What Does Nehemiah 5:10 Mean in the King James?
I likewise, and my brethren, and my servants, might exact of them money and corn: I pray you, let us leave off this usury.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The Hebrew behind “exact” names an ongoing creditor relationship, and the verse asks the whole group, including the speaker, to leave it behind.
THE MEANING
When your resources give you power over someone else’s need, this verse brings your own part into view: “I likewise” includes the speaker among those lending. The request to leave off the usury makes ending that burden a shared possibility.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that financial harm belongs only to outsiders: the speaker includes himself, his brothers, and his servants in the lending practice.
THE ROOT
נֹשִׁים
nōšîm
GROWS FROM
נשה
n-sh-h
To lend on interest or act as a creditor.
The word translated “exact” describes acting as a creditor, making the speaker’s position visible before the verse names what must end. “I likewise” places the people asking for change inside the same arrangement.
ALSO GROWS
nāšāh: To lend on interest or act as a creditor.
נָשָׁה
This verbal form shows the continuing practice beneath the speaker’s role.
nōšeh: A person who lends on interest.
נֹשֶׁה
This related form names the creditor as a participant in the relationship the verse asks to leave.
נַעַזְבָה־נָּא
naʿazvā-nnā
GROWS FROM
עזב
To leave, abandon, or forsake.
“leave off” in this verse is naʿazvā-nnā. The request uses the language of leaving something behind. The usury is treated as an attachment the group can abandon, not as an unavoidable feature of lending.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāzav: To leave or forsake.
עָזַב
The same root names the act the group is asked to take toward the usury.
ʿazuvah: Left behind or abandoned.
עֲזוּבָה
This related form shows the other side of the root: what is left is no longer held in place.
THE PATTERN
A community’s provision becomes a burden when another’s need is used to secure interest, and the burden can be named and relinquished.
If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury.Take thou no usury of him, or increase: but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee.But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.THE THREAD
If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury.The Hebrew word translated “usurer” here, נֹשֶׁה (nōšeh, creditor), shares the creditor root behind “might exact” in Nehemiah. The earlier verse makes the role visible; Nehemiah’s appeal includes the speaker in that role and calls the group to leave the usury behind.
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