Zechariah 7
7
You Should Have Obeyed the LORD’s Prophets
1On the fourth day of the ninth month (the month of Chislev) in Darius’ fourth year as king, the Lord spoke his word to Zechariah. 2Now, ⌞the people from⌟ Bethel sent Sharezer and Regem Melech with their men #7:2 Or “Bethel Sharezer sent Regem Melech with his men.” to ask the Lord for a blessing. 3They asked the priests from the house of the Lord of Armies as well as the prophets, “Should we mourn and fast in the fifth month as we have done for so many years?”
4Then the Lord of Armies spoke his word to me. He said, 5“Tell all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months these past 70 years, did you really do it for me? 6When you ate and drank, didn’t you do it to benefit yourselves? 7Aren’t these the same words that the Lord announced through the earlier prophets, when Jerusalem and its surrounding cities were inhabited and undisturbed and the Negev and the foothills were still inhabited?’ ”
8Then the Lord spoke his word to Zechariah. He said, 9“This is what the Lord of Armies says: Administer real justice, and be compassionate and kind to each other. 10Don’t oppress widows, orphans, foreigners, and poor people. And don’t even think of doing evil to each other.
11“But people refused to pay attention. They shrugged their shoulders at me and shut their ears so that they couldn’t hear. 12They made their hearts as hard as flint so that they couldn’t hear the Lord’s teachings, the words that the Lord of Armies had sent by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. So the Lord of Armies became very angry.
13“When I called, they wouldn’t listen. So now when they call, I won’t listen, says the Lord of Armies. 14I used a windstorm to scatter them among all the nations, nations they hadn’t even heard of. They left behind a land so ruined that no one is able to travel through it. They have turned a pleasant land into a wasteland.”
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Zecharyah 7
7
1And it came to pass in the shnat arba of Daryavesh HaMelech, that the Devar Hashem came unto Zecharyah in the fourth of the chodesh hateshi'i (ninth month), even in Kislev;
2And Beit-El had sent Sar-Etzer and Regem-Melech, and their men, to make entreaty for favor before Hashem,
3And to speak unto the kohanim which were in the Beis Hashem Tzva'os, and to the nevi'im, saying, Should I mourn in the fifth month, hinnazer (separating myself by fasting), as I have done these so many shanim?
4Then came the Devar Hashem Tzva'os unto me, saying,
5Speak unto kol Am Ha'Aretz, and to the kohanim, saying, When ye did a tzom and mourned in the fifth and seventh, even these past shivim shanah, did ye at all fast the tzom unto Me, even to Me?
6And when ye did eat, and when ye did drink, did not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?
7Should ye not hear the devarim which Hashem hath preached by the nevi'im harishonim, when Yerushalayim was inhabited and at ease, and the towns thereof round about her, when men inhabited the Negev and the Shefelah?
8And the Devar Hashem came unto Zecharyah, saying,
9Thus saith Hashem Tzva'os, saying, Administer mishpat emes. And let every man show chesed and rachamim to his brother;
10And oppress not the almanah, nor the yetomim, the ger, nor the aniyim; and let none of you imagine ra'ah against his brother in your lev.
11But they refused to heed, and stubbornly stiffened their shoulders, stopped up their oznayim, that they not hear.
12Yea, they made their hearts as shamir (diamond),#7:12 i.e., hard as shamir and would not yield in mishma'at (obedience) to the Torah and the devarim which Hashem Tzva'os hath sent by His Ruach#7:12 Hakodesh through the hand of the nevi'im harishonim; therefore came a ketzef gadol (great wrath) from Hashem Tzva'os.
13Therefore it is come to pass, that as He#7:13 Hashem called, and they would not hear; so they called, and I would not hear, saith Hashem Tzva'os;
14But I dispersed them with a whirlwind among kol HaGoyim which they had not known. Thus HaAretz was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned; for they laid the Eretz Chemdat#7:14 Jer 3:19 (Desired Land) desolate.
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