Ezra reads the Law to the people
Standing on a wooden platform, Ezra read the Law from dawn until noon while Levites explained it; the people wept, then celebrated the Feast of Booths and renewed the covenant.
Then he said to them, “Go your way. Eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to him for whom nothing is prepared, for today is holy to our Lord. Don’t be grieved, for the joy of Yahweh is your strength.”
Nehemiah 8:10 (World English Bible)
Nehemiah told the weeping crowd that this was a holy day for feasting, not mourning. For the first time since Joshua's day the whole community lived in booths for the festival. The people then signed a written covenant to keep the Law.
Places
Ancient witnesses outside the Bible
Historical sources, not Scripture.
- 1 Esdras 9:37–55 — as 1 Esdras retells it
Dating notes
The seventh month, just after the wall was finished (Nehemiah 7:73–8:2), 454 BC in Ussher.