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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Nehemiah 6:15 - 6:15
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The wall completed, and the impression made by this work upon the enemies of the Jews. - Neh 6:15 The wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of the month Elul, i.e., of the sixth month, in fifty-two days. According to this statement, it must have been begun on the third day of the fifth month (Ab). The year is not mentioned, the before-named (Neh 2:1) twentieth year of Artaxerxes being intended. This agrees with the other chronological statements of this book. For, according to Neh 2:1, it was in Nisan (the first month) of this year that Nehemiah entreated permission of the king to go to Jerusalem; and we learn from Neh 5:14 and Neh 13:6 that he was governor in Jerusalem from the twentieth year onwards, and must therefore have set out for that place immediately after receiving the royal permission. In this case, he might well arrive in Jerusalem before the expiration of the fourth month. He then surveyed the wall, and called a public assembly for the purpose of urging the whole community to enter heartily upon the work of restoration (Neh 2:11-17). All this might take place in the course of the fourth month, so that the work could be actually taken in hand in the fifth. Nor is there any reasonable ground, as Bertheau has already shown, for doubting the correctness of the statement, that the building was completed in fifty-two days, and (with Ewald) altering the fifty-two days into two years and four months.
(Note: Ewald, Gesch. iv. p. 178, thinks that traces of the correct reading of this verse are found in the statement of Josephus, Ant. xi. 5. 7f., that the wall of Jerusalem was finished in two years and four months, and that the word וּשְׁנָתַיִם may have been omitted from Neh 6:15 by an ancient clerical error, though he is obliged to admit that Josephus in other instances gives no trustworthy dates concerning Nehemiah, whom he makes arrive at Jerusalem in the twenty-fifth, and complete the wall in the twenty-eight year of Xerxes. On the other hand, Bertheau has already remarked, that even if שְׁנָתַיִם is supplied, no agreement with the statement of Josephus is obtained, since the question still remains how four months can be made out of fifty-two days, or vice versa, fifty-two days of four months. In fact, it is vain to seek for any common ground on which these two different statements can be harmonized; and hence the two years and four months of Josephus can scarcely be regarded as furnishing traces of another reading of the text.)
For we must in this case consider, 1st, the necessity for hastening the work repeatedly pointed out by Nehemiah; 2nd, the zeal and relatively very large number of builders - the whole community, both the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the men of Jericho, Tekoa, Gibeon, Mizpah, etc. having combined their efforts; 3rd, that the kind of exertion demanded by such laborious work and unintermitted watchfulness as are described Neh 4, though it might be continued for fifty-two days, could scarcely endure during a longer period; and lastly, the amount of the work itself, which must not be regarded as the rebuilding of the whole wall, but only as the restoration of those portions that had been destroyed, the repair of the breaches (Neh 1:3; Neh 2:13; Neh 6:1), and of the ruined gates, - a large portion of wall and at least one gate having remained uninjured.). To this must be added that the material, so far as stone was concerned, was close at hand, stone needing for the most part to be merely brought out of the ruins; besides which, materials of all kind might have been collected and prepared beforehand. It is, moreover, incorrect to compute the extent of this fortified wall by the extent of the wall of modern Jerusalem.
Neh 6:16
The news that the wall was finished spread fear among the enemies, viz., among the nations in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem (comp. Neh 4:1; Neh 5:9); they were much cast down, and perceived “that this work was effected with the help of our God.” The expression בְעֵנֵיהֶם יִפְּלוּ occurs only here, and must be explained according to פָּנָיו יִפְּלוּ, his countenance fell (Gen 4:5), and לֵב יִפֹּל, the heart fails (i.e., the courage) (1Sa 17:32): they sank in their own eyes, i.e., they felt themselves cast down, discouraged.