Whatever their businesse was, these men had better successe then afterwards, Philo the Jew and his Col∣leagues had in their Embassy to Cajus the Emperour: who cast them out with contempt, and would not hear their apology against Appion of Alexandria, their deadly E∣nemy.Īnd I asked them concerning the Jewes] The Church was his care: neither could he enjoy ought so long as it went ill with Zion. 2.Ĭame, he, and certain men of Judah] Upon some great suit likely, for their Countrey because they took so long and troublesome a journey in the Winter, not without that Ro∣man resolution of Pompey in like case, Necesse est ut eam, non ut vivam. Out of my brethren] Not by race, perhaps but surely by grace, and place: a Jew, and that inwardly, and therefore entrusted after this, by Nehemiah with a great charge, Neh, 7. That Hanani] A gracious man, according to his Name and zealous for hisĬountrey which indeed is a mans self and therefore when our Saviour used that proverb Physician heal thy self, the sense is, heal thy Countrey, Luk. * Strabo and others say, that the Inhabitants of Susia were quiet and perceable: and were therefore the better beloved by the Kings of Persia, Cyrus being the first that made his chief abode there, in Winter especially: and that this City was long, and in Compasse 15 miles about. Here was Nehemiah waiting upon his office, and pro∣moting the good of his people. Now it is called Vahdac of the poverty of the place.

I was in Shushan the palace] Id est, In the palace of the City Susan: this Susan signifieth a Lily, and was so called, likely, for the beauty and delectable site. of Artaxerxes Longimanus, thirteen yeares after Ezra and his company first came to Jerusalem, Ezra 7.8. In the moneth Chisleu] In the deep of Winter then it was that Hanani and his brethren undertook their journey into Persia, for the good of the Church. *Īnd it came to passe] This Book then is a continuation of the former: Nehemiah being a third instrument of procuring this peoples good, after Zerubbabel, and Ezra and deser∣vedly counted and called a Third Founder of that Common-wealth, after Joshuah, & David. Here-hence also some inferre, that Nehemiah himself was the Pen-man of this Book (and not Ezra, as the vulgar Latine, * and many ancients would have it) like as Juli∣us Caesar wrote his own acts and by a more modest Name, called his book Commentaries, and not Histories: yet did it so well, ut prae∣repta non praebita facultas scriptoribus videatur, (said Aulus Hirtius,) that Historians had their work done to their hands: He wrote with the same spirit he fought, saith Quintilian.

OR, The deeds, for he was good at both, & so a singular comfort to his Country-men, according to the notation of his Name Nehemiah, Id est, The comfort or rest of the Lord.

Necesse est ut eam non ut vivam