Thus far in my study of the fourth chapter of the Book of Nehemiah, we have discovered that opposition from the enemies of the Jews to their building the wall around Jerusalem came, first, in the form of intimidation and ridicule (Nehemiah 4:1-3). When this didn’t cause the Jews to cease their labor on the wall, their enemies conspired together to use violence, as the next logical step to make their threats ring true (Nehemiah 4:7-8). According to the text, however, it doesn’t seem as though the Jews’ enemies intended to attack them openly, as one might expect violent opposition to materialize. Instead, and perhaps because the kings command was clearly defined in the letters, which the king had given Nehemiah to present to his satrap and governors beyond the Euphrates, open violence, in itself, would have been considered rebellion.
Therefore, what the Jews’ enemies decided to do was come upon them in a kind of guerilla fashion, whereby they could slay the Jews that worked on the wall, before they knew their enemies were in their midst (Nehemiah 4:11). Nevertheless, Nehemiah focused the Jews’ response to their enemies’ tactics by primarily pointing his brethren to the Lord, reminding them, that the Lord their God would fight with them and for them (Nehemiah 4:4-5, 9, 14).
In fact, the Lord brought the tactics of the enemy to naught by letting the conspirators’ plans leak out to local Jews who dwelt in Samaria and other lands of the enemies of Jerusalem (Nehemiah 4:15, cp. verse-12). Once those Jews traveled to Jerusalem, they informed the city’s authorities of the secret plot of Sanballat and his allies. It wasn’t long, therefore, that the Jews’ enemies came to realize their devious plans had somehow become known to the Jews at Jerusalem. Once their secret tactics were discovered, they understood there was little else they could do that would be effective enough to stop the Jews from rebuilding the wall around their capital city.
When the enemies’ plans were discovered and revealed to Nehemiah, he, with the support of the other Jewish authorities in Jerusalem, divided the builders into two groups. One group primarily built up the wall and cleared away the ruins of the former wall that stood in the days before the coming of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. The second group of men primarily looked out for the defense of those who were involved in the building project. The defenders still helped in the build, but were primarily concerned with guarding the build, while the builders still fought, when and if they were attacked, but they concerned themselves with the build, and left concerns for their defense to the other group (Nehemiah 4:16-18).
Nevertheless, the building project was an immense undertaking. The groups of builders and defenders weren’t all together. The fact was, they were separated by distances great enough that one group wasn’t always able to hear or even see the other groups that built next to them (Nehemiah 4:19). Therefore, Nehemiah had the trumpeter with him (verse-18), and when he sounded the alarm, men of the groups not affected by an attack were to help those who were in the battle, as indicated by the trumpeter (Nehemiah 4:20).
Thus, this was the manner in which the building process continued. Half the men defended and held his spear, and even those who built the wall had a weapon (H2719) which could have been a sword, a dagger, an axe or even a tool that was, also, used as a weapon. Moreover, it was agreed that, while the building process was underway, the men wouldn’t leave Jerusalem during the night, but would remain in the city as a guard against an attack under the cover of darkness (Nehemiah 4:21-22). Neither did they remove their clothes during the night, except to wash (verse-23), until the danger was past.
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