Chap. 10
Verse 1
Neh 10:1 (Hebrew_Bible_10:2)A covenant made (vv. 1-32), and an engagement entered into, to furnish what was needed for the maintenance of the temple, its services, and ministers (Neh 10:33-39). - Vv. 1-28. For the purpose of giving a lasting influence to this day of prayer and fasting, the assembled people, after the confession of sin (given in Neh 9), ), entered into a written agreement, by which they bound themselves by an oath to separate from the heathen, and to keep the commandments and ordinances of God, - a document being prepared for this purpose, and sealed by the heads of their different houses.
And because of all this we make and write a sure covenant; and our princes, Levites, and priests sign the sealed (document). בּכל־זאת does not mean post omne hoc, after all that we have done this day (Schmid, Bertheau, and others); still less, in omni hoc malo, quod nobis obtigerat (Rashi, Aben Ezra), but upon all this, i.e., upon the foundation of the preceding act of prayer and penitence, we made אמנה, i.e., a settlement, a sure agreement (the word recurs Neh 11:23); hence כּרת is used as with בּרית, Neh 9:8. אמנה may again be taken as the object of כּתבים, we write it; החתוּם ועל be understood as “our princes sealed.” החתוּם is the sealed document; comp. Jer 22:11, Jer 22:14. החתוּם על means literally, Upon the sealed document were our princes, etc.; that is, our princes sealed or signed it. Signing was effected by making an impression with a seal bearing a name; hence originated the idiom החתוּם על אשׁר, “he who was upon the sealed document,” meaning he who had signed the document by sealing it. By this derived signification is the plural חחתוּמים על (Neh 10:2), “they who were upon the document,” explained: they who had signed or sealed the document.
Verses 2-9
Neh 10:2-9 (Hebrew_Bible_10:3-10)
At the head of the signatures stood Nehemiah the Tirshatha, as governor of the country, and Zidkijah, a high official, of whom nothing further is known, perhaps (after the analogy of Ezr 4:9, Ezr 4:17) secretary to the governor. Then follow (in vv. 3-9) twenty-one names, with the addition: these, the priests. Of these twenty-one names, fifteen occur in Neh 12:2-7 as chiefs of the priests who came up with Joshua and Zerubbabel from Babylon, and in Neh 12:11-20
