10 And Ezra the priest stood up, and said unto them, You have transgressed, and have taken foreign wives, to increase the trespass of Israel.
11 Now therefore make confession unto the LORD God of your fathers, and do his pleasure: and separate yourselves from the people of the land, and from the foreign wives.
12 Then all the congregation answered and said with a loud voice, As you has said, so must we do.
13 But the people are many, and it is a time of heavy rain, and we are not able to stand outside, neither is this a work of one day or two: for we are many that have transgressed in this thing.
14 Let now our rulers of all the congregation stand, and let all them who have taken foreign wives in our cities come at appointed times, and with them the elders of every city, and the judges thereof, until the fierce wrath of our God for this matter is turned from us.
15 Only Jonathan the son of Asahel and Jahzeiah the son of Tikvah opposed this matter: and Meshullam and Shabbethai the Levite supported them.
16 And the children of the captivity did so. And Ezra the priest, with certain heads of the fathers' houses, according to their fathers' houses, and each of them by name, were set apart, and sat down in the first day of the tenth month to examine the matter.