7:1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev.
7:2 Now the town of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regemmelech and ①their men to ②seek the favor of the LORD,
▷ ①Lit his ②Lit soften the face of
7:3 speaking to the priests who belong to the house of the LORD of armies, and to the prophets, saying, “Shall I weep in the fifth month ①and fast, as I have done these many years?”
▷ ①Lit to fast
7:4 Then the word of the LORD of armies came to me, saying,
7:5 “Say to all the people of the land and to the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months ①these seventy years, was it actually for Me that you fasted?
▷ ①Lit and this
7:6 And when you eat and drink, ①do you not eat for yourselves and drink for yourselves?
▷ ①Lit is it not you who eat and you who drink
7:7 Are these not the words which the LORD proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and carefree along with its cities around it, and the ①Negev and the ②foothills were inhabited?’ ”
▷ ①I.e., South country ②Heb Shephelah
7:8 Then the word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying,
7:9 “This is what the LORD of armies has said: ‘Dispense true justice and practice kindness and compassion each to his brother;
7:10 and do not oppress the widow or the ①orphan, the stranger or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.’
▷ ①Or fatherless
7:11 But they refused to pay attention, and ①turned a stubborn shoulder and ②plugged their ears from hearing.
▷ ①Lit gave ②Lit made their ears heavy
7:12 They also made their hearts as hard as a diamond ①so that they could not hear the Law and the words which the LORD of armies had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets; therefore great wrath came from the LORD of armies.
▷ ①Lit from hearing
7:13 And just as He called and they would not listen, so they called and I would not listen,” says the LORD of armies;
7:14 “but I ①scattered them with a storm wind among all the nations whom they did not know. So the land was desolated behind them ②so that no one went back and forth, since they made the pleasant land desolate.”
▷ ①Lit stormed them away upon all ②Lit from passing and from returning