1. Nehemiah 3:13 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

What are we to understand by “repaired a thousand cubits of the wall as far as the Dung Gate”?

Nehemiah 3:13 (ESV)

13 Hanun and the inhabitants of Zanoah repaired the Valley Gate. They rebuilt it and set its doors, its bolts, and its bars, and repaired a thousand cubits of the wall, as far as the Dung Gate.

A thousand cubits computes to approximately 450 metres. For one team to reconstruct that length (plus the Valley Gate) suggests that the team (that is, the inhabitants of Zanoah under Hanun’s leadership) was extraordinarily large and competent. Alternatively, this may be the section of wall that the returned exiles had begun to reconstruct some decades ago and on which King Artaxerxes had placed a stop-work order (Ezra 4:12, Ezra 4:21). The latter is the more probable understanding.