hen the king said to me: For what dost thou make request? And I
prayed to the God of heaven,

2:5. And I said to the king: If it seem good to the king, and if thy
servant hath found favour in thy sight, that thou wouldst send me into
Judea to the city of the sepulchre of my father, and I will build it.

2:6. And the king said to me, and the queen that sat by him: For how
long shall thy journey be, and when wilt thou return? And it pleased the
king, and he sent me: and I fixed him a time.

2:7. And I said to the king: If it seem good to the king, let him give
me letters to the governors of the country beyond the river, that they
convey me over, till I come into Judea:

2:8. And a letter to Asaph the keeper of the king's forest, to give me
timber that I may cover the gates of the tower of the house, and the
walls of the city, and the house that I shall enter into. And the king
gave me according to the good hand of my God with me.

2:9. And I came to the governors of the country beyond the river, and
gave them the king's letters. And the king had sent with me captains of
soldiers, and horsemen.

2:10. And Sanaballat the Horonite, and Tobias the servant, the Ammonite,
heard it, and it grieved them exceedingly, that a man was come, who
sought the prosperity of the children of Israel.

2:11. And I came to Jerusalem, and was there three days.

2:12. And I arose in the night, I and some few men with me, and I told
not any man what God had put in my heart to do in Jerusalem, and there
was no beast with me, but the beast that I rode upon.

2:13. And I went out by night by the gate of the valley, and before the
dragon fountain, and to the dung gate, and I viewed the wall of
Jerusalem which was broken down, and the gates thereof which were
consumed with fire.

2:14. And I passed to the gate of the fountain, and to the king's
aqueduct, and there was no place for the beast on which I rode to pass.

2:15. And I went up in the night by the torrent, and viewed the wall,
and going back I came to the gate of the valley, and returned.

2:16. But the magistrates knew not whither I went, or what I did:
neither had I as yet told any thing to the Jews, or to the priests, or
to the nobles, or to the magistrates, or to the rest that did the work.

2:17. Then I said to them: You know the affliction wherein we are,
because Jerusalem is desolate, and the gates thereof are consumed with
fire: come, and let us build up the walls of Jer