Zechariah 14 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
Late sixth or fifth century BC, in the Persian period after the temple was rebuilt around 516 BC
Location
Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives just east of the city, looking out toward the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean
Audience
Jews of the restored community in Judah, living under Persian rule with a rebuilt but modest temple
Situation
The book ends with a day when nations gather against Jerusalem, the Mount of Olives splits in two to open an escape valley, and living water flows out of the city year round. The surviving nations then come up yearly to keep the Festival of Shelters.
Key Background
Jerusalem sits on limestone hills with only one reliable spring, so a picture of water running east and west in both summer and winter reverses the city's basic geographic weakness. The earthquake in the days of King Uzziah, referred to here as a memory, was severe enough to leave traces in the archaeological record and stayed in Israel's collective memory for centuries. The Festival of Shelters was the autumn harvest pilgrimage when Israelites camped in temporary huts, and it was tied to praying for the coming rains, which is why nations that refuse to attend are threatened with drought.
Look, a is that to when they from you will be split up inside your own walls.
I will gather every nation against Jerusalem for war. The city will be captured, the houses stripped, the and half the city will go though the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.
Then Yahweh will out and those nations, the way he fights on a day of battle.
On that day his feet will stand on the of the ridge that faces Jerusalem from the east, and the of will down the from east to west into an enormous valley, half the mountain pulling away north and half of it south.
You will run out through the valley between my mountains, because that valley will reach all the way to Azal. You will run the way your people ran from the earthquake in the of king of Judah. Then Yahweh my God will come, and all with him.
On that day there will be no light, no and no
It will be of its own, and Yahweh is the who knows it, neither nor night, and when evening comes there will still be light.
On that day, will run out from Jerusalem, half of it toward the eastern sea, half of it toward the western sea, in and in
will be king over the whole earth. On that day will be one, and
The whole land will be flattened into from down to south of Jerusalem. But Jerusalem will stand high, still on her own ground, from the Gate of Benjamin to the place of the First Gate, on to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the king's winepresses.
People will live in her. Nothing there will ever again be for and Jerusalem will settle down without fear.
And this is the Yahweh will strike every nation with, all of them who marched out against Jerusalem: their flesh will while they are still standing on their feet, their eyes will in the sockets, their tongues will in their mouths.
On that day Yahweh will send a down among them. Each man will grab the hand of the man beside him, and his own hand will come up against his neighbour's.
Judah too will be at and the wealth of all the surrounding nations will be gathered in, gold and silver and in enormous quantity.
A sickness like that one will fall on the horses and the mules, the camels and the donkeys, and every animal in those camps.
Then everyone left alive out of all the nations that came against Jerusalem will come up, year after year, to bow down before the King, who and to keep the of
And if any family on earth will not come up to Jerusalem to bow down before the King, Yahweh who commands armies, no will on them.
And if the of will not come up, will not present themselves, then no rain will fall on them either. They will get the same sickness Yahweh strikes every nation with that will not come up to keep the Festival of Shelters.
This is what for to come, and what every nation that will not come up to keep the Festival of Shelters.
On that day, the on the will be engraved TO and the in Yahweh's house will count for as much as the bowls in front of the altar.
Every in Jerusalem and in Judah will to who commands armies. Anyone who comes to make an offering will take a off the shelf and boil the meat in it. And on that day there will no longer be a in the house of who commands armies.