Nehemiah 5:4

There were also that said, We have borrowed money for the king's tribute, and that upon our lands and vineyards.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(4) We have borrowed money for the king’s tribute.—Literally, we have made our fields and vineyards answerable for the payment of the Persian tribute. They had pledged the coming produce.

Benson Commentary

Nehemiah 5:4. We have borrowed money for the king’s tribute — Which was laid upon them all, Ezra 4:13; Ezra 7:24. Houbigant renders the last part of this verse, for the king’s tribute on our lands and vineyards.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

5:1-5 Men prey upon their fellow-creatures: by despising the poor they reproach their Maker. Such conduct is a disgrace to any, but who can sufficiently abhor it when adopted by professing Christians? With compassion for the oppressed, we should lament the hardships which many in the world are groaning under; putting our souls into their souls' stead, and remembering in our prayers and succours those who are burdened. But let those who show no mercy, expect judgment without mercy.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The king's tribute - The tax payable to the Persian monarch (compare Ezra 4:13; Esther 10:1). In ancient times, heavy taxation was often productive of debt and distress.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

CHAPTER 5

Ne 5:1-5. The People Complain of Their Debt, Mortgage, and Bondage.

1-5. there was a great cry of the people … against their brethren—Such a crisis in the condition of the Jews in Jerusalem—fatigued with hard labor and harassed by the machinations of restless enemies, the majority of them poor, and the bright visions which hope had painted of pure happiness on their return to the land of their fathers being unrealized—must have been very trying to their faith and patience. But, in addition to these vexatious oppressions, many began to sink under a new and more grievous evil. The poor made loud complaints against the rich for taking advantage of their necessities, and grinding them by usurious exactions. Many of them had, in consequence of these oppressions, been driven to such extremities that they had to mortgage their lands and houses to enable them to pay the taxes to the Persian government, and ultimately even to sell their children for slaves to procure the means of subsistence. The condition of the poorer inhabitants was indeed deplorable; for, besides the deficient harvests caused by the great rains (Ezr 10:9; also Hag 1:6-11), a dearth was now threatened by the enemy keeping such a multitude pent up in the city, and preventing the country people bringing in provisions.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The kings tribute was laid upon them all. See Ezra 4:13 7:24

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

There were also that said,.... Who though they were able to buy corn for their families without mortgaging their estates: yet, say they:

we have borrowed money for the king's tribute, and that upon our lands and vineyards; for though the priests, Levites, and Nethinims, were exempted from it, yet not the people in common; and some of these were so poor, that they could not pay it without borrowing upon their estates, and paying large usury for it, see

Geneva Study Bible

There were also that said, We have borrowed money for the king's {c} tribute, and that upon our lands and vineyards.

(c) To pay our tribute to the king of the Persians, which was exacted yearly from us.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

4. Yet a third class is mentioned, who had been compelled to borrow in order to pay the taxes and, not having the means to pay their creditors, sold their children as slaves.

we have borrowed … for the king’s tribute] One special cause of distress seems to have been the heaviness of the royal taxes. Jews who were poor to start with and impoverished by recent circumstances, found themselves under the necessity of borrowing in order to pay the tribute levied by the Persian king from his foreign subjects. See on ‘tribute’ note on Ezra 4:13; Ezra 4:20; Ezra 6:8; Ezra 7:24. On the severity of this taxation in the Persian Empire see Nehemiah 9:37.

and that upon our lands and vineyards] R.V. upon our fields and vineyards. The poor people, in order to pay the tax, borrowed money upon the security of their small holdings. In this way a considerable portion of the property of the poorer classes had passed into the hands of the wealthy money-lenders, who exacted high usury (Nehemiah 5:11), and had no compunction in plying their trade, and visiting default of payment with seizure of a fellow-countryman’s few acres of field and vineyard. At a time when distress was due to the presence of a common foe, this want of generosity and patriotism excited the indignation of the working classes. Even in the more favourable cases, the necessity of paying the interest upon the mortgages deprived the poor Jew of any profits from his holding.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 4. - The king's tribute. Judaea, like other Persian provinces, had to pay a tribute, partly in money and partly in kind, yearly to the Persian monarch (see the comment on Ezra 4:13); but there is no reason to believe that this burthen was generally felt as oppressive, nor that it was heavier in Judaea than elsewhere. But by the very poor even a small amount of direct taxation is felt as a grievance; and the necessity of meeting the demands of the tax-gatherer was in the ancient world often the turning-point, which compelled the contracting of a debt (Liv., 2:23); and so it seems to have been with these complainants, Nehemiah 5:4

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Others, again, complained: We have borrowed money for the king's tribute upon our fields and vineyards. לוה means to be dependent, nexum esse, and transitively to make dependent, like מלא, to be full, and to make full: We have made our fields and our vineyards answerable for money for the king's tribute (Bertheau), i.e., we have borrowed money upon our fields for ... This they could only do by pledging the crops of these lands, or at least such a portion of their crops as might equal the sum borrowed; comp. the law, Leviticus 25:14-17.