Ezra reads God’s laws to the people
8
📚And all the people gathered together as one man in the square that was in front of the Water Gate, and they spoke to Ezra 📖 the scribe about bringing the book of the law of Moses 📖, which the LORD had commanded to Israel. 2 📚And on the first day of the seventh month Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation of both men and women, and all who could hear with understanding. 3 📚And from morning to midday 📖 he read 📖 from it facing the square that was in front of the Water Gate in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand, and the ears of all the people listened attentively to the book of the law.
4 📚And Ezra the scribe 📖 stood on a wooden platform which they had made for the purpose, and beside him, on his right, stood Mattithiah and Shema and Anaiah and Uriah and Hilkiah and Maaseiah, and on his left, Pedaiah and Mishael and Malchiah and Hashum and Hashbadana, Zechariah and Meshullam.
5 📚And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people (for he was standing above all the people), and when he opened it all the people stood up. 6 📚And Ezra praised 📖 the LORD, the great God. And all the people answered, “Amen, Amen”, lifting up their hands, and they bowed their heads, and worshipped the LORD with their faces toward the ground.
7 📚Also Jeshua and Bani and Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodijah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, and the Levites, explained the law to the people, and the people stood in their places. 8 📚So they read distinctly from the book of the law of God and gave the sense, so that they understood 📖 what was read.
9 📚And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who were teaching the people, said to all the people, “This day is holy to the LORD your God. Do not mourn or weep 📖”. For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law.
10 📚Then he said to them, “Go your way, eat rich food and drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared 📖, for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not be sad, for the joy 📖 of the LORD is your strength”.
11 📚So the Levites calmed all the people, saying, “Be still, for the day is holy. Do not be grieved”.
12 📚And all the people went their way to eat and drink, and to send portions to others, and to rejoice greatly, because they understood 📖 the words that had been proclaimed to them.
Festival of Tabernacles
13 📚And on the second day the heads of the fathers’ households of all the people, the priests, and the Levites, gathered together around Ezra the scribe to understand the words of the law. 14 📚And they found written in the law which the LORD commanded by Moses, that the children of Israel should live in booths during the feast of the seventh month, 15 📚and that they should announce it and proclaim it in all their cities and in Jerusalem, saying, “Go out to the mountain, and bring olive branches and pine branches and myrtle branches and palm branches and branches of leafy trees, to make booths, as it is written”.
8:14-15 Lev 23:34-43 – the Feast of Tabernacles.⚜
16 📚So the people went out and brought them, and they made booths for themselves, each one on the roof of his house, or in their compounds, or in the courtyards 📖 of the house of God, and in the square at the Water Gate and in the square at the Gate of Ephraim. 17 📚And the whole congregation of those who had come back from the captivity made booths, and sat under the booths. For since the days of Joshua the son of Nun until that day the children of Israel had not done so 📖. And the rejoicing was very great.
18 📚Also day by day, from the first day to the last day, he read from the book of the law of God. And they kept the feast for seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly, according to the regulation.
8:18 Lev 23:36; Num 29:35; Deut 31:11. These days resulted in a time of revival in many hearts (Neh 9:1-3; 10:28-39) – a revival not based on man’s techniques, or personalities, but on the hearing of the Word of God.⚜