1And then the people and their wives wailed a great wailing against their brethren, the Judeans. 2And there were those who said: “Our sons and our daughters and our brothers are many. We shall take grain and we shall eat and we will live!” 3And there were those who said: “We are selling our fields and our houses and our vineyards, and we will take grain in the famine and we will live!” 4And there were those who said: “We shall borrow money from the taxes of the King, and we shall cultivate our fields and our vineyards, and we shall live!” 5And there were those who said: “Therefore as the flesh of our brethren, so also is our flesh, and like their children, so also are our children! Behold, therefore, we are compelling our sons and our daughters as our Servants, and there were some of our daughters whom we subjected to Maid Servants, and they did not lift their hands before God, and our fields and our vineyards and our goods we gave to others!”

6And I was very grieved myself when I heard their wailing and these words. 7And my heart was broken within me, and I extended my spirit, and I spoke with the Elders and with the Princes. 8And I said to them: “We are purchasing our brethren the Judeans who were sold to those nations, and their sons, are you taking captive each man his brother?” Because of this, I gave a cry against them, and I said to them: “Shall you also sell your brothers?” And they kept silent and did not give me an answer. 9And I said to them: “The matter that you are doing is not good, therefore you are not walking in the reverence of our God, because you are doing according to the works of the nations that are around us. 10Also I and my sons and my brethren will take money, we will sell grain and we shall release the poor who are among our people. 11And we shall return their fields to them and their vineyards and their olive groves and their houses, and the silver and grain and wine and oil we shall leave for the rest of the people.” 12And they were saying to me: “Thus shall we do as you say! And I called the Priests and I said to them: ‘Thus it is right to do!’ And I took an oath of them to do according to this answer, also of the small boys. 13And we were saying: “Thus shall God shake every man out of his house who will not stand on this matter, and thus he shall be shaken out from his labor and worthless!” And all the people were saying, “Amen!'' And all the people stood and they glorified LORD JEHOVAH. And all the people did according to this response.

14Also from the day he commanded me to be a Ruler in the land of Yehuda, from the twentieth year and unto the thirty second year of Artakhshesht the King, twelve years I and my brothers have been their Leader, and I did not take a donkey from one of them, neither did I harm any person among them. 15And the Rulers who had preceded me had enslaved the people, and they took from them wine and bread and much money for taxes, unto forty shekels, also their Servants ruled over the people and were authorized over them, and they abused them, and I have not done so, because of the presence of the awe of God. 16Also in the work of this wall I was greatly strengthened, and I have not bought fields, and all the boys, the sons of the Judeans, were gathered, and they stood there over the work. 17And Princes and the Governors, a hundred and fifty men, and those who came to us from the nations which surround us, they came to us, each man with his gift. 18And a man that had made bread was bringing it for the Servants who worked; one bull and six fat sheep and kids were prepared for us, and once in ten days much wine, and with this I did not ask the bread of the governorship, because the work was severe on this people. 19‘Remember for me, my God, everything good that I have done for the sake of this people.’”