And the king said to me, For what do you ask thus? So I prayed to the God of heaven.

[Turn] not [away], I pray, O Lord, but let Your ear be attentive to the prayer of Your servant, and to the prayer of Your servants, who desire to fear Your name, and prosper Your servant this day, and cause him to find mercy in the sight of this man (For I was the king's cupbearer).

And your old waste desert [places] shall be built up, and your foundations shall last through all generations; and you shall be called a repairer of breaches, and you shall cause your paths between to be in peace.

And they shall build the old waste places, they shall raise up those that were before made desolate, and shall renew the desert cities, [even] those that had been desolate for [many] generations.

And it shall come to pass, [that] before they call, I will hearken to them; while they are yet speaking, I will say, What is it?

From the day that he charged me to be their ruler in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year even to the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes, twelve years, neither I nor my brothers ate the [provisions] extorted from them.

But in all this [time] I was not in Jerusalem; for in the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon I came to the king, and after a certain time I made my request of the king;