And my God put into mine heart to gather together the nobles, and the rulers, and the people, that they might be reckoned by genealogy. And I found a register of the genealogy of them which came up at the first, and found written therein,
Ver. 5. And my God put into my heart] Seeing how thinly the city was inhabited, and casting in his mind what evil might come of it, he bethinks himself (by a motion from heaven) how to set things to rights; that the city might be better peopled, and so preserved. This to do, God put into his heart by his Holy Spirit (the sweet motions whereof are the sound of his goings, the footsteps of his anointed, Psa 89:51). We are not sufficient of ourselves (saith that great apostle) to think anything as of ourselves: but our sufficiency is of God, 2 Corinthians 3:5. Nemo vir magnus sine aliquo afflatu Divino unquam fuit, saith Cicero; no man ever grew to be greatly good without a Divine instinct.
To gather together the nobles, and the rulers, &c.] That out of them a tenth man might be taken to furnish out the city, Nehemiah 11:1, after that they had been first prepared by the hearing of the law, Nehemiah 8:2 .
That they might be reckoned by their genealogy] And so, Jerusalem be inhabited again, in her own place, even in Jerusalem, Zechariah 12:6 .