17. So I complained to the nobles of Judah and asked them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing? You are profaning Yom Shabbat!
18. Didn’t your ancestors do exactly the same causing our God to bring all this evil upon us and upon this city? So now you are bringing even more wrath upon Israel by profaning Yom Shabbat.”
19. When evening darkness began to fall on the gates of Jerusalem before Yom Shabbat, I commanded the doors to be shut. I further commanded that they should not be opened till after Yom Shabbat. I appointed some of my attendants over the gates so that no burden could enter during Shabbat.
20. Once or twice the traders and those selling all kinds of merchandise camped outside Jerusalem.
21. But I warned them and said to them, “Why are you camping next to the wall? If you do so again, I will lay hands on you.” From that time they no longer came on the Shabbat.
22. Then I commanded the Levites to purify themselves, and to come and guard the gates in order to sanctify Yom Shabbat. Remember this also on my behalf, O my God, and have compassion on me according to the greatness of your lovingkindness.
23. In those days I also saw Jews who had married women from Ashdod, Ammon and Moab.
24. Half of their children spoke the dialect of Ashdod or the language of other peoples, but none of them understood the language of Judah.
25. So I rebuked them. I cursed them, beat some of their men and pulled their beards. I made them swear by God, saying, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons—or for yourselves.
26. Didn’t Solomon king of Israel sin about these things? Yet among many nations there was never any king like him. Yes, he was beloved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. Nevertheless, the foreign women caused even him to sin.
27. Must we then hear about you doing all this great evil, thereby being unfaithful with our God by marrying foreign women?”
28. Now one of the sons of Joiada, son of Eliashib the kohen gadol , was son-in-law of Sanballat the Horonite. So I drove him from me.
29. O my God, please remember them for the defilement of the priesthood as well as the covenant of the priesthood and the Levites.
30. So I purged them from everything foreign and I assigned duties for the kohanim and the Levites, each to his own task,