Nehemiah 13:25

And I contended with them, &c.— These words, it must be acknowledged, as proceeding from Nehemiah's own month, sound somewhat harshly in our translation; but the meaning of them is no more than this, "I contended with them, 1:e. I expostulated the matter with them; I cursed them, 1:e. excommunicated them; in the doing of which I denounced God's judgments against them; I smote certain of them, 1:e. ordered the officers to beat some of the most notorious offenders either with rods or scourges, according to Deuteronomy 25:2 and I plucked off their hair. 1:e. I commanded them to be shaved, thereby to put them to shame, and to make them look like vile slaves; for, as the hair was esteemed a great ornament among the eastern nations, so baldness was accounted a great disgrace. And Nehemiah had a sufficient provocation to inflict these several punishments upon them, because in their marrying with heathen nations, they had acted contrary not only to the express law of God, but to their own late solemn covenant and promise, Ezra 10:19." See Poole, and the note on Ezra 10:3.