1. Then Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and our other enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall and that there was not one gap in it. But I had not yet set the doors in the gates.
2. So Sanballat and Geshem sent me this message: “Come, Nehemiah, let’s meet together in Kephirim on the plain of Ono.”But they were planning to harm me.
3. So I sent messengers to them with this answer: “I am doing a great work, and I can’t come down. I don’t want the work to stop while I leave to meet you.”
4. Sanballat and Geshem sent the same message to me four times, and each time I sent back the same answer.
5. The fifth time Sanballat sent his helper to me with the message, and in his hand was an unsealed letter.
6. This is what was written:A report is going around to all the nations, and Geshem says it is true, that you and the Jewish people are planning to turn against the king and that you are rebuilding the wall. They say you are going to be their king