Nehemiah 2:3
And I said unto the king: 'Let the king live for ever: why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers' sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire?'
JPS TaNaKH 1917
In The King James Version
In Context
4Then the king said unto me: 'For what dost thou make request?' So I prayed to the God of heaven.
Cross References
1 Kings 1:31Then Bath-sheba bowed with her face to the earth, and prostrated herself to the king, and said: 'Let my lord king David live for ever.'
2 Chronicles 28:27And Ahaz slept with his fathers, and they buried him in the city, even in Jerusalem; for they brought him not into the sepulchres of the kings of Israel; and Hezekiah his son reigned in his stead.
Nehemiah 1:3And they said unto me: 'The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach; the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned with fire.'
Psalms 38:7(38-8) For my loins are filled with burning; and there is no soundness in my flesh.
Psalms 102:15(102-16) So the nations will fear the name of the LORD, and all the kings of the earth Thy glory;
Lamentations 2:9Her gates are sunk into the ground; He hath destroyed and broken her bars; her king and her princes are among the nations, instruction is no more; yea, her prophets find no vision from the LORD.
Matthew Henry on Nehemiah 2:2-9
Nehemiah's Request to the King. ( b. c. 445.) 1 And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him: and I took up the wine, and gave it unto the king. Now I had not been beforetime sad in his presence. 2 Wherefore the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? this is nothing else but sorrow of heart. Then I was very sore afraid, 3 And said unto the king, Let the king live for ever: why should not my countenance be sad, when… Read the whole commentary →