1
On that day there was read in the book of Moses, in the ears of the people, and it hath been found written in it that an Ammonite and Moabite doth not come into the assembly of God -- unto the age,
2
because they have not come before the sons of Israel with bread and with water, and hire against them Balaam to revile them, and our God turneth the reviling into a blessing.
3
And it cometh to pass, at their hearing the law, that they separate all the mixed people from Israel.
4
And before this Eliashib the priest, appointed over chambers of the house of our God, [is] a relation of Tobiah,
5
and he maketh for him a great chamber, and there they were formerly putting the present, the frankincense, and the vessels, and the tithe of the corn, the new wine, and the oil -- the commanded thing of the Levites, and the singers, and the gatekeepers -- and the heave-offering of the priests.
6
And during all this I was not in Jerusalem, for in the thirty and second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon did I come unto the king, and at the end of days I have asked of the king,
7
and I come in to Jerusalem, and understand concerning the evil that Eliashib hath done for Tobiah, to make to him a chamber in the courts of the house of God,
8
and it is very displeasing to me, and I cast all the vessels of the house of Tobiah without, out of the chamber,
9
and I speak, and they cleanse the chambers, and I bring back thither the vessels of the house of God with the present and the frankincense.