Nehemiah 9:38

_AND BECAUSE OF ALL THIS WE MAKE A SURE COVENANT, AND WRITE IT; AND OUR PRINCES, LEVITES, AND PRIESTS, SEAL UNTO IT._ We make a sure covenant, and write - i:e., subscribe or sign it. This written document would exercise a wholesome influence in restraining their backslidings or in animating them to duty, by being a witness against them if in future they were unfaithful to their engagements. Every deed in Israel was so arranged as to be voluntary, and so was their entering into a national covenant, by which they bound themselves to be faithful to the service of Yahweh. The people did it by their representatives (cf. Exodus 24:3; Deuteronomy 27:17; Joshua 24:1; cf....

4-38 The summary of their prayers we have here upon record. Much more, no doubt, was said. Whatever ability we have to do any thing in the way of duty, we are to serve and glorify God according to the utmost of it. When confessing our sins, it is good to notice the mercies of God, that we may be the more humbled and ashamed. The dealings of the Lord showed his goodness and long-suffering, and the hardness of their hearts. The testimony of the prophets was the testimony of the Spirit in the prophets, and it was the Spirit of Christ in them. They spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, and what they said is to be received accordingly. The result was, wonder at the Lord's mercies, and the feeling that sin had brought them to their present state, from which nothing but unmerited love could rescue them. And is not their conduct a specimen of human nature? Let us study the history of our...

Verse Nehemiah 9:38. _OUR PRINCES, LEVITES, AND PRIESTS, SEAL UNTO IT._] Persuaded that we have brought all the miseries upon ourselves by our transgressions, _feeling much_ and _fearing more_, we make a covenant with thee to devote ourselves to thy service; to do with us as thou pleasest. From this _sealing_ we learn that at this time the government of the Jews was a mixed _aristocracy_; composed of the _nobles_ for the _civil_ department, and the _priests_ and _Levites_ for the _ecclesiastical_. This was not mixing the _Church_ with the _state_, or the _state_ with the _Church_: both were separate, yet both mutually supported each other. The _state_ never attempted to model the Church according to its own mind; because the Church had been founded and regulated by God, and neither its creed

SEAL UNTO IT - The exact force of the phrase used is doubtful; but its general sense must be that the classes named took part in the sealing. It was usual in the East to authenticate covenants by appending the seals of those who were parties to them (see Jeremiah 32:10)....

EXPOSITION SOLEMN FAST KEPT, WITH CONFESSION OF SINS; AND VOLUNTARY COVENANT WITH GOD ENTERED INTO BY THE PEOPLE, AND SEALED TO BY THE PRINCES, PRIESTS, AND LEVITES (Nehemiah 9:1.). When the law was first read to them on the opening day of the seventh month, the people had shown strong feelings of compunction, an earnest desire to return to God by the thorny way of repentance. In checking this feeling on that particular day, Ezra and Nehemia

SEAL See (Nehemiah 10:1)....

CHAPTER 9 _ 1. The public humiliation and confession (Nehemiah 9:1)_ 2. The great confession and prayer (Nehemiah 9:6) Nehemiah 9:1. Two days after the feast of tabernacles had been concluded this humiliation and confession of sin took place. The assembled congregation fasted, with sackcloth and earth upon them. Separation was next. Evil confessed must mean evil put away. They separated themselves from all strangers, and after their confession they worshipped the Lord. Here again is the right order of a spiritual revival. Reading, hearing and believing the Word always comes first; humiliation, self-judgment, confession and true worship follow....

NEHEMIAH 9:38 TO NEHEMIAH 10:39. THE COVENANT. This section is probably originally from Ezra's memoirs, though it has been considerably worked over, presumably not by the Chronicler, since he writes in the third person. It is, in the main, written in the first person plural, and may in its present form have come from some loyal follower of Ezra or Nehemiah who writes as representing one of the people. The special points of the covenant are the undertaking not to marry foreigners, to observe the Sabbath more strictly, to remit debts in the seventh year, to pay a third of a shekel to the Temple, to supply wood for burning the sacrifices, to offer all the first-fruits, and to give tithes; with all this _cf._ ch. 13....

AND BECAUSE, &C. Ezra chapter 10 in Hebrew text begins with this verse. PRINCES. Nehemiah and Hananiah, if not others, were members of the royal family of Judah. See Nehemiah 1:1. This chapter is parallel with the last chapter of Ezra (Neh 10:1-44). Consequently all beyond it is supplementary (chronologically). See note on Nehemiah 9:1, the Structure on p. 617, notes on p. 618, and App-58....

Nehemiah 10:1 in Heb.; so Luther. The A.V. and R.V. follow the division of the Vulg. and LXX. _And because of all this_ R.V. AND YET FOR ALL THIS. R.V. marg. -Or, _because of_". The relation of this sentence to the preceding confession is not certain. This uncertainty has given rise to the doubt whether chap. 9 should not have closed at Nehemiah 9:37. The English translation treats the verse as the concluding sentence of the Confession. The A.V. rendering -And because of all this" refers back to the whole summary of Israelite history (7 37), i.e. -because of Jehovah's mercy in spite of our disobedience." The R.V. rendering -And yet for all this" refers especially to the concluding words, describing the sorrows and afflictions which had come upon the people, i.e. -And yet in spite of all th