Bible In One Year Day 279 (Nehemiah 11, Esther 9-11, Proverbs 21: 17-20)

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Day 279:  Blessings and Burdens 

Agape Bible Study 
Nehemiah 11 

The outline of chapters 11-13:

1. Obedience to the Covenant (11:1-13:31)
   1. Resettlement of the Citizens (11:1-36)
   2. Register of the Priests and Levites (12:1-26)
   3. Dedication of Jerusalem’s Wall (12:27-47)
   4. Spiritual Restoration of the Covenant People (13:1-31)

Resettlement of the Citizens of Judah (11:1-36)

Nehemiah 11:1-3 ~ Nehemiah’s Method of Repopulating Jerusalem
Nehemiah’s memoirs resume only to be interrupted again at 11:3 by several lists.  Nehemiah Chapter 11 has two different literary additions.  Verses 1-2, 20, 25a, and 36 are included by the Chronicler using the Memoires of Nehemiah, but a later editor has inserted the lists of verses 4-19 and 25b-35 that he must have discovered among the documents in the Jerusalem achieves.  He introduced them by the heading in verse 4 and added the notes of verses 21-24.

Despite its status as Yahweh’s “holy city” where His “name dwells” among His people, Jerusalem had not attracted re-settlement by the returned exiles because of the attacks and threats of destruction against the city by its Gentile neighbors (Neh 7:1-4).  However, now that its protective walls and gates are in place, it is time to repopulate the city.  Flavius Josephus wrote, “Nehemiah seeing that the city had a small population, urged the priests and Levites to leave the countryside and move to the city and remain there, for he had prepared houses for them at his own expense” (Antiquities of the Jews, 11.5.8).

Nehemiah accomplishes the re-settlement by a lot system.  A “tithe” of a tenth of the returned exiles will live in Jerusalem (verse 1).

Nehemiah 11:4-19 ~ The Jewish Population Resettled in Jerusalem

Jerusalem was on the border between the territories of Benjamin and Judah but belonged to the tribal lands of Benjamin (Josh 27-28), and this may be the reason for the large number of Benjaminites who settled in the city.  The list of names and occupations in 11:4-24 of those chosen to live in Jerusalem:

1. The leaders of the tribe of Judah from the clan of Perez were 468 men (verse 4, 6)
2. One Judahite man from the clan of Shelah (verses 5).
3. The leaders who claimed lineage from the tribe of Benjamin* from the clans of Sallu and his brothers were 928 men (verses 7-9).
4. Priests from the line of Zadok the descendant of Eleazar son of Aaron were 822 men (verses 10-12a).
5. Priests from the line of Aaron’s son Ithamar were 242 men (verse 12b-13a).
6. Priests who could not prove their lineage from Aaron and his sons numbered 128 men (verses 13b-14).
7. The Levitical leaders responsible for work outside the Temple (verses 15-16).
8. The Levites who led the praise and thanksgiving prayers in the liturgy of worship (verse 17), and the total number of Levites was 284 men (verse 18).
9. The gatekeepers were 172 men (verse 19).
10. Temple servants (verse 21)

Nehemiah 11:21-24 ~ Supplementary Notes

The Temple slaves/servants were the descendants of Gentiles David liberated from the fierce Amalekites (1 Sam 30:20).  The liberated Gentiles developed a relationship with David and his heirs, with the best of their fighting men serving as his bodyguard (2 Sam 8:18; 1 Kng 1:38; 1 Chron 18:17).  Since they, and other Gentiles who converted and entered David’s service, could not own land in Israel, David gave them and their descendants an occupation that could support their families as servants in his palace and the Temple.

The Ophel is the southeastern ridge of Jerusalem and the site of the original City of David.  Nehemiah repaired the walls of Ophel (Neh 3:26-27).  Ziha and Gishpa were the family leaders of the Temple servants.  Their families returned from the exile with Sheshbazzar and the first group of returnees (Ezra 2:43; Neh 7:46).

Uzzi was the official in charge of the Levitical choir and a descendant of Asaph, a Levite from the time of King David.  Like David, Asaph wrote many of the Psalms (cf., Psalm 50, 73-83).  David was not only a warrior-king but also a poet and musician.  Before David, there was no music to accompany the liturgy of worship.  David appointed Asaph to oversee the order of music in worship, the “royal orders” in verse 23 (1 Chron 6:39), and he (or his son) sang at the dedication of Solomon’s Temple (2 Chron 9:15).

The sons of Zerah were the descendants of Judah from Tamar’s son Zerah, the twin of Perez.  This verse suggests Nehemiah has returned to Persia and Petahiah was a Persian governor who served after Nehemiah. 

Nehemiah 11:20, 25-35 ~ The Jewish Population Outside Jerusalem

The towns resettled in Judah:

1. Verse 25: Kiriath-Abra, “city of the four” (also known as Hebron) was a city associated with Abraham (Gen 23:2; 35:27; Josh 14:15; 15:13, 54; 20:7; 21:11; Judg 1:10), and after the conquest became a Levitical city of refuge (Josh 20:7; 21:13) in the territory of Judah assigned to the Gentile convert and hero of the Conquest, Caleb (Josh 15:13-17).  The people of Hebron were strong supporters of David who ruled at Hebron for seven years before the other tribes urged him to become the king of a united Israel (1 Sam 30:26-31; 2 Sam 2:4, 11; 5:1-5; 1 Chron 11:1-3).  See the list of towns and lands allotted to the tribe of Judah in Joshua 15:1-63 and those assigned to the clans of Benjamin in Joshua 18:11-28.
2. Verse 26a: Dibon was an important town located on the trade route known as the King’s Highway (from Egypt running along the east side of the Jordan River into Mesopotamia), thirteen miles east of the Dead Sea and three miles north of the Arnon River whose water flows from the east into the Dead Sea. Jekabzeel was apparently a town in the southern part of Judah whose exact location is unknown.
3. Verses 26-27: Jeshua, Moladah, Beth-Pelet, Hazar-Shual, and Beersheba were towns in the northern Negev desert, in the territory once assigned to the tribe of Simeon (Josh 19:2) that had been absorbed by the larger tribe of Judah.  These cities were lost to the Edomites in the late seventh century BC but were temporarily regained during the governorship of Nehemiah.
4. Verse 28: Ziklag and Meconah were towns in the Negev west and south of the Dead Sea.  Ziklag was David’s military base for a time when he was an outlaw (1 Sam 27:5-12).
5. Verses 29-30: En-Rimmon, Zorah, Jarmuth, 30 Zanoah, Adullam and their villages were fifteen miles west of Jerusalem.
6. Verse 30b: Lachish and its lands, and Azekah and its dependencies were in the foothills of Judah.  Lachish was the second largest fortified city in Judah, located about twenty-five miles southwest of Jerusalem and fifteen miles west of Hebron.

Esther Denouncing Haman by Ernest Normand

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A Daily Defense 

DAY 279 Does Mary’s Perpetual Virginity Matter?

CHALLENGE; “What difference does it make if Mary remained a virgin? Couldn’t God have continued Jesus’ mission if she had other children?”

DEFENSE: God is omnipotent and can do anything he chooses, but this doesn’t mean his choices are arbitrary.

This objection is a subcase of a broader one: Why should Mary be a virgin in the first place? Couldn’t God’s Son be born of a woman who wasn’t a virgin? He could have. Being omnipotent, God could do that. He even could have had his Son born of a prostitute if he chose.

It isn’t intrinsically required that Mary be any special kind of woman to be Jesus’ mother—just that she be a woman. However, this doesn’t mean it wasn’t appropriate for God to give Mary certain qualities to make her a more fitting mother for his Son.

This applies, in the first place, to the virginal conception itself. The fact that Jesus was conceived without a human father is striking, arresting. It naturally raises the question: “What does this mean?”

One could say, “It makes a difference because God had prophesied in advance that his Son would be born of a virgin” (see Days 253 and 254). But this only raises the question: “Why did God prophecy that? What difference did it make that his Son be virgin-born?”

The answer is that, if Jesus doesn’t have a human father, his father must be looked for outside of the human realm. Jesus’ Father is not on earth but in heaven: His Father is God. This is the fundamental point underscored by the Virgin Birth.

It is also the fundamental reason for Mary’s perpetual virginity (see Day 188). Consider: If Joseph and Mary later had children, it would raise doubts about the Virgin Birth itself. Jesus was conceived when Mary was already legally married to Joseph, but before their time of cohabitation began (Matt. 1:18; Luke 1:26–34). If the two had gone on to have other children, it would have been all the easier to say, “Jesus wasn’t literally the Son of God. His parents just had sex sooner than they let on.”

The fact that Mary remained a virgin even after Jesus’ birth thus underscores the fact that he is God’s Son, the same way the Virgin Birth itself does.

Jimmy Akin, A Daily Defense: 365 Days (Plus One) to Becoming a Better Apologist