21. Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from him a straight way for us, and for our little ones, and for all our possessions.
22. For I was ashamed to ask of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy on the way, because we had spoken to the king, saying, “The hand of our God is on all those who seek him, for good; but his power and his wrath is against all those who forsake him.”
23. So we fasted and begged our God for this: and he granted our request.
24. Then I set apart twelve of the chiefs of the priests, even Sherebiah, Hashabiah, and ten of their brothers with them,
25. and weighed to them the silver, the gold, and the vessels, even the offering for the house of our God, which the king, his counsellors, his princes, and all Israel there present, had offered.
26. I weighed into their hand six hundred and fifty talents of silver, one hundred talents of silver vessels; one hundred talents of gold,
27. twenty bowls of gold weighing one thousand darics; and two vessels of fine bright bronze, precious as gold.
28. I said to them, “You are holy to the Lord, and the vessels are holy. The silver and the gold are a freewill offering to the Lord, the God of your fathers.
29. Watch and keep them, until you weigh them before the chiefs of the priests and the Levites, and the princes of the fathers’ households of Israel, at Jerusalem, in the rooms of the Lord’s house.”