Nehemiah 13:8

And it grieved me sore: therefore I cast forth all the household stuff of Tobiah out of the chamber.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(8) It grieved me sore.—The second time we read of Nehemiah’s deep emotion: first, because of the utter dissoluteness of which this was a token; and secondly, because it was a priestly desecration.

Benson Commentary

Nehemiah 13:8. It grieved me sore — That so sacred a place should be polluted by one who, on many accounts, ought not to have come there, being no priest, a stranger, an Ammonite, and one of the worst of that people; and that all this should be done by the permission and order of the high-priest.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

13:1-9 Israel was a peculiar people, and not to mingle with the nations. See the benefit of publicly reading the word of God; when it is duly attended to, it discovers to us sin and duty, good and evil, and shows wherein we have erred. We profit, when we are thus wrought upon to separate from evil. Those that would drive sin out of their hearts, the living temples, must throw out its household stuff, and all the provision made for it; and take away all the things that are the food and fuel of lust; this is really to mortify it. When sin is cast out of the heart by repentance, let the blood of Christ be applied to it by faith, then let it be furnished with the graces of God's Spirit, for every good work.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Artaxerxes king of Babylon - See Nehemiah 1:1. Compare Ezra 6:22, where Darius Hystaspis is called "king of Assyria."

After certain days - Or, "at the end of a year," which is a meaning that the phrase often has Exodus 13:10; Leviticus 25:29-30; Numbers 9:22. Nehemiah probably went to the court at Babylon in 433 B.C., and returned to Jerusalem 432 B.C.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6-9. But in all this was not I at Jerusalem—Eliashib (concluding that, as Nehemiah had departed from Jerusalem, and, on the expiry of his allotted term of absence, had resigned his government, he had gone not to return) began to use great liberties, and, there being none left whose authority or frown he dreaded, allowed himself to do things most unworthy of his sacred office, and which, though in unison with his own irreligious character, he would not have dared to attempt during the residence of the pious governor. Nehemiah resided twelve years as governor of Jerusalem, and having succeeded in repairing and refortifying the city, he at the end of that period returned to his duties in Shushan. How long [Nehemiah] remained there is not expressly said, but "after certain days," which is a Scripture phraseology for a year or a number of years, he obtained leave to resume the government of Jerusalem; to his deep mortification and regret, he found matters in the neglected and disorderly state here described. Such gross irregularities as were practised, such extraordinary corruptions as had crept in, evidently imply the lapse of a considerable time. Besides, they exhibit the character of Eliashib, the high priest, in a most unfavorable light; for while he ought, by his office, to have preserved the inviolable sanctity of the temple and its furniture, his influence had been directly exercised for evil; especially he had given permission and countenance to a most indecent outrage—the appropriation of the best apartments in the sacred building to a heathen governor, one of the worst and most determined enemies of the people and the worship of God. The very first reform Nehemiah on his second visit resolved upon, was the stopping of this gross profanation [by Eliashib]. The chamber which had been polluted by the residence of the idolatrous Ammonite was, after undergoing the process of ritual purification (Nu 15:9), restored to its proper use—a storehouse for the sacred vessels.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

It grieved me sore, that so sacred a place should be polluted by one who in many respects ought not to have come there, being no priest, a stranger, an Ammonite, and one of the worst of that people; and that all this should be done by the permission and order of the high priest, who by his office should have punished and reformed these things in others.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And it grieved me sore,.... That such a sacred place should be converted to common use, and to that of an Heathen, and of an enemy to the Jews and their religion:

therefore I cast forth all the household stuff of Tobiah out of the chamber; as being chief magistrate, and acting by commission under the king of Persia, and to regulate everything amiss, according to the Jewish laws, as well as those of the king, his power being, no doubt, as large as Ezra's, Ezra 7:25, by "household stuff" is meant what is movable in the house, as chairs, tables, vessels for dressing, caring, drinking, &c. there are various opinions about this with the ancients (e).

(e) Vid. Alex. ab Alex. Genial. Dier. l. 1. c. 19.

Geneva Study Bible

And it grieved me sore: therefore I cast forth all the household stuff to Tobiah out of the chamber.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

8. it grieved me sore] Cf. Nehemiah 2:10, ‘it grieved them exceedingly.’

all the household stuff] Literally, ‘all the vessels of the house.’ ‘Stuff’ = the furniture, an old English word. For ‘stuff’ in this sense cf. Genesis 31:37; Genesis 45:20; 1 Samuel 10:22. Aldis Wright (Bible Word-Book, ed, 1, p. 463) cites, in illustration of this word, Hall (Hen. IV. fol. 26 b), ‘Sir Thomas Rampston knight the kynges vice-chamberlain with all his chamber stuffe, And apparell;’ and Shakespeare (Com. of Errors IV. 4), ‘Therefore away to get our stuffe aboard.’

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 8. - Therefore cast I forth all the household stuff. Tobiah had furnished his "chamber" as a dwelling-house, filling it with "household stuff" of various kinds. Nehemiah, of his own authority, had the whole of it turned out of doors. Nehemiah 13:8

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

This so greatly displeased him, that he cast out all the household stuff of Tobiah, and commanded the chamber to be purified, and the vessels of the house of God, the meat-offering and the frankincense, and probably the tenths and heave-offerings also, the enumeration being here only abbreviated, to be again brought into it. From the words household stuff, it appears that Tobiah used the chamber as a dwelling when he came from time to time to Jerusalem.