Nehemiah 1:1-3

Amplified Bible

Nehemiah’s Grief for the Exiles

1 The words of Nehemiah son of Hacaliah:

Now it happened in the month of Chislev, in the ^[a]twentieth year [of the ^[b]Persian king], as I was in the ^[c]capitol of Susa, ² Hanani, one of my brothers, and some men from Judah came; and I asked them about the surviving Jews who had escaped and survived the captivity, and about Jerusalem. ³ They said to me, “The remnant there in the province who survived the captivity are in great distress and reproach; the wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its [fortified] gates have been burned (destroyed) by fire.”