The fate of Israel cannot be separated from the land of Israel. Ever since God commanded Abraham: "Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee. . ." the land was appointed to be that place where the sons of Israel could best work out their mysterious destiny. The Ten Commandments were given in a desert no people could claim, to teach us the code that was meant for all men, though Israel was its direct recipient. But most of the Bible and Apocryphal books were written in the land of Israel. They were the unique creation of the Jewish people, and they bear its imprint on every page. 

The book of Nehemiah is such a book. It deals with a stage in the growth of the Second Commonwealth of Israel. Had Nehemiah not been strong enough to bolster and defend the infant state, Israel might have been lost among the surrounding nations, as were so many of the peoples of that day.

For Nehemiah, as for all Jews born outside of Israel, there was no conflict between his duties to his native land, Persia, and his loyalty to his ancestral and religious homeland, Israel. He was rooted in both. But Bani, his nephew, is all Persian. He wants no part of the land of Israel. Indeed he rebels against the very idea of leaving Susa, the winter capital of Persia.

Builders of Jerusalem tells Bani's story: his conflict with Nehemiah; his adventures; his anxieties; and his eventual understanding and love for Israel. For those readers interested in the fate of modern Israel, Builders of Jerusalem should be very illuminating, since the problems are so similar. For those who like and exciting story, dealing with a crucial moment, of not only Jewish history, but of world history, Builders of Jerusalem will prove engrossing.

From the dust jacket