What Does Nehemiah 6:13 Mean?
Therefore he was hired, that I would be afraid, and do so, and miss the mark, and that they might have an evil name, and reproach me.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Therefore was he hired, that I should be afraid, and do so, and sin, and that they might have matter for an evil report, that they might reproach me.THE KEY
The trap is paid to turn fear into your act, then turn that act into a bad name others can use against you.
THE MEANING
The verse shows a fear trap at work now: pressure draws you toward the very act someone wants you to commit. The “evil report” is literally a “bad name” (שֵׁם רָע, shem ra), giving others an act to cast as your nature and use to shame you. Fear is the lever; your action is meant to become the accusation that outlasts the moment of fear.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that intimidation ends when the frightening moment passes: the intended harm is the public label the coerced act can supply.
THE ROOT
שָׂכוּר
sākûr
GROWS FROM
שכר
sakar
To hire or engage for wages.
“hired” in this verse is sākûr. The verse does not present fear as an accidental atmosphere: it is the intended product of paid counsel. The wage-root makes the scheme an exchange, with someone commissioned to create the fear that could produce a compromising act.
ALSO GROWS
sākār: Wages or recompense.
שָׂכָר
The same word family makes the payment behind the influence visible: this fear is commissioned, not incidental.
sākîr: A hired worker or wage earner.
שָׂכִיר
This branch names someone engaged for payment, matching the verse’s picture of fear deliberately manufactured.
וְחָטָאתִי
veḥāṭā’tî
GROWS FROM
חטא
ḥāṭāʾ
To miss, go wrong, or sin.
“miss the mark” in this verse is veḥāṭā’tî. The root carries the sense of missing or going wrong beneath the word “sin.” The trap depends on inducing a real misstep, then turning that deed into a damaging name.
ALSO GROWS
ḥaṭṭā’t: Sin; also an offering for sin.
חַטָּאת
The word family holds wrongdoing and the offering associated with it together, showing that the deed is more than the public shame attached to it.
ḥōṭē’: One who sins.
חוֹטֵא
This branch names a person by the act, echoing the verse’s danger that a deed becomes a label others attach to someone.
THE PATTERN
Fear becomes a snare when pressure redirects conduct into a wrong act that can be exposed and used against someone.
The trembling of man sets a snare, but the one who leans his full weight on the LORD is set on high.Saul said to Samuel, I have missed the mark, for I have crossed over the mouth of the LORD and your words, because I feared the people and heard and responded to their voice.For before some came from James, he ate together with the nations. But when they came, he drew back and marked himself off, fearing those from the circumcision.THE THREAD
Saul said to Samuel, I have missed the mark, for I have crossed over the mouth of the LORD and your words, because I feared the people and heard and responded to their voice.Both verses use ירא (yare, fear): Nehemiah has אִירָא (ʾîrāʾ, “I may fear”), while Samuel has יָרֵאתִי (yārē’tî, “I feared”). In both, fear of other people presses toward an act that becomes grounds for blame or reproach.
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