In those days I also saw Jews who had married women from Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod or of the other peoples, but could not speak the language of Judah. I rebuked them and called down curses on them. I beat some of these men and pulled out their hair. Then I made them take an oath before God and said, "You must not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters as wives for your sons or for yourselves! Did not King Solomon of Israel sin in matters like this? There was not a king like him among many nations, and he was loved by his God, who made him king over all Israel—yet foreign women drew him into sin. Must we now hear that you too are doing all this terrible evil and acting unfaithfully against our God by marrying foreign women?"
No Ammonite or Moabite or any of their descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, even to the tenth generation.
Significance
Nehemiah 13:23 discovers Jews married to women from Ammon and Moab — the very nations excluded from the assembly in Deuteronomy 23:3 (לֹא־יָבֹא עַמּוֹנִי וּמוֹאָבִי בִּקְהַל יְהוָה, lo-yavo Ammoni uMoavi biqhal YHWH). Nehemiah's violent response — rebuking, cursing, beating, and extracting oaths — reflects his understanding that intermarriage with these specific nations compounds the Deuteronomic prohibition. His invocation of Solomon's fall through foreign wives (v. 26) adds a historical precedent argument: even Israel's wisest king was led into sin by precisely such marriages. The passage shows Nehemiah applying Deuteronomy 23 not merely as an assembly-entrance regulation but as a broader principle against covenant-threatening foreign entanglement.
Found via
Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type
Allusion
Connection Method(s)
Longitudinal Theme
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