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Nehemiah 5:3

Poverty and the vulnerableMoney and wealth

1 About that time there was a great outcry from the people and their wives against their fellow Jews.

2 Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous. We must get grain in order to eat and stay alive.”

Others were saying, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our homes to get grain during the famine.”

4 Still others were saying, “We have borrowed money to pay the king’s tax on our fields and vineyards.

5 We and our children are just like our countrymen and their children, yet we are subjecting our sons and daughters to slavery. Some of our daughters are already enslaved, but we are powerless to redeem them because our fields and vineyards belong to others.”

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Here the Bible tells a story about someone else. Ask yourself what it can say to us today. Do read the surrounding verses too, because the context often says more than a single verse.

Compare

BSB
Others were saying, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our homes to get grain during the famine.”
KJV
Some also there were that said, We have mortgaged our lands, vineyards, and houses, that we might buy corn, because of the dearth.
WEB
There were also some who said, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our houses. Let us get grain, because of the famine.”
ASV
Some also there were that said, We are mortgaging our fields, and our vineyards, and our houses: let us get grain, because of the dearth.
DARBY
And there were that said, We have had to pledge our fields, and our vineyards, and our houses, that we might procure corn in the dearth.
BLB
And there were those who said, “Our lands and vineyards and houses we have mortgaged, that we might buy grain during the famine.”
ÅB
Andre sa: Våre marker og vingårder og hus må vi sette i pant; la oss få korn til å stille vår hunger!
OTB
Andre sa: “Vi pantsetter våre marker, våre vingårder og våre hjem for å skaffe korn på grunn av hungersnøden.”
B1930
Andre sa: Våre marker og vingårder og hus må vi sette i pant; la oss få korn til å stille vår hunger!

Study notes (Tyndale)

Original text and word study

Cross references

  • Leviticus 25:35–39

    Now if your countryman becomes destitute and cannot support himself among you, then you are to help him as you would a foreigner or stranger, so that he can continue to live among you.

    Read in context

  • Malachi 3:8–11

    Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing Me! But you ask, ‘How do we rob You?’ In tithes and offerings.

    Read in context

  • Deuteronomy 15:7

    If there is a poor man among your brothers within any of the gates in the land that the LORD your God is giving you, then you are not to harden your heart or shut your hand from your poor brother.

    Read in context

  • Genesis 47:15–25

    When the money from the lands of Egypt and Canaan was gone, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? For our funds have run out!”

    Read in context