Nehemiah is very significant to Christians. Knowing that God had appointed Him governor (John 13:13-14), Jesus followed Nehemiah's example of how a governor should act (Neh. 5:14-18). He was also following Nehemiah's example when he threw the moneychangers out of the temple. Speaking of His own work, Jesus clearly had Nehemiah's rebuilding of the wall in mind (John 9:4, Neh 4:21-22). Nehemiah 2:19-20 is a most important incident, especially to Christians, since the apostles Peter and Paul both teach from it. It reads as follows:
When Sanballat the Horonite, and Tobiah the Ammonite servant, and Geshem the Arab heard, they mocked us and despised us and said, "What is this thing you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?" So I answered them and said to them, "The God of heaven will give us success; therefore we His servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or memorial in Jerusalem."
This is often cited by those who justify deporting the Arab population from Jerusalem and indeed for ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian population of the entire West Bank. But what does it actually say? Why are Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem excluded? Two possibilities appear in the text. The question we must settle is whether Nehemiah disqualified these men from any "portion or right or memorial in Jerusalem" because of their non-Jewish ethnic background, or because of what came out of their mouths.
The ethnic question is easily disposed of. Nehemiah asked the king to have Asaph the keeper of the king's forest give him timber with which to rebuild the city (Neh. 2:7-8). The king of Persia was certainly not a Jew, but Nehemiah had no objection to asking for his help in rebuilding the city and therefore having a part in its rebuilding. Non-Jewish ethnic background was in itself no problem to Nehemiah.
The problem then could only be in what came out of their mouths. The text reveals that their words consisted of mocking, arrogance, and a slanderous attempt to get Nehemiah in trouble with the king by falsely charging him with rebellion - a clear violation of God's commandment not to bear false witness against their neighbor. What "portion or right or memorial in Jerusalem" had God given lately to Jews who acted like this? Nebuchadnezzar God's servant (Jeremiah 24:9) had taken them away captive into exile, and Nehemiah himself acknowledged that this exile was just (Neh. 9:33-34). God had driven home to Nehemiah in the most severe way that Jews who act and talk like Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem have no right even to be in Jerusalem, much less to participate in building it.
Nehemiah had been appalled at the bad news concerning Jerusalem even when he was still with the king (Neh. 1:4) - how much more when he had seen it for himself. Fresh from surveying the devastation (Neh. 2:11-16), and filled with the knowledge of the insolence which had earned it, he then hears Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem expressing the very spirit which had earned this punishment. Should men expressing the spirit that had brought about the city's destruction really have a place in rebuilding it? If they had been Jews talking like this, would Nehemiah have answered any differently?
Knowing all this, and that the universal Jerusalem is the kingdom of God (Gal. 4:25-26), Paul wrote that those who practice the works of the flesh - like Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem - will not inherit the kingdom of God (Gal. 5:19-21). Paul plainly confirms Nehemiah's judgment, based not on ethnic background but on attitude toward God and neighbor.
In Acts 8:18-21, the apostle Peter also followed the steps of Nehemiah
in Samaria, which is, significantly, the city of Sanballat, Tobiah, and
Geshem. When Simon the sorcerer wanted to buy the Holy Spirit for
a bribe, Peter answered in the words of Nehemiah, "Your money perish with
you, because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money.
You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not
right in the sight of God." And that, as Peter understood, was why
Sanballat, Tobiah and Geshem had no right, no portion, or memorial in Jerusalem.
The practitioners of ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem, the vandals and olive
thieves, the lovers of oppression and cruelty, would do well to lay that
to heart.