Nehemiah 2:5

If it please the king, and if thy servant,&c. A double conditional sentence precedes the request. On the king's approbation of the policy and on the king's personal favour to Nehemiah must depend the issue.

The words run literally, -If it is good before the king and if thy servant be good in thy presence." The phrase in the first clause is the same as that used, e.g. in Esther 1:19; Esther 9:13. The second clause differs from the common phrase -to find favour or grace," e.g. 1 Samuel 26:22; Esther 2:15. The verb which with this meaning is generally used impersonally, here has a subject; elsewhere this construction is unusual, cf. Esther 5:14, -the thing pleased Haman;" Ecclesiastes 7:26, -whoso pleaseth God," literally, -is good in the presence of God."

that I may build it If, as is most probably the case, Ezra 4:7-24 refers to the events of the reign of Artaxerxes, Nehemiah in alluding to the city of Jerusalem introduces a subject that had some time previously engaged the king's attention. According to the letters in that chapter the work of -building" the city had been stopped. But the decree, which had stopped the work, also contemplated the possibility of its being resumed: see Ezra 4:21, -Make ye now a decree to cause these men to cease and that this city be not builded until a decree shall be made by me." Nehemiah makes request that such a decree should be made. The knowledge of this previous edict would have increased his apprehensions. -Build" in this passage is equivalent to -building the walls," cf. Ezra 4:12; Ezra 4:16.