Neh 3:24-27 | KD | STEP | Next repaired Binnui the son of Henadad, a second portion from the house of Azariah, to the angle and to the corner; and further on ( ) Palal the son of Uzzai, from opposite the angle and the high tower which stands out from the king’s house by the court of the prison. We join העליון to המּגדּל, though it is also verbally admissible to combine it with המּלך בּית, “the tower which stands out from the king’s upper house,” because nothing is known of an upper and lower king’s house. It would be more natural to assume (with Bertheau) that there was an upper and a lower tower at the court of the prison, but this is not implied by העליון. The word means first, high, elevated, and its use does not assume the existence of a lower tower; while the circumstance that the same tower is in called the great (הגּדול) tells in favour of the meaning high in the present case. The court of the prison was, according to , in or near the king’s house; it is also mentioned , ; ; ; , , , and Jer 39:14. But from none of these passages can it be inferred, as by Bertheau, that it was situate in the neighbourhood of the temple. His further remark, too, that the king’s house is not the royal palace in the city of David, but an official edifice standing upon or near the temple area, and including the court of the prison with its towers, is entirely without foundation. The royal palace lay, according to Josephus, Ant . viii. 5. 2, opposite the temple (ἀντικρὺς ἔχων ναόν), i.e., on the north-eastern side of Zion, and this is quite in accordance with the statements of this verse; for as it is not till that the description of the wall-building reaches the walls of Ophel, all the localities and buildings spoken of in must be sought for on the east side of Zion. The court of the prison formed, according to Eastern custom, part of the royal fortress upon Zion. The citadel had, moreover, a high tower. This is obvious from Sol 4:4, though the tower of David there mentioned, on which hung a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men, may not be identical with the tower of the king’s house in this passage; from Mic 4:8, where the tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, is the tower of the royal citadel; and from , where citadel and tower (בּחן, properly watch-tower) answer to the ארמון of the royal citadel, which lay with its forts upon the hill of Zion. This high tower of the king’s house, i.e., of the royal citadel, stood, according to our verses, in the immediate neighbourhood of the angle and the corner (הפּנּה); for the section of wall which reached to the פּנּה lay opposite the angle and the high tower of the king’s house. The wall here evidently formed a corner, running no longer from south to north, but turning eastwards, and passing over Ophel, the southern spur of Moriah. A length from this corner onwards was built by Pedaiah the son of Parosh; comp. Ezr 2:3.

‏ Nehemiah 3:24-27

Next repaired Binnui the son of Henadad, a second portion from the house of Azariah, to the angle and to the corner; and further on (Neh 3:25) Palal the son of Uzzai, from opposite the angle and the high tower which stands out from the king’s house by the court of the prison. We join העליון to המּגדּל, though it is also verbally admissible to combine it with המּלך בּית, “the tower which stands out from the king’s upper house,” because nothing is known of an upper and lower king’s house. It would be more natural to assume (with Bertheau) that there was an upper and a lower tower at the court of the prison, but this is not implied by העליון. The word means first, high, elevated, and its use does not assume the existence of a lower tower; while the circumstance that the same tower is in Neh 3:27 called the great (הגּדול) tells in favour of the meaning high in the present case. The court of the prison was, according to Jer 32:2, in or near the king’s house; it is also mentioned Jer 32:8, Jer 32:12; Jer 33:1; Jer 37:21; Jer 38:6, Jer 38:13, Jer 38:28, and Jer 39:14. But from none of these passages can it be inferred, as by Bertheau, that it was situate in the neighbourhood of the temple. His further remark, too, that the king’s house is not the royal palace in the city of David, but an official edifice standing upon or near the temple area, and including the court of the prison with its towers, is entirely without foundation. ^{▼▼Equally devoid of proof is the view of Ewald, Diestel (in Herzog’s Realencycl. xiii. p. 325), Arnold, and others, that the royal palace stood upon Moriah or Ophel on the south side of the temple, in support of which Diestel adduces Neh 3:25. See the refutation of this view in the commentary on 1Ki 7:12 (Note).}

The royal palace lay, according to Josephus, Ant. viii. 5. 2, opposite the temple (ἀντικρὺς ἔχων ναόν), i.e., on the north-eastern side of Zion, and this is quite in accordance with the statements of this verse; for as it is not till Neh 3:27 that the description of the wall-building reaches the walls of Ophel, all the localities and buildings spoken of in Neh 3:24-27 must be sought for on the east side of Zion. The court of the prison formed, according to Eastern custom, part of the royal fortress upon Zion. The citadel had, moreover, a high tower. This is obvious from Sol 4:4, though the tower of David there mentioned, on which hung a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men, may not be identical with the tower of the king’s house in this passage; from Mic 4:8, where the tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, is the tower of the royal citadel; and from Isa 32:14, where citadel and tower (בּחן, properly watch-tower) answer to the ארמון of the royal citadel, which lay with its forts upon the hill of Zion. This high tower of the king’s house, i.e., of the royal citadel, stood, according to our verses, in the immediate neighbourhood of the angle and the corner (הפּנּה); for the section of wall which reached to the פּנּה lay opposite the angle and the high tower of the king’s house. The wall here evidently formed a corner, running no longer from south to north, but turning eastwards, and passing over Ophel, the southern spur of Moriah. A length from this corner onwards was built by Pedaiah the son of Parosh; comp. Ezr 2:3. Neh 3:26

Having now reached the place where the wall encloses Ophel, a remark is inserted, Neh 3:26, on the dwellings of Nethinim, i.e., of the temple servants. The Nethinim dwelt in Ophel as far as (the place) before the water-gate toward the east, and the tower that standeth out. הי המּגדּל still depends upon נגד עד. The water-gate towards the east, judging from Neh 12:37, lay beyond the south-eastern corner of the temple area. Bertheau, reasoning upon the view that the open space of the house of God, where Ezra spoke to the assembled people (Ezr 10:9), is identical with the open place before the water-gate mentioned Neh 8:1, Neh 8:3, Neh 8:16, places it on the east side of the temple area, near where the golden gate (Rab er Rahme) now stands. This identity, however, cannot be proved; and even if it could, it would by no means follow that this open space lay on the east side of the temple area. And as little does it follow from Neh 12:37, as we shall show when we reach this passage. היּוצא המּגדּל is said by Bertheau to have belonged perhaps to the water-gate towards the east, since, by reason of the statements contained in Neh 3:31 and Neh 3:32, we must not seek it so far northwards on the east side of the temple area, as to combine it with the remains of a tower projecting seven and a half feet from the line of wall at the north-east corner, and described by Robinson (Biblical Researches, p. 226). But even if the tower in question must not be identified with these remains, it by no means follows that it stood in the neighbourhood of the golden gate. Even Arnold, in his work already cited, p. 636, remarks, in opposition to Bertheau’s view, that “it is evident from the whole statement that the tower standing out from the king’s house, in Neh 3:25, Neh 3:26, and Neh 3:27, is one and the same, and that Bertheau’s view of our having here three separate towers can hardly be maintained,” although he, as well as Bertheau, transposes both the king’s house and the court of the prison to the south of the Temple area. The similar appellation of this tower as היּוצא in the three verses speaks so decidedly for its identity, that very forcible reasons must be adduced before the opposite view can be adopted. In Neh 3:26 it is not a locality near the water-gate in the east which is indicted by היּוצא המּגדּל, but the western boundary of the dwellings of the Nethinim lying opposite. They dwelt, that is, upon Ophel, southwards of the temple area, on a tract of land reaching from the water-gate in the east to opposite the outstanding tower of the royal citadel in the west, i.e., from the eastern slope of the ridge of Ophel down to the Tyropoean valley. Neh 3:27

After them the Tekoites repaired a second piece from opposite the great tower that standeth out to the wall of Ophel. The great (high) tower of the king’s house within the city wall being some distance removed therefrom, the portion of wall on the eastern ridge of Zion from south to north, reaching as far as the turning and the corner, and the commencement of the wall running from this corner eastwards, might both be designated as lying opposite to this tower. The portion mentioned in our verse passed along the Tyropoean valley as far as the wall of Ophel. King Jotham had built much on the wall of Ophel (2Ch 27:3); and Manasseh had surrounded Ophel with a very high wall (2Ch 33:14), i.e., carried the wall round its western, southern, and eastern sides. On the north no wall was needed, Ophel being protected on this side by the southern wall of the temple area.