But it came to pass, athat when Sanballat heard that we builded the wall, he was wroth, and took great indignation, and bmocked the Jews. 2 And he spake before his brethren and the army of cSamaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will they †fortify themselves? will they sacrifice? will they make an end in a day? will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned? 3 Now aTobiah the Ammonite was by him, and he said, Even that which they build, if da fox go up, he shall even break down their stone wall. 4 eHear, O our God; for we are †despised: and fturn their reproach upon their own head, and give them for a prey in the land of captivity: 5 And gcover not their iniquity, and hlet not their sin be blotted out from before thee: for they have provoked thee to anger before the builders. 6 So built we the wall; and all the wall was joined together unto the half thereof: for the people had a mind to work.

7 But it came to pass, that when Sanballat, and Tobiah, and the iArabians, and the jAmmonites, and the kAshdodites, heard that the walls of Jerusalem †were made up, and that the breaches began to be stopped, then they were very wroth, 8 And lconspired all of them together to come and to fight against Jerusalem, and †to hinder it. 9 Nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night, because of them.