But perhaps the most trying thing which the Samaritans did was to put a stop to a very old and very favourite custom of the Jews.  For a long time those Jews who lived in Jerusalem had been accustomed to let their brethren in Babylon know the very time that the Passover moon rose in Jerusalem, so that they and their absent friends might keep the feast together at the very same time.  They did this in a very curious and interesting way.  As soon as the watchers on the Mount of Olives saw the moon rising, they lighted a beacon fire, other fires were already prepared on a succession of hilltops, reaching all the way from Jerusalem to Babylon.  As soon as the light was seen on Olivet the next fire was lighted, and then the next, and the next, till in a very short time those Jews who sat by the waters of Babylon saw the signal, and joined in the Passover rejoicing with their friends hundreds of miles away in Jerusalem.  It showed them that they were not forgotten, and it helped them to join in the prayer and the praise of those who were in their father-land.

But the Samaritans annoyed the Jews and spoilt this beautiful old custom, by lighting false fires on other mountains, on wrong days, and at wrong hours, and thus confusing those who were watching by the beacon-fires.  After a time, so many mistakes were made by means of these false signals, that the Jews were compelled to give up the system of beacon-fires altogether, and to depend on the slower course of sending messengers.

We have now come to the end of Nehemiah’s story, and we have, at the very same time, come to the end of the history of the Old Testament.  For if all the historical books were arranged chronologically, Nehemiah’s book would come the very last in the series.  Nothing more is told us in the Book of God of this world’s history, until St. Matthew takes up the pen and writes an account of the birth of the expected Messiah.  Yet between the Book of Nehemiah and the Gospel of St. Matthew there is an interval of 400 years, years which were full of interest in Jewish history, but of which we are told nothing in the Bible story.

There was one prophet who lived in the time of Nehemiah, and whose book is a commentary on the book of Nehemiah.  The prophet Malachi was living in Jerusalem at this very time, and if we look at his book we shall see that mention is made of many things of which we are told in the Book of Nehemiah.  For instance, if we turn to Mai. iii. 8, 9, 10, we shall find the very words which the prophet spoke to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, at the time when the temple store-house was empty, and when the people had ceased to bring their tithes and offerings, and to give God the due proportion of their possessions.

’Will a man rob God?  Yet ye have robbed Me.  But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?  In tithes and offerings.  Ye are cursed with a curse; for ye have robbed Me, even this whole nation.  Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in Mine house.’