Zechariah 10–14

Restoration of Judah and Israel

10Ask ^athe Lord for ^brain

In ^cthe time of the ¹latter rain.

The Lord will make ²flashing clouds;

He will give them showers of rain,

Grass in the field for everyone.

²For the ^didols ³speak delusion;

The diviners envision ^elies,

And tell false dreams;

They ^fcomfort in vain.

Therefore the people wend their way like ^gsheep;

They are ⁴in trouble ^hbecause there is no shepherd.

³“My anger is kindled against the ⁱshepherds,

^jAnd I will punish the ⁵goatherds.

For the Lord of hosts ^kwill visit His flock,

The house of Judah,

And ^lwill make them as His royal horse in the battle.

⁴From him comes ^mthe cornerstone,

From him ⁿthe tent peg,

From him the battle bow,

From him every ⁶ruler together.

⁵They shall be like mighty men,

Who ^otread down their enemies

In the mire of the streets in the battle.

They shall fight because the Lord is with them,

And the riders on horses shall be put to shame.

⁶“I will strengthen the house of Judah,

And I will save the house of Joseph.

^pI will bring them back,

Because I ^qhave mercy on them.

They shall be as though I had not cast them aside;

For I am the Lord their God,

And I ^rwill hear them.

⁷Those of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man,

And their ^sheart shall rejoice as if with wine.

Yes, their children shall see it and be glad;

Their heart shall rejoice in the Lord.

⁸I will ^twhistle for them and gather them,

For I will redeem them;

^uAnd they shall increase as they once increased.

⁹“I ^vwill ⁷sow them among the peoples,

And they shall ^wremember Me in far countries;

They shall live, together with their children,

And they shall return.

^10xI will also bring them back from the land of Egypt,

And gather them from Assyria.

I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon,

^yUntil no more room is found for them.

^11zHe shall pass through the sea with affliction,

And strike the waves of the sea:

All the depths of ⁸the River shall dry up.

Then ^athe pride of Assyria shall be brought down,

And ^bthe scepter of Egypt shall depart.

¹²“So I will strengthen them in the Lord,

And ^cthey shall walk up and down in His name,”

Says the Lord.

Desolation of Israel

11Open ^ayour doors, O Lebanon,

That fire may devour your cedars.

²Wail, O cypress, for the ^bcedar has fallen,

Because the mighty trees are ruined.

Wail, O oaks of Bashan,

^cFor the thick forest has come down.

³There is the sound of wailing ^dshepherds!

For their glory is in ruins.

There is the sound of roaring lions!

For the ¹pride of the Jordan is in ruins.

Prophecy of the Shepherds

⁴Thus says the Lord my God, “Feed the flock for slaughter, ⁵whose owners slaughter them and ^efeel no guilt; those who sell them ^fsay, ‘Blessed be the Lord, for I am rich’; and their shepherds do ^gnot pity them. ⁶For I will no longer pity the inhabitants of the land,” says the Lord. “But indeed I will give everyone into his neighbor’s hand and into the hand of his king. They shall ²attack the land, and I will not deliver them from their hand.”

⁷So I fed the flock for slaughter, ³in particular ^hthe poor of the flock. I took for myself two staffs: the one I called ⁴Beauty, and the other I called ⁵Bonds; and I fed the flock. ⁸I ⁶dismissed the three shepherds ⁱin one month. My soul loathed them, and their soul also abhorred me. ⁹Then I said, “I will not feed you. ^jLet what is dying die, and what is perishing perish. Let those that are left eat each other’s flesh.” ¹⁰And I took my staff, ⁷Beauty, and cut it in two, that I might break the covenant which I had made with all the peoples. ¹¹So it was broken on that day. Thus ^kthe ⁸poor of the flock, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the Lord. ¹²Then I said to them, “If it is ⁹agreeable to you, give me my wages; and if not, refrain.” So they ^lweighed out for my wages thirty pieces of silver.

¹³And the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the ^mpotter”—that princely price they set on me. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord for the potter. ¹⁴Then I cut in two my other staff, ¹Bonds, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.

¹⁵And the Lord said to me, ⁿ“Next, take for yourself the implements of a foolish shepherd. ¹⁶For indeed I will raise up a shepherd in the land who will not care for those who are cut off, nor seek the young, nor heal those that are broken, nor feed those that still stand. But he will eat the flesh of the fat and tear their hooves in ^opieces.

¹⁷“Woe ^pto the worthless shepherd,

Who leaves the flock!

A sword shall be against his arm

And against his right eye;

His arm shall completely wither,

And his right eye shall be totally blinded.”

The Coming Deliverance of Judah

12The ¹burden of the word of the Lord against Israel. Thus says the Lord, ^awho stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and ^bforms the spirit of man within him: ²“Behold, I will make Jerusalem ^ca cup of ²drunkenness to all the surrounding peoples, when they lay siege against Judah and Jerusalem. ^3dAnd it shall happen in that day that I will make Jerusalem ^ea very heavy stone for all peoples; all who would heave it away will surely be cut in pieces, though all nations of the earth are gathered against it. ⁴In that day,” says the Lord, ^f“I will strike every horse with confusion, and its rider with madness; I will open My eyes on the house of Judah, and will strike every horse of the peoples with blindness. ⁵And the governors of Judah shall say in their heart, ‘The inhabitants of Jerusalem are my strength in the Lord of hosts, their God.’ ⁶In that day I will make the governors of Judah ^glike a firepan in the woodpile, and like a fiery torch in the sheaves; they shall devour all the surrounding peoples on the right hand and on the left, but Jerusalem shall be inhabited again in her own place—Jerusalem.

⁷“The Lord will save the tents of Judah first, so that the glory of the house of David and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall not become greater than that of Judah. ⁸In that day the Lord will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; the one who is feeble among them in that day shall be like David, and the house of David shall be like God, like the Angel of the Lord before them. ⁹It shall be in that day that I will seek to ^hdestroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

Mourning for the Pierced One

¹⁰ⁱ“And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will ^jlook on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him ^kas one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn. ¹¹In that day there shall be a great ^lmourning in Jerusalem, ^mlike the mourning at Hadad Rimmon in the plain of ³Megiddo. ¹²ⁿAnd the land shall mourn, every family by itself: the family of the house of David by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of the house of ^oNathan by itself, and their wives by themselves; ¹³the family of the house of Levi by itself, and their wives by themselves; the family of Shimei by itself, and their wives by themselves; ¹⁴all the families that remain, every family by itself, and their wives by themselves.

Idolatry Cut Off

13“In that ^aday ^ba fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for ^cuncleanness.

²“It shall be in that day,” says the Lord of hosts, “that I will ^dcut off the names of the idols from the land, and they shall no longer be remembered. I will also cause ^ethe prophets and the unclean spirit to depart from the land. ³It shall come to pass that if anyone still prophesies, then his father and mother who begot him will say to him, ‘You shall ^fnot live, because you have spoken lies in the name of the Lord.’ And his father and mother who begot him ^gshall thrust him through when he prophesies.

⁴“And it shall be in that day that ^hevery prophet will be ashamed of his vision when he prophesies; they will not wear ⁱa robe of coarse hair to deceive. ^5jBut he will say, ‘I am no prophet, I am a farmer; for a man taught me to keep cattle from my youth.’ ⁶And one will say to him, ‘What are these wounds between your ¹arms?’ Then he will answer, ‘Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.’

The Shepherd Savior

⁷“Awake, O sword, against ^kMy Shepherd,

Against the Man ^lwho is My Companion,”

Says the Lord of hosts.

^m“Strike the Shepherd,

And the sheep will be scattered;

Then I will turn My hand against ⁿthe little ones.

⁸And it shall come to pass in all the land,”

Says the Lord,

“That ^otwo-thirds in it shall be cut off and die,

^pBut one-third shall be left in it:

⁹I will bring the one-third ^qthrough the fire,

Will ^rrefine them as silver is refined,

And test them as gold is tested.

^sThey will call on My name,

And I will answer them.

^tI will say, ‘This is My people’;

And each one will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’ ”

The Day of the Lord

14Behold, ^athe day of the Lord is coming,

And your ¹spoil will be divided in your midst.

²For ^bI will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem;

The city shall be taken,

The houses ²rifled,

And the women ravished.

Half of the city shall go into captivity,

But the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city.

³Then the Lord will go forth

And fight against those nations,

As He fights in the day of battle.

⁴And in that day His feet will stand ^con the Mount of Olives,

Which faces Jerusalem on the east.

And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two,

From east to west,

^dMaking a very large valley;

Half of the mountain shall move toward the north

And half of it toward the south.

⁵Then you shall flee through My mountain valley,

For the mountain valley shall reach to Azal.

Yes, you shall flee

As you fled from the ^eearthquake

In the days of Uzziah king of Judah.

^fThus the Lord my God will come,

And ^gall the saints with ³You.

⁶It shall come to pass in that day

That there will be no light;

The ⁴lights will diminish.

⁷It shall be one day

^hWhich is known to the Lord

Neither day nor night.

But at ⁱevening time it shall happen

That it will be light.

⁸And in that day it shall be—

That living ^jwaters shall flow from Jerusalem,

Half of them…