility. So I think that's helpful to know. It's helpful to point out because we want to always approach the Scriptures in a way that's in conformity, again, with the way in which God gave them. And that's the way he gave them. Yeah, God speaks to the individual in the assembly, though, right? So God's not, like, trying to talk to you personally through the Bible, and this is like, if he could just get everybody to read the Bible personally, then he could tell everybody

what it is that he was trying to say to them individually. God has, like, a word that he's trying to say to his people, and, like, this is why he does it this way. Yeah, well, it's that kind of individualistic, just me and Jesus in my Bible, that leads people into all kinds of gross errors as well as heresies, because there's a reason that we are the body of christ and we learn from one another and we learn from those who've gone before us and we approach the scriptures as as a body because if we're on our own if we're just kind of trying to figure this out on our own interpret on our own we're going to go into all kinds of

crazy ideas yeah because we we all we all need we all need each other it's also just kind of cool to think about uh this happening where hey we're gonna bust out the scrolls baby and like like everyone gets together like we're gonna hear it read i don't know if you could pull that off today but uh it's pretty cool it is yeah for and this happened for for a long time so um so this is the first day of the seventh month as i've already pointed out that's how verse two ends and it says look get this and he read it facing the square before the water gate from early morning until midday yeah don't don't don't no no complaining about the length of your pastor's sermon right yeah this is just the reading yeah in the presence of the men and the women

and all who could understand and the ears of all the people were uh literally in the hebrew they were toward the the scroll of the torah is this idea that your ears are like pointing toward the so the esv has attentive you know which is a good translation but the idea is your your ears are open they're pointed toward the scroll of the torah and you're there a long time i mean that so in in my tradition sometimes we'll have uh an easter vigil service not sometimes but easter vigil service is saturday night before easter and there's a lot of very long readings you're gonna hear all the genesis one into genesis two account you're gonna hear the flood account you're gonna hear genesis chapter 22 i mean there's a lot of i hear more bible read in that easter

vigil service than in any service throughout throughout the year and i'll admit even for someone like me who loves the bible and really loves the old testament there's a lot of old testament read at the easter vigil service i mean after about the fourth or fifth reading i'm like dang these are some long these are some long readings and i'm only there for a couple hours come on this is from early morning until midday and he just reading we don't know exactly what read i mean did he start with genesis did he start with read deuteronomy where are they told just the the scroll of the torah of moses so they're just standing there listening all this all this time man i hope he was a good reader that would that'd be the worst you ever had like a bad monotone yeah

i am now going to read from the bible just or just stumbling over every every word like man this is maybe this maybe maybe maybe that's what it was maybe he's got like you're like man this to be a lot shorter if this guy could read this is true yeah speed it up so um then verse four adds a little detail here uh ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform so this is in hebrew it's a tower is the migdal is the is the word that's used there so uh they they erected this they set this up and this is not just like a like he climbed up a little set of stairs here and it's big enough for him like don't so don't imagine a pulpit that's kind of you know erected in in the air i want you because listen to this beside him stood i'm not going to read these names there's

a whole bunch of them though you got mattathai and shema and empadadiah and michelle's all these folks are i didn't even add them up one two three four five six on his right hand and one two three four five six seven on his left got 13 guys up there so you got you got a picture a pretty big space i feel like someone one of those guys one of those guys must have snuck up there because i'm sure he was like i need 12 guys up here he's like how do we get 13 guys is seventh guy on the left hand he's like i want my name in the bible too i'm gonna sneak up there we'll be on stage how are you gonna come on ezra how you can have 13 guys on the platform it's not even a biblical number now yeah what's going on here so uh all these guys are uh are around him while he's

reading i'm not sure why but they're up there and uh ezra uh opened the book you know he just well he didn't open the book he unrolled the scroll uh kind of modernizing in these translations inside of all the people because he was above all the people of course and he opened it and all the people this is a significant detail too stood so they they stood up for for the reading now uh and our listeners are going to be from various kinds of of christian traditions and uh in in mind so we have three readings every sunday morning we'll have a reading from the old testament then we'll have a reading from uh a non-gospels part of the new testament the epistle reading and we'll have a gospel reading okay and for the first two old testament epistle

we remain seated for the gospel we stand and i mean we're only standing for a couple minutes come on these are these are short readings but these people stood up for the uh the scroll of the torah of moses and presumably they just stood there this is chad's whole argument for like we should stand for the old testament reading that's precisely it's in the bible since the old testament's reading is announced all right everybody on your feet chad's at church he's the only one standing for the old testament reading hey you gotta make your here i stand i can do no other that's right you're gonna make your make your statement so uh verse six ezra blessed the lord the great god and all the people answered amen amen lifting up their hands

and they they i'm assuming this is at the end of the reading so they bow their heads and worship the lord with their faces to the ground because that's of course is the way that uh that worship happened and it's same in hebrews as in greek so in greek you proskuneo you bend the knee that's in in in hebrew you you get on your face so as i often point out you know you you picture uh Muslims in a mosque on their knees with a face to the ground. Well, that's a basic description of the way that worship looked like in the Old Testament. You are down there prostrate with your face to the ground. And that happened not just in terms of worship, but anytime you were in the presence of a superior authority like a king, certainly the king of kings, that's the way

that you position your body in a state of humility so uh bow their heads worship the lord face to the ground and then we have a whole list of other names and i think there's maybe 13 of these guys as well and we are told that they and i wish we had some greater clarity here as to exactly what was happening, but we're told they helped the people to understand the Torah while the people remained in their places. And then verse 8 says, they read from the book, from the Torah of God, clearly, I'm going to come back to that word, clearly, and they gave the sense so that the people understood the reading. So what's going on here? Well, again, I wish we had a little bit more clarity because what seems to be happening is you got so many people gathered here they got

some people on stage got the 13 guys on stage along with Ezra he's reading and you got all these other guys and maybe they're so the people are stationed we're told they don't move you know where you're at that's where you stay so maybe these guys are moving around a little bit making sure people can hear making sure people can understand uh so that they hear clearly now this word in hebrew for clearly has been understood a lot a lot of different ways uh one of the ways is that it's this idea that they're maybe even having to translate yeah yeah isn't it it's like it's like interpret right like i mean it's to me like i always read that maybe i'd be interested to know if you uh think differently of this chad because i'm not sold on this it's just the way i

always kind of thought of it was the the interpret part so they and it says that they gave the sense right so they gave they made it so it's sort of like they interpreted it so it made sense and so the people understood the reading um now the one way you can say like are there people there that don't there speak different languages and they're having to like translate it that way um you know is that how this works i i sort of looked at this as i mean this is taken like all day um that you have the reading being read, then you have these guys that are within the people. So these are, maybe this is your invention of small groups. So they have these smaller groups of people, and they are not giving the sermon, but they are telling you what it means, like what

the thing means that you just heard. So they're making you understand. So they're the ones that are sort of exegeting what's been read. And so you have the reading, and then you have maybe these other guys most people that and this is what this means you know and then they and they tell them what this means uh maybe that's like completely off uh that's sort of how i've thought of it uh is that like okay so you got you got these other guys that are trained enough to tell you like hey guys this is what you you heard what you heard uh here's what it means uh you think about um maybe this is just my my lutheranness coming out uh i think of like the catechism right And so you have, like, here's the text, and then what does this mean?

And then you have, like, an explanation, and it seems like maybe some of that is what's going on. Maybe not. No, I think that makes perfect sense. I mean, it's a very logical explanation of kind of what we know about the gathering and the fact that, you know, there were—did everyone know Hebrew? Well, there's evidence later in Nehemiah that there were some who did not, or maybe their Hebrew wasn't up to par. and so they needed some help so a lot there's actually a pretty pretty old tradition that

this is the origin of what later was to be called the targums or targumeme so a targum is an aramaic translation slash paraphrase of the hebrew text and these started out just orally so basically you would have a reader who would stand up and he would read from the hebrew and then either that person or another person would give a translation with a bit of explanation and paraphrase in Aramaic to the people. So this is when their Hebrew just wasn't as strong. Aramaic was the spoken language of the people. Now, eventually these Targums were written down, but that happened centuries later. And they remain a great source of understanding how the Hebrew was interpreted and traditions that were part of the the interpretation of the text and

whatnot and you can you know you can read these online if you're interested but there's a lot of people who point to this is kind of the beginning of that process so you got a reader in Hebrew as Ezra's up there he's reading in Hebrew and then maybe there's a pause and one of these Levites who's kind of interspersed within the people they're making sure hey you understand that here's what it means here's some application here's you know maybe they're saying they're translating part of it into the language of the people who didn't who didn't know hebrew that seems to be kind of what's going on it makes it makes sense yeah i think the the takeaway really from it uh whatever it is that's going on there is that you can see a real commitment

to making sure that everyone hears and understands what's going on yes yeah so this isn't just kind of a uh mechanical uh reading of the scriptures this certainly it's a reading of the scriptures but they want to make sure people understand what it means, you know, and if they need to do a little bit of translation in there, then that's what they'll do. I mean, that is, we read the Word of God, sure, but we also have sermons, we have Bible classes, we have podcasts, books and videos. All of these are never, of course, never wanting to take the place of the Word of God or be above the Word of God, but we all know, I mean, you and I have been studying the Bible our entire lives and there's a lot of things that are still hard for us to completely understand and so we're

trying to learn we're trying to uh to deepen our deepen our knowledge and so we we have we have resources resources for that i still i still learn stuff at the on recording the podcast jad oh i do too all of a sudden like that's a that's like part of the fun part about doing it uh it's like oh man like i think i see i i understand something different i didn't understand i i hardly ever in fact probably never uh either get ready for this podcast or another podcast or one of my weekly videos or whatever it is without learning something and usually more than more than one thing well then that happens partially through of course study and stuff but then also i mean part of the reason that podcasts like this you could have just chad do it or i i mean it could be way

worse than just have me do it but like this is part of the importance of what you were talking about where people are discussing the scriptures and stuff. This is how that works. I mean, that's where you learn a lot, is where people just see things that you don't see. And as you discuss it, you're like, oh, yeah, that makes sense. I don't know why I didn't see that before, but yeah, obviously that's what's going on.

And that's the reason that God wants you to discuss the scriptures with each other and that sort of thing. Yeah, and even I was watching a video of a pastor the other day, And he was talking about he was listening to a Bible app while he was taking a walk. And the reader happened to emphasize a particular word in his reading that he ordinarily in his reading would not have emphasized. And just that little thing right there caused him to stop and to think about this text in a new sort of way. So even the way that it's read, it's certainly the way that it's discussed can lead to new insights, new perspectives. And it's one of the reasons that we do what we do.

So that's the end of verse eight. Nehemiah in verse nine is going to reenter the scene here, but in third person. So remember that beginning with a whole genealogy in the last chapter, Nehemiah is going to drop out of this as far as a first person Nehemiah memoir. He's going to be mentioned here, but only in third person. He's going to pick up the I and me and my language later on. Verse nine, we're told Nehemiah, who was governor and Ezra, the priest and scribe And the Levites, so you got these three folks here, what they do, they taught the people. They said to all the people, this day is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep.

Why'd they say that? Because we read that all the people wept as they heard the words of the Torah. So presumably what's going on here is something that we've seen actually elsewhere, like in the days of Josiah. Remember they found the Bible? They found this book of the Torah of Moses. they read it in front of Josiah and his immediate reaction was to not stand up and cheer he got ripped his garments because he's like this these words are convicting you know we're not doing the very things that this book describes so maybe that's what's going on here the people wept as

they heard the words of the Torah but they say to them verse 10 go your way eat the fat it's these are the this hebrew word probably means like your uh delicacies something like that some eat part of whatever is part of this uh this feast uh festival dishes rich fare uh some commentators say so go and eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready so to to the needy for this day is holy to our lord and don't don't be grieved for the joy of the lord is your strength. Now, there's a phrase that we've probably all familiar with, and here's where it comes from, Nehemiah chapter 8. And then just kind of finish this up, Levites calmed all the people, and they said, be quiet, this day is holy, do not be grieved. And all the people went their

way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them. This is kind of a little bit of a weird law gospel kind of moment, right? So you hear the words of the law, and you're like, yeah, I'm sure that you're like, oh man, we're in deep trouble. I mean, you get there and read this all day, and you're like, man, we're not doing any of this. We are, like, what's going to happen to us? What was me?

Yeah, people are crying and mourning and grieving. and they probably think that the end is nigh, and they get this word of comfort which says, hey, this is not a day for grieving. This is a day for celebration. This is a day to remember that the joy of the Lord is your strength, that God is not asking you to actually do anything in response to this reading other than to celebrate that you've heard His Word. And so that's pretty nice because you don't sometimes you don't get a lot of that and uh and these kind of narratives and uh no you you don't you don't and i love the kind of the progress of the narrative too so you hear you hear the the words which convict you and then you hear this word of comfort and

then it's like now go eat go feast i mean it's it's basically what happens in christian worship till the day you hear the law you hear the gospel you celebrate the feast of the of the supper i I mean, the whole pattern is right here as well. And the fact that the people are rejoicing because they understood the words that were declared to them. They heard the word of God. They understood it. And with that joy being the strength that they received from the Lord, they go on to eat and to drink and to just kind of relish this gift that they received from the Lord. Yeah, and it's interesting that one of the ways that they sort of soothe the conscience of the people is by saying, this day is holy, right?

Which you might think, well, sometimes that's not very comforting when you hear about the holiness of God or whatever. But I think what they're doing is saying, hey, you don't need to be freaked out and grieve and stuff. God is pleased with this day and what has happened here. God is not looking down as you hear these words, and he's like, see what I've told you? And he's angry about it. He's actually very pleased with the assembly of his people hearing his word. This is a holy day to him. So he literally tells him to shut up.

So shut up with the crying. God is not angry right now. God is actually quite pleased with this day. Yeah, yeah. And that's a great way to end. We're not at the end of the chapter. We're into 40 minutes. So we'll hear more about the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles

and some more good stuff to come in Chapter 9. All right, sounds good. I'll see you next week. See you then.