After the failure to fortify Jerusalem recorded in Ezra 4:8-23, Nehemiah, a Jew in high station and favor at Artaxerxes' court, obtained from his king a personal letter, appointing him governor of Judea for a limited time, with the special commission to rebuild the walls and gates of Jerusalem. The same bitter hostility which the Samaritans and other neighbors in Palestine throughout had shown toward the returned Jews, reached its climax in the efforts of Sanballat and others in public and private station to hinder Nehemiah's purpose. But with great energy and bravery, and with a personal appeal and example that swept all into the common stream of patriotic service, Nehemiah built the ruined walls and gates in fifty-two days, instituted social reforms, ch. 5, and imposed a covenant on all the people to obey the Law which Ezra read and expounded. Chs. 8 to 10. Elements in the little nation that joined with his enemies to discredit and even to assassinate him were banished or curbed. The origin of the peculiar sect of the Samaritan is connected with Nehemiah through his rigor in banishing a grandson of the high priest who had married Sanballat's daughter. This disloyalty of the priesthood is also one of Malachi's chief indictments against his nation, and the basis of his promise that a great reformer, an "Elijah," should arise to prepare the sinful people for the coming of their God. QUESTIONS ON LESSON XIII 1. How long after the Return was the Temple finished? Who hindered? Who helped? 2. What are the scene and the date of the book of Esther? 3. Compare the return of the Jews to Jerusalem under Ezra with that under Zerubbabel (_a_) in date, (_b_) in numbers, (_c_) in purpose and result. 4. Tell the story of Nehemiah: the occasion of his return, his enemies, his achievements. In what did Ezra help him? 5. Associate the ministry of the three prophets of this period after the Exile with the leaders and movements they respectively helped. LESSON XIV Israel's Religious Life