Zechariah 9:11-17
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
Restoration of the People
11 As for you, by the blood of your covenant,[a](A)
I have freed your prisoners from a waterless pit.
12 Return to a fortress,[b]
O prisoners of hope;
This very day, I announce
I am restoring double to you.
13 For I have bent Judah as my bow,
I have set Ephraim as its arrow;
I will arouse your sons, O Zion,
against your sons, O Yavan,[c]
and I will use you as a warrior’s sword.
14 The Lord will appear over them,
God’s arrow will shoot forth as lightning;
The Lord God will sound the ram’s horn,
and come in a storm from the south.(B)
15 The Lord of hosts will protect them;
they will devour and conquer with sling stones,
they will drink and become heated as with wine;
they will be full like bowls—like the corners of the altar.(C)
16 And the Lord their God will save them:
the people, like a flock on that day;(D)
For like gemstones of a crown[d]
they will shine on the land.
17 Then how good and how lovely!
Grain will make the young men flourish,
and new wine the young women.(E)
Footnotes
- 9:11 The blood of your covenant: the covenant between the Lord and Israel sealed with sacrificial blood (Ex 24:8).
- 9:12 Fortress: the Hebrew word for “fortress” (bissaron) plays upon the Hebrew word for Zion (siyyon). Those who return to Zion will be protected by the Lord. O prisoners of hope: imagery of exile, conveying a sense that the future in Israel will be better.
- 9:13 Your sons, O Yavan: the reference is to the Greeks and their struggle with the Persians for control of Syria-Palestine and the eastern Mediterranean in the mid-fifth century B.C.
- 9:16 Like gemstones of a crown: imagery reminiscent of First Zechariah (3:9; 4:7, 10; 6:11, 14) and evocative of the Temple and the priestly headgear (cf. Ex 29:6 and Lv 8:9).
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