Zephaniah 2
2
God Asks People to Change Their Lives
1Shameless people, change your lives 2before you become like a dry and dying flower. In the heat of day, a flower will wilt and die. You will be like that when the Lord shows his terrible anger. So change your lives before the Lord shows his anger against you! 3All you humble people, come to the Lord! Obey his laws. Learn to do good things. Learn to be humble. Maybe then you will be safe when the Lord shows his anger.
The Lord Will Punish Israel’s Neighbors
4No one will be left in Gaza. Ashkelon will be destroyed. By noon, the people will be forced to leave Ashdod. Ekron#2:4 Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron Philistine cities. In Hebrew, Zephaniah is making wordplays on the names of these cities. will be empty.#2:4 empty In Hebrew this word is like the word meaning “Philistines.” Also in verse 6. 5You Cretans#2:5 Cretans People from Crete. The Philistines came from that island. living by the sea, this message from the Lord is about you. Canaan, land of the Philistines, you will be destroyed—no one will live there! 6Your land by the sea will become empty fields for shepherds and their sheep. 7Then the land will belong to the survivors from Judah. The Lord their God will remember the people from Judah and restore their fortunes. Then they will let their sheep eat the grass in those fields. In the evenings they will lie down in the empty houses of Ashkelon.
8The Lord says, “I know what the people of Moab and Ammon did. They embarrassed my people. They took their land to make their own countries larger. 9So, as surely as I am alive, Moab and the people of Ammon will be destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah. I am the Lord All-Powerful, the God of Israel, and I promise those countries will be destroyed completely forever. Their land will be overgrown with weeds. It will be like the land covered with salt by the Dead Sea. The survivors of my people will take that land and everything left in it.”
10This will happen to the people of Moab and Ammon because they were so proud and cruel and humiliated the people of the Lord All-Powerful. 11They will be afraid of the Lord, because he will destroy their gods. Then everyone in all the faraway lands will worship the Lord. 12People of Ethiopia, this even means you! The Lord’s sword will kill your people. 13Then the Lord will turn north and punish Assyria. He will destroy Nineveh—that city will be like an empty, dry desert. 14Only sheep and wild animals will live in those ruins. Owls and crows will sit on the columns that are left standing. Their calls will be heard coming through the windows. Crows will sit on the doorsteps. Black birds#2:14 Black birds Or “cedar beams.” will make their homes in those empty houses. 15Nineveh is so proud now. It is such a happy city. The people think they are safe. They think Nineveh is the greatest place in the world, but it will be destroyed! It will be an empty place where only wild animals go to rest. People who pass by will whistle and shake their heads when they see how badly the city was destroyed.
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© 1987, 2004 Bible League International
Tsephanyah (Zephaniah) 2
2
1Gather together, gather together, O nation without shame,
2before the law gives birth – the day shall pass on like chaff – before the burning wrath of יהוה comes upon you, before the day of wrath of יהוה comes upon you!
3Seek יהוה, all you meek ones of the earth, who have done His right-ruling. Seek righteousness, seek meekness, if so be that you are hidden in the day of wrath of יהוה.
4For Azzah is abandoned and Ashqelon laid waste, Ashdoḏ is driven out at noonday and Eqron is uprooted.
5Woe to the inhabitants of the seacoast, the nation of the Kerĕthites! The word of יהוה is against you, O Kena‛an, land of the Philistines, “And I shall destroy you, so that there is no inhabitant.”
6And the seacoast shall be pastures, shepherds’ meadows and enclosures for flocks.
7And the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Yehuḏah. They shall feed their flocks on it, at evening they lie down in the houses of Ashqelon. For יהוה their Elohim shall visit them and turn back their captivity.
8“I have heard the reproach of Mo’aḇ, and the revilings of the children of Ammon, with which they have reproached My people, and exalted themselves against their borders.
9“Therefore, as I live,” declares יהוה of hosts, the Elohim of Yisra’ĕl, “Mo’aḇ shall be like Seḏom, and the children of Ammon like Amorah – a possession for weeds and a pit of salt, and a waste forever, the remnant of My people plunder them, and the rest of My nation possess them.”
10This is what they get for their pride, because they have reproached and exalted themselves against the people of יהוה of hosts.
11יהוה shall be awesome to them, for He shall make all the mighty ones of the earth to shrivel, while all the coastlands of the nations bow down to Him, each one from his place.
12“You too, O Kushites, are to be slain by My sword.”
13And He shall stretch out His hand against the north, and destroy Ashshur, and make Ninewĕh a waste, as dry as a wilderness.
14And droves shall lie down in her midst, every beast of the nation, both pelican and bittern lodge in the tops of her columns, a voice singing at the window, ruin be at the threshold, for the cedar work is exposed.
15This is the exultant city that is dwelling in safety, that said in her heart, “I am it, and there is none but me.” How has she become a waste, a place for beasts to lie down! Everyone who passes by her whistles and shakes his fist.
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