Nehemiah 8 Bible study: They gave the sense

The chapter doesn't begin with a command to gather. It begins with the people: "All the people gathered themselves together as one man into the wide place that was in front of the water gate; and they spoke to Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the LORD had commanded to Israel" (8:1). Ezra brings it "before the assembly, both men and women, and all who could hear with understanding" (8:2). He reads "from early morning until midday" (8:3), and the chapter says how they listened: "The ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law" (8:3). When he opened the book, "all the people stood up" (8:5), and when he blessed the LORD they "answered, “Amen, Amen,” with the lifting up of their hands" and "worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground" (8:6). The chapter doesn't say what part of the law was read.

Nehemiah 8:8→leads toLuke 24:45

"They read in the book, in the law of God, distinctly; and they gave the sense, so that they understood the reading" (8:8), and the people celebrated "because they had understood the words that were declared to them" (8:12). After he rose, Jesus stood among the eleven and those who were with them (Luke 24:33, 24:36) and spoke to them of the law of Moses, the prophets and the psalms (Luke 24:44). Luke then says, "Then he opened their minds, that they might understand the Scriptures" (Luke 24:45). Luke doesn't cite Nehemiah, so setting the two side by side is a reading. It rests on a shared subject, the Scriptures and their being understood, not on a shared word. Some see in Luke 24:45 the understanding 8:8 speaks of, given by Jesus himself. Others keep each in its own setting: in Nehemiah the Levites read the law and gave the sense (8:7-8); in Luke, Jesus opened their minds after he rose (Luke 24:45), and Luke draws no line back to Ezra's day.

בִּיןbinsay BEEN

Brown-Driver-Briggs: "discern", and in the causative form, "give understanding, make understand, teach". Strong's: "to separate mentally (or distinguish)". The Hebrew of Nehemiah has it eight times, and six of them are in this chapter: "all who could hear with understanding" (8:2); "those who could understand" (8:3); the Levites "caused the people to understand the law" (8:7); "so that they understood the reading" (8:8); "the Levites who taught the people" (8:9); and "because they had understood the words that were declared to them" (8:12). The WEB gives understanding, understand, understood and taught; in Hebrew they are all bin. The other two uses in Nehemiah are "everyone who had knowledge and understanding" (10:28) and "understood the evil that Eliashib had done" (13:7).