_THE PRAYER ANSWERED._
NEHEMIAH ii. 1-8.
Nehemiah's prayer had commenced on celestial heights of meditation
among thoughts of Divine grace and glory, and when it had stooped to
earth it had swept over the wide course of his nation's history and
poured out a confession of the whole people's sin; but the final point
of it was a definite request for the prospering of his contemplated
interview with the king. Artaxerxes was an absolute despot, surrounded
with the semi-divine honours that Orientals associate with the regal
state, and yet in speaking of him before "the God of heaven," "the
great and terrible God," Nehemiah loses all awe for his majestic pomp,
and describes him boldly as "this man."[148] In the supreme splendour
of God's presence all earthly glory fades out of the worshipper's
sight, like a glow-worm's spark lost in the sunlight. Therefore no one
can be dazzled by human magnificence so long as he walks in the light
of God. Here, however, Nehemiah is speaking of an absent king. Now it
is one thing to be fearless of man when alone with God in the
seclusion of one's own chamber, and quite another to be equally
imperturbable in the world and away from the calming influence of
undisturbed communion with Heaven. We must remember this if we would
do justice to Nehemiah, because otherwise we might be surprised that
his subsequent action did not show all the courage we should have
expected.
[148] Neh. i. 11.
Four months passed away before Nehemiah attempted anything on behalf
of the city of his fathers. The Jewish travellers probably thought
that their visit to the court servant had been barren of all results.
We cannot tell how this interval was occupied, but it is clear that
Nehemiah was brooding over his plans all the time, and inwardly
fortifying himself for his great undertaking. His ready reply when he
was suddenly and quite unexpectedly questioned by the king shows that
he had made the troubles of Jerusalem a subject of anxious thought,
and that he had come to a clear decision as to the course which he
should pursue. Time spent in such fruitful thinking is by no means
wasted. There is a hasty sympathy that flashes up at the first sign of
some great public calamity, eager "to do something," but too blind in
its impetuosity to consider carefully what ought to be done; and this
is often the source of greater evils, because it is inconsiderate. In
social questions especially people are tempted to be misled by a
blind, impatient philanthropy. The worst consequence of yielding to
such an influence--and one is strongly urged to yield for fear of
seeming cold and indifferent--is that the certain disappointment that
follows is likely to provoke despair of all remedies, and to end in
cynical callousness. Then, in the rebound, every enthusiastic effort
for the public good is despised as but the froth of sentimentality.
Very possibly Nehemiah had no opportunity of speaking to the king
during these four months. A Persian sovereign was waited on by several
cup-bearers, and it is likely enough that Nehemiah's terms of service
were intermittent. On his return to the court in due course he may
have had the first occasion for presenting his petition. Still it is
not to be denied that he found great difficulty in bringing himself to
utter it, and then only when it was dragged out of him by the king. It
was a petition of no common kind. To request permission to leave the
court might be misconstrued unfavourably. Herodotus says that people
had been put to death both by Darius and by Xerxes for showing
reluctance to accompany their king. Then had not this very Artaxerxes
sanctioned the raid upon Jerusalem which had resulted in the
devastation which Nehemiah deplored and which he desired to see
reversed? If the king remembered his rescript to the Syrian governors,
might he not regard a proposal for the reversal of its policy as a
piece of unwarrantable impertinence on the part of his household
slave--nay, as an indication of treasonable designs? All this would be
apparent enough to Nehemiah as he handed the wine-cup on bended knee
to the Great King. Is it wonderful then that he hesitated to speak, or
that he was "very sore afraid" when the king questioned him about his
sadness of countenance?
There is an apparent contradiction in Nehemiah's statement concerning
this sad appearance of his countenance which is obscured in our
English translation by the unwarrantable insertion of the word
"beforetime" in Nehemiah ii. 1, so that the sentence reads, "Now I had
not been _beforetime_ sad in his presence." This word is a gloss of
the translators. What Nehemiah really says is simply, "Now I had not
been sad in his presence"--a statement that evidently refers to the
occasion then being described, and not to previous times nor to the
cup-bearer's habitual bearing. Yet in the very next sentence we read
how the king asked Nehemiah the reason for the sadness of his
countenance. The contradiction would be as apparent to the writer as
it is to us; and if he left it Nehemiah meant it to stand, no doubt
intending to suggest by a dramatic description of the scene that he
attempted to disguise his sorrow, but that his attempt was
ineffectual--so strong, so marked was his grief. It was a rule of the
court etiquette, apparently, that nobody should be sad in the king's
presence. A gloomy face would be unpleasant to the monarch.
Shakespeare's Cæsar knew the security of cheerful associates when he
said:--
"Let me have men about me that are fat;
Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep o' nights:
Yond' Cassius has a lean and hungry look;
He thinks too much; such men are dangerous."
Besides, was not the sunshine of the royal countenance enough to drive
away all clouds of trouble from the minds of his attendants? Nehemiah
had drilled himself into the courtier's habitual pleasantness of
demeanour. Nevertheless, though passing, superficial signs of emotion
may be quite reined in by a person who is trained to control his
features, indications of the permanent conditions of the inner life
are so deeply cut in the lines and curves of the countenance that the
most consummate art of an actor cannot disguise them. Nehemiah's grief
was profound and enduring. Therefore he could not hide it. Moreover,
it is a king's business to understand men, and long practice makes
him an expert in it. So Artaxerxes was not deceived by the
well-arranged smile of his servant; it was evident to him that
something very serious was troubling the man. The sickness of a
favourite attendant would not be unknown to a kind and observant king.
Nehemiah was not ill, then. The source of his trouble must have been
mental. Sympathy and curiosity combined to urge the king to probe the
matter to the bottom. Though alarmed at his master's inquiry, the
trembling cup-bearer could not but give a true answer. Here was his
great opportunity--thrust on him since he had not had the courage to
find it for himself. Artaxerxes was not to be surprised that a man
should grieve when the city of his ancestors was lying desolate. But
this information did not satisfy the king. His keen eye saw that there
was more behind. Nehemiah had some request which as yet he had not
been daring enough to utter. With real kindness Artaxerxes invited him
to declare it.
The critical moment had arrived. How much hangs upon the next sentence--not
the continuance of the royal favour only, but perhaps the very life of the
speaker, and, what is of far more value to a patriot, the future destiny of
his people! Nehemiah's perception of its intense importance is apparent in
the brief statement which he here inserts in his narrative: "So I prayed to
the God of heaven."[149] He is accustomed to drop in suggestive notes on
his own private and behaviour along the course of his narrative. Only a few
lines earlier we came upon one of these characteristic autobiographical
touches in the words, "Now I had not been sad in his presence,"[150] soon
followed by another, "Then I was very sore afraid."[151] Such remarks
vivify the narrative, and keep up an interest in the writer. In the present
case the interjection is peculiarly suggestive. It was natural that
Nehemiah should be startled at the king's abrupt question, but it is an
indication of his devout nature that as the crisis intensified his fear
passed over into prayer. This was not a set season of prayer; the pious Jew
was not in his temple, nor at any _proseuché_, there was no time for a
full, elaborate, and orderly utterance, such as that previously recorded.
Just at the moment of need, in the very presence of the king, with no time
to spare, by a flash of thought, Nehemiah retires to that most lonely of
all lonely places, "the inner city of the mind," there to seek the help of
the Unseen God. And it is enough: the answer is as swift as the prayer; in
a moment the weak man is made strong for his great effort.
[149] Neh. ii. 4.
[150] Neh. ii. 1.
[151] Neh. ii. 2.
Such a sudden uplifting of the soul to God is the most real of all
prayers. This at least is genuine and heartfelt, whatever may be the
case with the semi-liturgical composition the thought and beauty of
which engaged our attention in the previous chapter. But then the man
who can thus find God in a moment must be in the habit of frequently
resorting to the Divine Presence; like the patriarchs, he must be
walking with God. The brief and sudden prayer reaches heaven as an
arrow suddenly shot from the bow; but it goes right home, because he
who lets it off in his surprise is a good marksman, well practised.
This ready prayer only springs to the lips of a man who lives in a
daily habit of praying. We must associate the two kinds of prayer in
order to account for that which is now before us. The deliberate
exercises of adoration, confession, and petition prepare for the one
sudden ejaculation. There we see the deep river which supplies the sea
of devotion from which the momentary prayer is cast up as the spray of
a wave. Therefore it was in a great measure on account of his
deliberate and unwearying daily prayers that Nehemiah was prepared
with his quick cry to God in the crisis of need. We may compare his
two kinds of prayer with our Lord's full and calm intercession in John
xvii. and the short agonised cry from the cross. In each case we feel
that the sudden appeal to God in the moment of dire necessity is the
most intense and penetrating prayer. Still we must recognise that this
comes from a man who is much in prayer. The truth is that beneath both
of these prayers--the calm, meditative utterance, and the simple cry
for help--there lies the deep, true essence of prayer, which is no
thing of words at all, but which lives on, even when it is voiceless,
in the heart of one of whom it can be said, as Tennyson says of
Mary,--
"Her eyes are homes of silent prayer."
Fortified by his moment's communion with God, Nehemiah now makes known
his request. He asks to be sent to Jerusalem to repair its ruins and
fortify the city. This petition contains more than lies on the surface
of the words. Nehemiah does not say that he wishes to be appointed
Governor of Jerusalem in the high office which had been held by
Zerubbabel, but the subsequent narrative shows that he was assigned to
this position, and his report of the king's orders about the house he
was to dwell in at Jerusalem almost implies as much.[152] For one of
the royal household servants to be appointed to such a position was
doubtless not so strange an anomaly in the East in Nehemiah's day, as
it would be with us now. The king's will was the fountain of all
honour, and the seclusion in which the Persian monarchs lived gave
unusual opportunities for the few personal attendants who were
admitted into their presence to obtain great favours from them. Still
Nehemiah's attitude seems to show some self-confidence in a young man
not as yet holding any political office. Two or three considerations,
however, will give a very different complexion to his request. In the
first place, his city was in a desperate plight: deliverance was
urgently needed; no help appeared to be forthcoming unless he stepped
into the breach. If he failed, things could hardly become worse than
they were already. Was this an occasion when a man should hold back
from a sense of modesty? There is a false modesty which is really a
product of the self-consciousness that is next door to vanity. The man
who is entirely oblivious of self will sometimes forget to be modest.
Moreover, Nehemiah's request was at the peril of his life. When it was
granted he would be launched on a most hazardous undertaking. The
ambition--if we must use the word--which would covet such a career is
at the very antipodes of that of the vulgar adventurer who simply
seeks power in order to gratify his own sense of importance. "Seekest
thou great things for thyself? seek them not."[153] That humbling
rebuke may be needed by many men; but it was not needed by Nehemiah,
for he was not seeking the great things for _himself_.
[152] Neh. ii. 8.
[153] Jer. xlv. 5.
It was a daring request; yet the king received it most favourably.
Again, then, we have the pleasing spectacle of a Persian monarch
showing kindness to the Jews. This is not the first time that
Artaxerxes has proved himself their friend, for there can be no doubt
that he is the same sovereign as the Artaxerxes who despatched Ezra
with substantial presents to the aid of the citizens of Jerusalem some
twelve or thirteen years before.
Here, however, a little difficulty emerges. In the interval between
the mission of Ezra and that of Nehemiah an adverse decree had been
extracted from the compliant sovereign--the decree referred to in Ezra
iv. Now the semi-divinity that was ascribed to a Persian monarch
involved the fiction of infallibility, and this was maintained by a
rule making it unconstitutional for him to withdraw any command that
he had once issued. How then could Artaxerxes now sanction the
building of the walls of Jerusalem, which but a few years before he
had expressly forbidden? The difficulty vanishes on a very little
consideration. The king's present action was not the withdrawal of his
earlier decree, for the royal order to the Samaritans had been just to
the effect that the building of the walls of Jerusalem should be
stopped.[154] This order had been fully executed; moreover it
contained the significant words, "until another decree shall be made
by me."[155] Therefore a subsequent permission to resume the work,
issued under totally different circumstances, would not be a
contradiction to the earlier order; and now that a trusty servant of
the king was to superintend the operations, no danger of insurrection
need be apprehended. Then the pointed notice of the fact that the
chief wife--described as "The Queen"--was sitting by Artaxerxes, is
evidently intended to imply that her presence helped the request of
Nehemiah. Orientalists have discovered her name, Damaspia, but nothing
about her to throw light on her attitude towards the Jews. She may
have been even a proselyte, or she may have simply shown herself
friendly towards the young cup-bearer. No political or religious
motives are assigned for the conduct of Artaxerxes here. Evidently
Nehemiah regarded the granting of his request as a direct result of
the royal favour shown towards himself. "Put not your trust in
princes"[156] is a wholesome warning, born of the melancholy
disappointment of the pilgrims who had placed too much hope in the
Messianic glamour with which the career of poor Zerubbabel opened; but
it does not mean that a man is to fling away the advantages which
accrue to him from the esteem he has won in high places. Ever since
the Israelites showed no scruple in spoiling the Egyptians--and who
could blame them for seizing at the eleventh hour the overdue wages of
which they had been defrauded for generations?--"the people of God"
have not been slow to reap harvests of advantage whenever persecution
or cold indifference has given place to the brief, fickle favour of
the world. Too often this has been purchased at the price of the loss
of liberty--a ruinous exchange. Here is the critical point. The
difficulty is to accept aid without any compromise of principle.
Sycophancy is the besetting snare of the courtier, and when the
Church turns courtier she is in imminent danger of that, in her, most
fatal fault. But Nehemiah affords a splendid example to the contrary.
In his grand independence of character we have a fine instance of a
wise, strong use of worldly advantages, entirely free from the abuses
that too commonly accompany them. Thus he anticipates the idea of the
Apocalypse where it is said, "The earth helped the woman."[157]
[154] Ezra iv. 21.
[155] _Ibid._
[156] Psalm cxlvi. 3.
[157] Rev. xii. 16.
The interest of the king in his cup-bearer is shown by his repeated
questions, and by the determined manner in which he drags out of
Nehemiah all his plans and wishes. Every request is granted. The
favourite servant is too much valued to get his leave of absence
without some limit of time, but even that is fixed in accordance with
Nehemiah's desire. He asks and obtains letters of introduction to the
governors west of the Euphrates. The letters were most necessary,
because these very men had bestirred themselves to obtain the adverse
decree but a very few years before. It is not likely that they had all
veered round to favour the hated people against whom they had just
been exhibiting the most severe antagonism. Nehemiah therefore showed
a wise caution in obtaining a sort of "safe conduct." The friendliness
of Artaxerxes went still further. The king ordered timber to be
provided for the building and fortifying operations contemplated by
his cup-bearer; this was to be furnished from a royal hunting park--a
"Paradise," to use the Persian word--probably one which formerly
belonged to the royal demesne of Judah, somewhere in the neighbourhood
of Jerusalem, as the head-forester bore a Hebrew name, "Asaph."[158]
Costly cedars for the temple had to be fetched all the way from the
distant mountains of Lebanon, in Phoenician territory; but the city
gates and the castle and house carpentry could be well supplied from
the oaks and other indigenous timber of Palestine.
[158] Neh. ii. 8.
All these details evince the practical nature of Nehemiah's
patriotism. His last word on the happy conclusion of the interview
with Artaxerxes, which he had anticipated with so much apprehension,
shows that higher thoughts were not crushed out by the anxious
consideration of external affairs. He concludes with a striking
phrase, which we have met with earlier on the lips of Ezra.[159] "And
the king granted me, _according to the good hand of my God upon
me_."[160] Here is the same recognition of Divine Providence, and the
same graphic image of the "hand" of God laid on the writer. It looks
as though the younger man had been already a disciple of the Great
Scribe. But his utterance is not the less genuine and heartfelt on
that account. He perceives that his prayer has been heard and
answered. The strength and beauty of his life throughout may be seen
in his constant reference of all things to God in trust and prayer
before the event, and in grateful acknowledgment afterwards.
[159] Ezra vii. 28.
[160] Neh. ii. 8.