Discovery BoxNehemiah 2:6 
Context2:6 Then the king, with his consort 1 sitting beside him, replied, “How long would your trip take, and when would you return?” Since the king was amenable to dispatching me, 2 I gave him a time.
Nehemiah 4:22
Context4:22 At that time I instructed 3 the people, “Let every man and his coworker spend the night in Jerusalem and let them be guards for us by night and workers by day.
Nehemiah 6:1-2
Context6:1 When Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall and no breach remained in it (even though up to that time I had not positioned doors in the gates), 6:2 Sanballat and Geshem sent word to me saying, “Come on! Let’s set up a time to meet together at Kephirim 4 in the plain of Ono.” Now they intended to do me harm.
Nehemiah 13:21
Context13:21 But I warned them and said, 5 “Why do you spend the night by the wall? If you repeat this, I will forcibly remove you!” 6 From that time on they did not show up on the Sabbath. 7
1 tn Or “queen,” so most English versions (cf. HALOT 1415 s.v. שֵׁגַל); TEV “empress.”
2 tn Heb “It was good before the king and he sent me.”
3 tn Heb “said [to].”
4 tn It is not entirely clear whether the Hebrew word כְּפִירִים (kÿfirim) is a place-name not mentioned elsewhere in the OT (as indicated in the present translation; so also NAB, NASB) or whether it means “in [one of] the villages” (so, e.g., NIV, NRSV, NLT; see BDB 499 s.v.; HALOT 493 s.v.). The LXX and Vulgate understand it in the latter sense. Some scholars connect this term with the identically spelled word כּפירים (“lions”) as a figurative description of princes or warriors (e.g., Pss 34:11; 35:17; 58:7; Jer 2:15; Ezek 32:2, 13; Nah 2:14; see HALOT 493 s.v.): “let us meet together with the leaders in the plain of Ono.”
5 tn The Hebrew text includes the words “to them,” but they have been excluded from the translation for stylistic reasons.
6 tn Heb “I will send a hand on you.”
7 sn This statement contains a great deal of restrained humor. The author clearly takes pleasure in the effectiveness of the measures that he had enacted.
