On this case are carved representations of the Tabernacle, of the ark, of the two altars, of the trumpets, and of the various instruments used in sacrifice.

A crimson satin cover, on which inscriptions are worked in gold thread, is thrown over this precious book.
This old manuscript is written in Hebrew, and is said by the Jews to be the work of a man whose name has already come before us in Nehemiah's story.

We saw that Eliashib, the high priest, had a grandson named Manasseh, that Manasseh married the daughter of Sanballat, the Samaritan governor, and that Nehemiah felt very strongly that the temple would never be cleansed, nor God's blessing rest upon them as a nation, so long as one of their own priests had a heathen wife, and was in constant communication with Sanballat.

Accordingly he chased Manasseh from him, he made him at once leave the temple and his high position there; and Manasseh, in disgust and indignation, went off to Samaria to his father-in-law, Sanballat, taking his heathen wife and family with him.
Now it is that very Manasseh who was, according to the Jews, the writer of the Samaritan Pentateuch, that old copy of the Books of Moses.

The Samaritans themselves declare that it is far more ancient; that it was written soon after the Israelites entered the land of Canaan, by the great-grandson of Aaron; whilst some scholars think it is far more modern than some other copies of the Pentateuch which have been discovered; but the Jews pronounce it to have been the work of Manasseh, the grandson of Eliashib, the high priest of Nehemiah's day.
Manasseh arrived in Samaria, indignant with Nehemiah, and determined to have his revenge.