After studying some external challenges for the people who were rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem, the book of Nehemiah turns to an internal issue among the Jewish people.
In Nehemiah 5:1-5, the problem is explained to us. There’s a famine (verse 3), and the people are having trouble affording food.
Now the men and their wives raised a great outcry against their fellow Jews. Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous; in order for us to eat and stay alive, we must get grain.”
Nehemiah 5:1-2 NIV
(FYI: Per a commentator [Schoville], the word “outcry” here is apparently the same as the Israelites in Egypt ref. Exodus 3:9.)
There are several issues brought up and not everyone necessarily experienced all of them, but they all seem to be related, as suggested by the same commentator mentioned above.
For one thing, it seems that some have large families, meaning more mouths to feed. Today, some might judge others who have more children than they can afford to feed, but this behavior seems consistent with the command to Adam and Eve in Genesis 1:28. And, if there was presently a famine, the parents may have had the means to take care of their children when they were born, but an unexpected event put them in a bind.
There’s also a tax from the king. Remember, while the Persian leaders supported the return of Jewish people to Jerusalem, and even sponsored some of their work, the Persian empire was still in charge. While God had caused kings to be favorable to the work of rebuilding in Jerusalem, this wasn’t necessarily seen as charity by the kings themselves. In addition to the expectation that the Jewish people would pray to their God on behalf of the ruling foreign king, letting people return to their homelands was apparently still expected to support the empire’s tax base.
To get enough money to pay for food and taxes, some of the people are taking steps that we might consider to be normal, like borrowing against their property: both their source of income (their fields and vineyards) and their residences (their houses). Kind of like in the board game of Monopoly, though, when you flip a property over to get some money from the bank, that property’s usefulness is reduced.
In addition, though, these Jewish people are taking steps that seem strange to us, like having their children become slaves. Now, we need to differentiate the chattel slavery of the last few centuries from what slavery has looked like throughout history. I’m not suggesting that even these ancient forms of slavery were good things, whether in the ancient Middle East or in Roman times (both of which we see happening in the Bible’s accounts from those eras), but it definitely looked different.
As I understand it, someone who couldn’t provide for their own basic needs could sell themselves (or a family member, apparently) to a master who would put them to work in return for provisions or [per Schoville] to pay off debt. In this sense, this was closer to signing a contract to work for someone else, although the means of eventually getting out of this arrangement – if that was possible at all – varied. Regardless of the format, though, having to “rent out” or sell your children to work for others in order to keep food on the table is a pretty harsh situation to be in.
Of course, struggling to feed one’s family is not a new problem, and it is one that has not gone away today. However, in Nehemiah’s time, these particular families are part of a community that is expected to be helping them – and not hurting them. If you are part of a community today (including a congregation of believers in Jesus), consider your role in that as we continue reviewing what Nehemiah said and did, as documented in the rest of this chapter.
From Sunday School lesson prepared for February 19, 2023
References:
- The Lookout, February 19, 2023, © 2022 Christian Standard Media.
- Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
- The College Press NIV Commentary – Ezra-Nehemiah, by Keith Schoville. © 2001 College Press Publishing Co.
Those Who Sin Differently 