The Book of Nehemiah, which bears the title Nehemiah's Words, was anciently connected with Ezra, as if it formed part of the same work. It arose, doubtless, from the fact that Nehemiah is a sort of continuation of Ezra [EZRA].
The canonical character of Nehemiah's work is established by very ancient testimony.
The contents of the book have been specified above in the biography of the author. The work can scarcely be called a history of Nehemiah and his times. It is rather a collection of notices of some important transactions that happened during the first year of his government, with a few scraps from his later history. The contents appear to be arranged in chronological order, with the exception perhaps of , where the account of the dedication of the wall seems out of its proper place: we might expect it rather after , where the completion of the wall is mentioned.
As to the date of the book, it is not likely that it came from Nehemiah's hand till near the close of his life. Certainly it could not have been all written before the expulsion of the priest, recorded in , which took place about the year B.C. 413.
While the book as a whole is considered to have come from Nehemiah, it consists in part of compilation. He doubtless wrote the greater part himself, but some portions he evidently took from other works. It is allowed by all that he is, in the strictest sense, the author of the narrative from Nehemiah 1 to . The account in is avowedly compiled, for he says in , 'I found a register,' etc. This register we actually find also in hence it might be thought that our author borrowed this part from Ezra; but it is more likely that they both copied from public documents, such as 'the book of the chronicles,' mentioned in .
Nehemiah 8-10 were probably not written by Nehemiah, since the narrative respecting him is in the third person (; ), and not in the first, as usual (). Havernick, indeed, makes it appear, from the contents and style, that Ezra was the writer of this portion. The remaining chapters (Nehemiah 11-13) also exhibit some marks of compilation (; ); but there are, on the contrary, clear proofs of Nehemiah's own authorship in , and in; and hence Havernick thinks he wrote the whole except , which he took from 'the book of the chronicles,' mentioned m .
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John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
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