Zephaniah 1
EasyEnglish Bible
The Lord will destroy Judah
1 This is the Lord's message, which he gave to Zephaniah, Cushi's son.[a] Cushi's father was Gedaliah. Gedaliah's father was Amariah, and Amariah's father was Hezekiah. The Lord gave this message to Zephaniah when Josiah was king. Josiah was the son of Amon, who was the king of Judah.
2 ‘It is the Lord who is speaking now.
I will remove everything from the ground.
3 I will remove men and animals.
I will remove the birds that fly in the air.
I will also remove the fish that live in the sea.
I will remove all the bad people.
Bad people cause trouble for other people.
Yes, I will remove all the people from the ground.
It is the Lord who is speaking.
4 I will destroy Judah.
I will remove all the people who live in Jerusalem.
I will remove all those who believe in the false god Baal.
I will remove Baal's priests.[b]
5 Some people stand on the roof tops to worship the sun, the moon and the stars.[c] I will remove those people.
Some people say that they love me. But they say also that they love Malcam (a false god). So I will remove them, too.’[d]
6 ‘I will remove those who have turned away from the Lord.
I will also remove those who decide things without the Lord.
7 Be quiet! The Lord God is here.
It will soon be the day of the Lord.[e]
The Lord has made his sacrifice ready.[f]
He has made the people ready who will give the sacrifice to him.’[g]
8 ‘When it is time for the Lord's sacrifice, I will punish the rulers and the king's sons.
I will punish everyone who wears clothes like foreign people do.’[h]
9 ‘I will also punish the people who rush into other people's houses. They do that because they want to rob those people.
On that same day, I will also punish other robbers. Those people fill their masters' houses with the things that they take.’
10 The Lord says, ‘On that day you will hear the noise of people who are shouting from one gate of the city. It is the gate called the Fish Gate.
And there will be sad sounds from the next gate.
There will be loud noises from the hills.
11 Shout out, you who live near Jerusalem's market! Weep!
The Lord will remove the traders from your town.
Some people have lots of money there. But all those people will be dead then.’[i]
12 ‘At that time,
I will look in all Jerusalem's dark corners. I will take lights with me.
I will find the drunks and I will punish them. These people say in their minds,
“The Lord will do neither good things nor bad things to us.”
13 So I will take away from them everything that they have.
I will take away their houses too.
They will build houses, but they will never live in them.
They will plant plants to get grapes. But they will never have wine from them.’
The great day of the Lord
14 The time for the great day of the Lord is coming very soon.
It will happen quickly.
Strong men will weep when they hear the noise of it.
15 The Lord will be very angry at that time.
It will be a time when there will be trouble.
On that day, he will destroy everything bad.
It will be very dark. At that time, there will be thick dark clouds.
16 At that time, people will make a noise with trumpets. They will shout when they go to fight in a war.
In the fight, they will try to destroy the strong walls of cities.
And they will try to destroy the strong high parts of the walls.
17 I will cause trouble for people.
So they will walk like people who cannot see.
This is because they have not obeyed the Lord.
Their blood will fall to the ground.
Yes, they will fall to the ground and they will die. After that, they will be nothing.
18 Their money will not save them,
on the day when the Lord is angry.
He watches.
And he is angry when his people love other gods.
So he will send fire on the earth.
Yes, he will quickly kill all the people who live in Judah.
Footnotes
- 1:1 When we write Lord like this, it is a special name for God. Sometimes people write it as ‘Yahweh’, or as ‘Jehovah’. It is his own name that he told Moses. See Exodus 3:14. It means ‘I am who I am’. This shows that God has always been there and he always will be there.
- 1:4 priests: See 2 Kings 23:5.
- 1:5 the sun, the moon and the stars: Many people in w Judah worshipped the sun and the stars. See 2 Kings 23:11; Jeremiah 19:13; Ezekiel 8:16.
- 1:5 Malcam: The people who worshipped the false god Malcam killed their own children. They thought that it made Malcam happy.
- 1:7 ‘day of the Lord’ is the time when God comes as the great judge.
- 1:7 sacrifice: Here, this does not mean an animal. It means the people who worshipped false gods.
- 1:7 the people that God made ready: the army of the Chaldeans.
- 1:8 Foreign people probably put these clothes on when they worshipped their own gods.
- 1:11 This will happen to Judah's people when the army of the Chaldeans comes.
Zephaniah 1
New King James Version
The Great Day of the Lord(A)
1 The word of the Lord which came to Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of (B)Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah.
The Great Day of the Lord
2 “I will [a]utterly consume everything
From the face of the land,”
Says the Lord;
3 “I(C) will consume man and beast;
I will consume the birds of the heavens,
The fish of the sea,
And the [b]stumbling blocks along with the wicked.
I will cut off man from the face of the [c]land,”
Says the Lord.
4 “I will stretch out My hand against Judah,
And against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
[d]I will cut off every trace of Baal from this place,
The names of the (D)idolatrous[e] priests with the pagan priests—
5 Those (E)who worship the host of heaven on the housetops;
Those who worship and swear oaths by the Lord,
But who also swear (F)by [f]Milcom;
6 (G)Those who have turned back from following the Lord,
And (H)have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of Him.”
7 (I)Be silent in the presence of the Lord God;
(J)For the day of the Lord is at hand,
For (K)the Lord has prepared a sacrifice;
He has [g]invited His guests.
8 “And it shall be,
In the day of the Lord’s sacrifice,
That I will punish (L)the princes and the king’s children,
And all such as are clothed with foreign apparel.
9 In the same day I will punish
All those who (M)leap over the threshold,
Who fill their masters’ houses with violence and deceit.
10 “And there shall be on that day,” says the Lord,
“The sound of a mournful cry from (N)the Fish Gate,
A wailing from the Second Quarter,
And a loud crashing from the hills.
11 (O)Wail, you inhabitants of [h]Maktesh!
For all the merchant people are cut down;
All those who handle money are cut off.
12 “And it shall come to pass at that time
That I will search Jerusalem with lamps,
And punish the men
Who are (P)settled[i] in complacency,
(Q)Who say in their heart,
‘The Lord will not do good,
Nor will He do evil.’
13 Therefore their goods shall become booty,
And their houses a desolation;
They shall build houses, but not inhabit them;
They shall plant vineyards, but (R)not drink their wine.”
14 (S)The great day of the Lord is near;
It is near and hastens quickly.
The noise of the day of the Lord is bitter;
There the mighty men shall cry out.
15 (T)That day is a day of wrath,
A day of trouble and distress,
A day of devastation and desolation,
A day of darkness and gloominess,
A day of clouds and thick darkness,
16 A day of (U)trumpet and alarm
Against the fortified cities
And against the high towers.
17 “I will bring distress upon men,
And they shall (V)walk like blind men,
Because they have sinned against the Lord;
Their blood shall be poured out like dust,
And their flesh like refuse.”
18 (W)Neither their silver nor their gold
Shall be able to deliver them
In the day of the Lord’s wrath;
But the whole land shall be devoured
By the fire of His jealousy,
For He will make speedy riddance
Of all those who dwell in the land.
Footnotes
- Zephaniah 1:2 Lit. make a complete end of, Jer. 8:13
- Zephaniah 1:3 Idols
- Zephaniah 1:3 ground
- Zephaniah 1:4 Fulfilled in 2 Kin. 23:4, 5
- Zephaniah 1:4 Heb. chemarim
- Zephaniah 1:5 Or Malcam, an Ammonite god, 1 Kin. 11:5; Jer. 49:1; Molech, Lev. 18:21
- Zephaniah 1:7 Lit. set apart, consecrated
- Zephaniah 1:11 A market district of Jerusalem, lit. Mortar
- Zephaniah 1:12 Lit. on their lees; like the dregs of wine
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Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
