Nehemiah 3:1

Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brethren the priests, and they builded the sheep gate; they sanctified it, and set up the doors of it; even unto the tower of Meah they sanctified it, unto the tower of Hananeel.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(1) Then Eliashib.—The account begins with due honour to the high priest and the priesthood.

The sheep gate was in the neighbourhood of the priests’ quarter. Through it the victims passed for sacrifice, first being washed in the neighbouring pool of Bethesda. This being built, “they sanctified it,” as an earnest of the subsequent consecration of the entire wall. Their work and the sanctification of it extended to two towns near each other at the north-east corner.

Benson Commentary

Nehemiah 3:1. Then Eliashib the high-priest rose up — The grandchild of Jeshua, the first high-priest after their return from Babylon. He, with his brethren, set a noble example, in being the first that began to rebuild the walls of the holy city, which the Babylonians had demolished. Ministers should be foremost in every good work, animating others by their example as well as doctrine. And they built the sheep-gate — Which was on the south side of the city, in that part of the valley which looked toward mount Zion and the temple; called the sheep-gate, because the sheep were brought through it to be sacrificed. Thus he not only shows by whom, but in what order, the wall was built. They sanctified it — Or they prepared, or repaired it; for so the word sometimes signifies. But our translation seems best, both because that use of the word is most common, and because this is spoken only of this gate, which, being built by the priests, and nearest to the temple, and with a special eye to the service of the temple, for which both men and things were most commonly brought in this way, and being also the first part of the building, might be in a peculiar manner sanctified by solemn prayer and sacrifice, whereby it was dedicated to God’s service. Even unto the tower of Meah they sanctified it — That is, they sanctified the rest of the wall which they built as far as the tower of Meah on one side, and the tower of Hananeel on the other.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

3:1-32 The rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. - The work was divided, so that every one might know what he had to do, and mind it, with a desire to excel; yet without contention, or separate interests. No strife appears among them, but which should do most for the public good. Every Israelite should lend a hand toward the building up of Jerusalem. Let not nobles think any thing below them, by which they may advance the good of their country. Even some females helped forward the work. Some repaired over against their houses, and one repaired over against his chamber. When a general good work is to be done, each should apply himself to that part which is within his reach. If every one will sweep before his own door, the street will be clean; if every one will mend one, we shall all be mended. Some that had first done helped their fellows. The walls of Jerusalem, in heaps of rubbish, represent the desperate state of the world around, while the number and malice of those who hindered the building, give some faint idea of the enemies we have to contend with, while executing the work of God. Every one must begin at home; for it is by getting the work of God advanced in our own souls that we shall best contribute to the good of the church of Christ. May the Lord thus stir up the hearts of his people, to lay aside their petty disputes, and to disregard their worldly interests, compared with building the walls of Jerusalem, and defending the cause of truth and godliness against the assaults of avowed enemies.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Eliashib (compare the marginal reference) was the grandson of Joshua, the high priest contemporary with Zerubbabel.

The sheep gate - This was a gate in the eastern wall, not far from the pool of Bethesda, marginal reference, which was perhaps originally a sheep-pool.

The exact line which the writer follows in describing the circuit of the wall will probably be always a matter of dispute. According to the view here taken, the line described commences near the pool of Bethesda, on the east of the city, and is traced thence, first, northward, then westward, then southward, and finally eastward, as far as the pool of Siloam Nehemiah 3:15. From this point, it seems to the writer of this note that the line of the outer wall is not followed, but, instead of this, the inner wall of the "city of David," which included the temple, is traced. This wall is followed northward from the pool of Siloam, past the "sepulchres of David" and Hezekiah's pool to the "armoury" Nehemiah 3:19 at its northwest corner; it is then followed eastward to "the tower which lieth out from the king's house" Nehemiah 3:25; from this it is carried southward, along the western edge of the Kidron valley to the "great tower which lieth out" Nehemiah 3:27, and then southwestward to the point at which it commenced near Siloam Nehemiah 3:27. The special wall of the "city of David" being thus completed, the writer finishes his entire account by filling up the small interval between the northeast angle of this fortification and the "sheep-gate" Nehemiah 3:28-32, from which he started.

They sanctified it - The priests commenced the work with a formal ceremony of consecration. When the work was completed, there was a solemn dedication of the entire circuit (see Nehemiah 12:27-43).

The tower of Hananeel is often mentioned; that of Meah, or rather Hammeah, or "the Hundred," in Nehemiah only. Both towers must have been situated toward the northeastern corner of the city.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

CHAPTER 3

Ne 3:1-32. The Names and Order of Them That Builded the Wall of Jerusalem.

1. Then Eliashib the high priest—the grandson of Jeshua, and the first high priest after the return from Babylon.

rose up with his brethren the priests—that is, set an example by commencing the work, their labors being confined to the sacred localities.

and they builded the sheep gate—close to the temple. Its name arose either from the sheep market, or from the pool of Bethesda, which was there (Joh 5:2). There the sheep were washed and then taken to the temple for sacrifice.

they sanctified it, and set up the doors—Being the common entrance into the temple, and the first part of the building repaired, it is probable that some religious ceremonies were observed in gratitude for its completion. "It was the first-fruits, and therefore, in the sanctification of it, the whole lump and building was sanctified" [Poole].

the tower of Meah—This word is improperly considered, in our version, as the name of a tower; it is the Hebrew word for "a hundred," so that the meaning is: they not only rebuilt the sheep gate, but also a hundred cubits of the wall, which extended as far as the tower of Hananeel.The names of the several families that builded; their order wherein, and the proportion how much, they builded.

Eliashib the high priest; grandchild of Joshua, the first high priest after their return from Babylon.

Rose up; began the work.

They builded the sheep-gate; which was next to the temple; so called, either from the sheep-market, or the sheep-pool of Bethesda, John 5:2, where the sheep were washed, and then brought to the temple to be sacrificed.

They sanctified it; or, they prepared or repaired it; for so the word sometimes signifies. But our translation seems best, both because that use of the word is most common, and because this is spoken only of this gate, which being built by the priests, and nighest to the temple, and with a special eye to the service of the temple, for which both men and things were most commonly brought in this way, and being also the first part of the building, might be in a peculiar manner sanctified by solemn prayer and sacrifice, whereby it was dedicated to God’s service; and this either as it was considered in itself, or with respect to the rest of the building, of which this was the beginning, and in a manner the first-fruits, and therefore in the sanctification of it the whole lump and building was sanctified. And seeing the whole city is oft called the holy city, it is not strange if the walls and gates of it be also holy, and said to be sanctified, and especially this gate. Compare Deu 20:5.

The tower of Meah, or, of a hundred; so called, either because it was a hundred cubits high, or so far distant from the sheep-gate.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brethren the priests,.... This was the grandson of Jeshua or Joshua the high priest, his father's name was Joiakim, Nehemiah 12:10, being high priest, and rising first, he set a good example both to the priests and to the people, and served no doubt greatly to animate and encourage them:

and they built the sheep gate; so called, because the sheep were led through it to the temple, and near it was the sheep market, where they were sold, and the sheep pool, where the sacrifices were washed; and this being near the temple, and for the service of it, the priests undertook that; not that they laboured with their hands at it, though it is possible some of them might; but they were at the expense of it, employed labourers, and paid them, and directed them, and had the oversight of them: this gate was to the south of the city; and Rauwolff (u) says, it was still standing by Moriah, the mountain of the temple, which the Turks have taken to themselves, and built on it a Turkish mosque or temple. Near the gate you see still, he says, the sheep pond, which is large and deep, wherein the Nethinims used to wash the beasts, and then gave them to the priests; it is said (w) to lead to the mount of Olives, to Bethany, to Jericho, the desert, and all the east country to Jordan:

they sanctified it; this being for sacred use, and they sacred persons; and this the first part of the building, they prayed for a blessing on it, and in it on the whole work undertaken, of which this was the firstfruits:

and set up the doors of it; and so finished it:

even unto the tower of Meah they sanctified it, unto the tower of Hananeel; so far they built, and what they built they sanctified. The tower of Meah, or a "hundred", as the word signifies, might be so called, either because it was one hundred cubits from the sheep gate on one side, and as many from the tower of Hananeel on the other side, standing between both; or because it was one hundred cubits high: these two towers, perhaps, were firm and strong, and needed no repair, since no mention is made of any; though they seem to me to be one and the same tower; see Jeremiah 31:38.

(u) Travels, par. 3. c. 3. p. 226, 228. (w) Vid. Quistorp. in loc.

Geneva Study Bible

Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brethren the priests, and they builded the sheep gate; they {a} sanctified it, and set up the doors of it; even unto the tower of Meah they sanctified it, unto the tower of Hananeel.

(a) In Hebrew they sanctified it, that is, they finished it, and so dedicated it to the Lord by prayer, in desiring him to maintain it.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Ch. Nehemiah 3:1-32. The Distribution of the Work

The Rebuilding of the Wall. The present chapter mentions 42 portions of the work. But the description is clearly incomplete; and we may suppose that Nehemiah’s list either has been only partially reproduced by the Compiler or had been preserved in a mutilated copy. See notes on Nehemiah 3:7; Nehemiah 3:25-28.

Eliashib the high priest] Eliashib was the son of Joiakim, and the grandson of Jeshua (Ezra 3:2; Nehemiah 12:10). Though he co-operated in the work of rebuilding the walls, his close connexion with Tobiah, as described in chap. Nehemiah 13:4, shows that he did not sympathize with the policy of Ezra and Nehemiah in separating the Jews from any alliance or combination with other nations.

The technical title ‘the high-priest,’ literally ‘the great priest,’ which is used here and in Nehemiah 3:20, Nehemiah 13:28, is found in Leviticus 21:10; Numbers 35:25; Numbers 35:28; Joshua 20:6; 2 Kings 12:10; 2 Kings 22:4; 2 Chronicles 34:9; Haggai 1:1; Haggai 1:12; Haggai 1:14; Haggai 2:2; Haggai 2:4; Zechariah 3:1; Zechariah 3:8; Zechariah 6:11. Elsewhere we find him called ‘the chief priest,’ e.g. 2 Kings 25:18; 2 Chronicles 24:11; 2 Chronicles 26:20; Ezra 7:5; Ezra 8:17; Jeremiah 52:24.

the sheep gate] This gate is also referred to in Nehemiah 3:32 and Nehemiah 12:39. There can be little doubt that it is the same gate as that mentioned by St John 5:2, ‘Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda.’ The fact that the priests restored it suggests its proximity to the Temple. This is confirmed by the reference to it in chap. Nehemiah 12:39. Its position was in the N.E. portion of the city, and corresponded to the modern St Stephen’s gate, so far as the change in walls and ground-level permits of comparison. We may suppose that the name was taken from a sheep-market in the immediate neighbourhood. Large numbers of sheep would be required for the Temple sacrifices. The chief supplies of sheep would come from Eastern Palestine and the land of Moab. Their arrival through this eastern gate, whether a market stood near or not, was sufficient to account for the name.

Socin (Baedeker, Palestine and Syria, p. 151) says ‘As the pool of Bethesda is now believed to have been near the present ‘Ain esh-Shifâ,’ and not at the place assigned to it by tradition, we must inter that the sheep gate led from the industrial quarter of the Tyropœon into the Temple precincts.’ Comparing, however, this passage with Zechariah 14:10, it is tempting to identify ‘the sheep gate’ with ‘the gate of Benjamin,’ which is not mentioned in our chapter, but which clearly stood at the N.E. of the city (cf. Jeremiah 37:13).

they sanctified it] The same Hebrew word occurs in connexion with the completion of a building in 1 Kings 8:64, ‘The same day did the king hallow the middle of the court.’ It does not anticipate the solemn dedication of the walls in chap. 12. The completion of the priests’ work was signalised by a special sacred function. (See note on the word ‘sanctify’ in Nehemiah 12:47.)

set up the doors] This was the final act. See 1 Kings 16:34, where ‘gates’ is kept by the R.V. as the rendering of the same word.

unto the tower of Meah] R.V. unto the tower of Hammeah. Marg., unto the tower of ‘The hundred.’ What is intended by ‘the tower of Hammeah,’ we have no means of determining. The alternative rendering ‘the tower of The hundred,’ supposes either that the tower was approached by 100 steps, or that it required 100 men to defend it. It is possible that there has been some early defect in the reading.

they sanctified it] The repetition of these words shows that the wall running from the sheep gate to the tower is here intended. But the omission of the object to the verb creates a difficulty.

unto the tower of Hananeel] R.V. Hananel. This was a well-known building, which is mentioned also in chap. Nehemiah 12:39; Jeremiah 31:38; Zechariah 14:10. From the first of these passages we gather that the tower stood midway between the sheep gate and the fish gate. From the two others, that it stood at the N.E. corner of the city. Probably from this point the wall, which had run N.W., now turned due W. It may have owed its name to its builder.

The way in which it is mentioned here occasions some difficulty. If it is the same as the tower of Hammeah, there seems no reason why the writer should first of all have designated the well-known tower of Hananel by the name of Hammeah. If it is a different tower, how does it happen that two towers are mentioned as the limit of the priests’ restoration of the wall?

Supposing the text to be correct, the tower of Hammeah may have been the Eastern tower of the same stronghold which is also called Hananel. From the emphatic way in which it is mentioned this fortress probably represented an important strategic point. Now ‘the castle (or bîrah) which appertaineth to the house’ may have stood on high ground near this point. And the conjecture is plausible that the tower of Hananel was the name given to an outwork of the great fortress at the point where the city wall ran into it.

According to this theory, Eliashib and the priests restored the city wall between the sheep gate and a portion of the great fortress which commanded the Temple. It does not appear from this chapter that these towers had been pulled down. They had possibly been left to receive a garrison or were not so easily dismantled as the walls.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 1. - Then Eliashib the high priest rose up. It is satisfactory to find Eliashib the high priest taking the part which befitted him on this occasion. Subsequently we find him "allied by marriage to Tobiah (Nehemiah 13:4), and guilty of a profanation of the temple (ibid. ver. 5). By the line of high priests given in Nehemiah 12:10, 11, it appears that Eliashib was the son of Joiakim, and the grandson of the Jeshua who returned from Babylon with Zerubbabel (Ezra 2:2; Ezra 3:2). With his brethren. The priests generally. Compare ver. 28, which shows that the priests undertook a portion of the eastern wall, besides the work here mentioned. Builded the sheep gate. The "sheep gate" appears to have been a gate in the eastern wall, the προβατική of St. John (John %;2), which was close to the pool of Bethesda. By this gate were brought in the sheep needed for sacrifice, which were then washed in the adjoining pool, and conveyed from it into the temple area, whereon the pool abuts. The priests dwelt principally in this portion of the city. They sanctified it. This appears to have been a dedication quite distinct from that which is described in Nehemiah 12:27-43. The priests, having completed the rebuilding of the sheep gate, and of the wall extending from it northwards as far as the tower of Hananeel, anticipated the general dedication by a special one, which "sanctified," or consecrated, their own portion of the wall Thus a sacred character was impressed on the work at the earliest possible moment, and it was placed under the protection of the Almighty. The tower of Meah (or rather Hammeah, i.e. "the Hundred") and the tower of Hananeel appear to have been situated almost at the same point of the wall. Perhaps they were opposite each other, like the towers in the walls of Babylon (Herod., 1:179). Nehemiah 3:1

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The narrative of the building is connected with what precedes by ויּקם, which alludes to the carrying out of the resolve, נקוּם, Nehemiah 2:18. The enumeration begins with Eliashib the high priest and his brethren, i.e., the ordinary priests. These built the sheep-gate, rightly sought by modern topographers in the eastern wall north of Haram, the site of the ancient temple, i.e., in the position or neighbourhood of the present St. Stephen's gate, through which the Bedouins to this day drive sheep into the town for sale (Tobler, Topogr. i. p. 149). "Although," as Bertheau remarks, "we are not generally justified, after the lapse of so many centuries, during which great changes have been made in the positions of the gates and walls, and in face of the fact that the present walls and gates were not erected till the years 1536, 1537, and 1539, in determining the direction and extent of the walls between the several gates, and the locality of the gates in this description, by the direction and extent of the wall and the locality of the gates in modern Jerusalem (Tobl. Topogr. Dritte Wanderung, p. 265), yet in the present instance valid arguments exist in favour of this view. The very neighbourhood of the temple and the nature of the soil bear witness that from ancient times a gate was placed here which took its name from the circumstance that sheep were driven in by it, whether for sale in the market or for sacrificial purposes."

(Note: In the neighbourhood of this gate was the pool of Bethesda (John 5:2), i.e., either the present Birket Israel or Birket es Serain, south of St. Stephen's gate (Tobler, Denkbltter, p. 53f., and Dritte Wanderung, p. 221), or the Struthion pool mentioned by Josephus, bell. Jud. v. 11. 4, κολυμβήθρα τοῦ στρουθίου; Krafft, Topographie von Jerusalem, p. 127f.)

They sanctified it and set up its doors: and to the tower Hammeah they sanctified it unto the tower Hananeel. קדּשׁ, to sanctify, to dedicate (comp. 1 Kings 8:64), can here only mean that the priests dedicated that portion of building on which they were engaged, as soon as they had finished it, for the purpose of sanctifying the whole work by this preliminary consecration; the solemn dedication of the whole wall not taking place till afterwards, and being related Nehemiah 12:27. The setting up of the doors in the gates did not, according to Nehemiah 6:1, take place till after all the breaches in the wall had been repaired, i.e., till the building of the wall was completed. It is, however, mentioned here, and in Nehemiah 3:3, Nehemiah 3:6, etc., contemporaneously with the wall-building; because the builders of the several gates, undertaking also the construction and setting up of the doors, the intention is to give a summary of the work executed by the respective building parties. המּאה ועד־מגּדּל is still dependent on יבנוּ, that is to say, this verb must be mentally repeated before the words: they built to the tower Hammeah, they sanctified it (the suffix in קדּשׁוּהוּ can only relate to מגּדּל). יבנוּ must also be repeated before חננאל מגּדּל עד: and they built further, unto the tower Hananeel. The tower המּאה (the hundred) is only mentioned here and Nehemiah 12:39, but the tower Hananeel is likewise spoken of Jeremiah 31:38 and Zechariah 14:10. From these passages it appears that the two towers were so situated, that any one going from west to east along the north wall of the city, and thence southward, would first come to the tower Hananeel, and afterwards to the tower Hammeah, and that both were between the fish-gate and the sheep-gate. From the passages in Jeremiah and Zechariah especially, it is evident that the tower Hananeel stood at the north-east corner of the wall. Hence the statement in this verse, that the portion of wall built by the priests extended to the north-east corner of the wall; and the tower Hammeah must be sought between the sheep-gate and the north-east corner of the wall. Whence the names of these towers were derived is unknown.