those passages in Isaiah, we will bring a parallel case out of the Scriptures, by which the position is further supported if need be. This parallel case took place long after Isaiah's time, in the era of Nehemiah and his associates, when they were rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, which had been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, about seventy years before, when the Jews were carried away into captivity the first time. At that time it appears that many of the people of the Jews had sold their children, to their more wealthy brethren, for money to pay the taxes while in captivity, and for bread and victuals for their families, which occasioned great trouble and complaints among the people on their return to Judea.
We will give the account as it stands in the book of Nehemiah, chapter v, 1-5, as follows: "And there was a great cry of the people, and of their wives against their brethren, the Jews. For there were (some) that said: we, our sons and our daughters are many; therefore, we take up corn for them, that we may eat and live. Some, also, there were, that said: we have mortgaged our lands, vineyards and houses, that we might buy [not hire] corn, because of the dearth. There were, also, that said: we have borrowed money for the king's tribute, and that upon our lands and vineyards: yet, now our flesh is as the flesh of our brethren, our children as their children: and, lo, we bring into bondage our sons and our daughters to be servants [or slaves], and some of our daughters are bought into bondage already; neither is it in our power to redeem them, for other men have our lands and our vineyards."
