Bible Strands
Nehemiah 1:7
We have behaved corruptly against You and have not kept the commandments, statutes, and ordinances that You gave Your servant Moses.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Nehemiah speaks to God on behalf of the Israelites during a prayer of confession. He positions himself and his ancestors as guilty parties immediately after reporting Jerusalem's ruined state.
The words — The Hebrew חָבַ֣לְנוּ (cha.Val.nu) literally means "we have acted corruptly," contrasted with שָׁמַ֣רְנוּ (sha.Mar.nu), "we have kept," to mark the explicit failure to observe the commandments and statutes.
The thread — The text's pattern of corporate failure to keep divine statutes runs in Daniel 9:5, Daniel 9:11, and Daniel 9:13, where exiled leaders similarly acknowledge transgression against the Law of Moses.
Why it lands — The verse states that the people broke specific, recorded commands rather than committing vague moral failures. It asks a reader to treat confession as a precise accounting of broken obligations before any other theological application.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou commandedst thy servant Moses.
Cross-references
- Daniel 9:5 we have sinned and done wrong. We have acted wickedly and rebelled. We have turned away from Your commandments and ordinances.
- Daniel 9:11 All Israel has transgressed Your law and turned away, refusing to obey Your voice; so the oath and the curse written in the Law of Moses the servant of God has been poured out on us, because we have sinned against You.
- Daniel 9:13 Just as it is written in the Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us, yet we have not sought the favor of the LORD our God by turning from our iniquities and giving attention to Your truth.
- Psalms 106:6 We have sinned like our fathers; we have done wrong and acted wickedly.
- Leviticus 27:34 These are the commandments that the LORD gave to Moses for the Israelites on Mount Sinai.
- Deuteronomy 4:1 Hear now, O Israel, the statutes and ordinances I am teaching you to follow, so that you may live and may enter and take possession of the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.
- Deuteronomy 4:5 See, I have taught you statutes and ordinances just as the LORD my God has commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land that you are about to enter and possess.
- Deuteronomy 5:1 Then Moses summoned all Israel and said to them: Hear, O Israel, the statutes and ordinances that I declare in your hearing this day. Learn them and observe them carefully.
- Deuteronomy 6:1 These are the commandments and statutes and ordinances that the LORD your God has instructed me to teach you to follow in the land that you are about to enter and possess,
- Deuteronomy 28:14 Do not turn aside to the right or to the left from any of the words I command you today, and do not go after other gods to serve them.