Law of Moses — Nehemiah 4

In the previous chapter is a long list of the groups and their assigned sectors on the wall. Those who lived behind the wall built the section nearest their homes. A primary issue is that the entire city was still filled with rubble. Some of the stones were no longer suitable for building. The walls were made from local mined limestone, and once exposed to fire, it softens into something like sandstone, easily crushed. That stuff had to be tossed down the slope. But there was plenty of reusable rubble from the tightly packed homes that once stood inside the wall.

When Sanballat and his friends got the report that the wall building had begun, they came to mock the effort publicly. Imagine a very loud conversation with dramatic gestures acted out in the hearing of everyone working, and the mocking laughter. Further, the reference to making sacrifices is meant to mock Jehovah. What good would it do to call on their pitiful national deity, who had already deserted them and allowed His house to be destroyed? They also mentioned the problem with burned limestone blocks.

Nehemiah’s prayer is completely appropriate. If God is the one insulted, God can act to defend His own name. The people had been called to rebuild the city, and didn’t bother to even respond to the provocations.

At the point were the wall was about half-finished, the trio of enemies coaxed the remaining Philistines in Ashdod to join them in a plan to conduct raids. This had to be done in secret, to avoid transgressing the published command of Emperor Artaxerxes. So the idea was to engage in fast hit-n-run raids. Of course, they would all deny any culpability. But the plans leaked.

Nehemiah outlines his response. First, he prayed as always. Then, with his military training, he organized a defense. It was bad enough the work crews had so much useless rubble to remove and it was killing their enthusiasm for building. But with the threat of raids, they were really starting to give up.

Ten different times, the leaders of the outlying communities begged for Nehemiah to release the workers so they could come home to defend against the the obvious military activity among the surrounding nations. Instead, Nehemiah organized them to come and stay temporarily inside the city in support of their own work crews. He stationed defenders below the wall. He reminded the leadership that this was the business of their God Jehovah they were talking about, not some mere human pursuit. God is more than able to defend them.

This high degree of preparation discouraged the raiders. This was no longer an easy target. Any attack would turn out to be quite messy; the odds were now against the raids. Seeing how well this worked, Nehemiah forged a plan that saw half the able-bodied in full armor around the work crews in a rotation that probably served also to give folks a break from the heavy labor. Meanwhile, the crews were also armed, if not armored because of their work. It slowed the pace of the work, but it served to keep everyone focused on the mission of defending the city in the first place.

Further, Nehemiah stationed trumpeters with each work sector. Since some of the crews did not have direct line of sight to each other, this would provide a means of alarm so that extra defenders could rally to any part under attack. This gave the people the confidence to keep at it.

Finally, everyone lived tactically. The crews didn’t go home at night, but camped out behind the rising walls. Nehemiah didn’t spare himself nor his bodyguard the rigors, either. The leadership disrobed only to bathe in the evening, and then slept in their clothes in case the enemies tried any tricks at night. Keep in mind that it was virtually universal in that time and place for people to sleep nude, which would have made it hard to respond quickly to trouble.