Besides making Jerusalem a safe and pleasant city, there was something else very special about the order of the king for Nehemiah to rebuild that city,—that was the time of the order. It was a very important date for the Jewish people, and is of very great interest to us, even now.
Since the time of Moses and David and the prophets, the Jewish nation had been told that God would send a mighty ruler, called the Messiah, to deliver them from their enemies; but no date had been given them, until an angel of God told the time to Daniel, who was a captive Jew in Babylon, living some years before the time of Nehemiah.
The angel said to Daniel, “Know therefore, and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks.” Daniel 9:2525Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times. (Daniel 9:25). To the Jewish people “a week” meant “seven”; they counted their years in periods of sevens; so to them “seven weeks and three score and two weeks”, altogether sixty nine “weeks”, meant, 483 years. Their year had about the same number of days as we count a year.
Nehemiah and others may have known of the words of the angel to Daniel, but at least, the Jewish nation afterward had the writings of both Nehemiah and Daniel, and should have known that in 483 years after the date given by Nehemiah, the Messiah would come.
They very much needed the Great King to deliver them and rule over them, as they were not a free nation any more, but were under the rule. of what were called Gentile kings, and have been ever since.
The order of King Artaxerxes was in his twentieth year (Neh. 2:1-91And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him: and I took up the wine, and gave it unto the king. Now I had not been beforetime sad in his presence. 2Wherefore the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? this is nothing else but sorrow of heart. Then I was very sore afraid, 3And said unto the king, Let the king live for ever: why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers' sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire? 4Then the king said unto me, For what dost thou make request? So I prayed to the God of heaven. 5And I said unto the king, If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favor in thy sight, that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my fathers' sepulchres, that I may build it. 6And the king said unto me, (the queen also sitting by him,) For how long shall thy journey be? and when wilt thou return? So it pleased the king to send me; and I set him a time. 7Moreover I said unto the king, If it please the king, let letters be given me to the governors beyond the river, that they may convey me over till I come into Judah; 8And a letter unto Asaph the keeper of the king's forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the palace which appertained to the house, and for the wall of the city, and for the house that I shall enter into. And the king granted me, according to the good hand of my God upon me. 9Then I came to the governors beyond the river, and gave them the king's letters. Now the king had sent captains of the army and horsemen with me. (Nehemiah 2:1‑9)). We cannot now reckon the dates of those kings of Babylon and Persia, but the people living then, and for many years after, could keep exact account. Yet many of the Jewish people still are looking for the Messiah, so they seem not to have believed the records of Daniel and Nehemiah.
Those 483 years are long gone by. Did not God keep His promise made by the angel to Daniel? Yes, God’s promise surely came true.
Some of the people who lived at the end of those 483 years, and very many others since, have believed that Jesus of Nazareth came to be the great Messiah of Israel. He rode into Jerusalem as King David and Solomon did, but the leaders of the city did not want Him to be king (Matthew 21:1-1.6).
We do not know of Nehemiah’s last days; perhaps the king allowed him to stay at Jerusalem to help the people more. His writing was to encourage the Jews until their Messiah came, His is the last sure account we have of the people in Judah, until the books of the New Testament; and when we read his record we too are encouraged to remember that God’s promises always come true.
ML 02/11/1940