12 Minor Prophets (DSS)

Minor Prophets Dead Sea Scrolls

Minor Prophets Dead Sea Scrolls - Divided By Scroll

4Q76 Minor Prophetsa

Language: Hebrew

Date: 150-125 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents:

Jonah 1:1-5, 7-10, 15-17; 2:6; 3:2;

Zechariah 14:18;

Malachi 2:10-4:6 (Hebrew 2:10-3:24)   

Jonah 1

01 Now Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me.”

03 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh.

04 But Yahweh sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty storm on the sea, so that the ship was likely to break up.

05 Then the mariners were afraid, and every man cried to his god. They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone down into the innermost parts of the ship, and he was laying down, and was fast asleep.

[..]

07 They all said to each other, “Come! Let’s cast lots, that we may know who is responsible for this evil that is on us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

08 Then they asked him, “Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? Of what people are you?”

09 He said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear Yahweh, the God of heaven, and I fear he who has made the sea and the dry land.”

10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, “What have you done?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of Yahweh, because he had told them.

[..]

15 So they took up Jonah, and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging.

16 Then the men feared Yahweh exceedingly; and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh, and made vows.

17 Yahweh prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.   

Jonah 2

06 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth barred me in forever: yet have you brought up my life from the pit, Yahweh my God.  

[..]

Jonah 3

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message as this that I give you.”

[..]

Zechariah 14

18 If the family of Egypt doesn’t go up, and doesn’t come, neither will it rain on them. This will be the plague with which Yahweh will strike the nations that don’t go up to keep the feast of tents.

[..]

Malachi 2

10 Don’t we all have one father? Hasn’t one God created us? Why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, profaning the covenant of our fathers?

11 Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the holiness of Yahweh which he loves, and has married the daughter house of a foreign god.

12 Yahweh will cut off, to the man who does this, him who wakes and him who answers, out of the tents of Jacob, and him who offers an offering to Yahweh of Armies.

13 This again you do: you cover Yahweh’s altar with tears, and with weeping, and with sighing, because of troubles, does he doesn’t regard the offering any more, neither or receives receive it with good will at your hand.?[1]

14 Yet you say, ‘Why?’ Because Yahweh has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion, and the wife of your covenant.

15 Did he not make you one, although he had the residue of the Spirit? Why one? He sought godly offspring. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let no one deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.

16 For I hate if you hate and divorce”, says Yahweh, the God of to Israel, “and him who covers his they cover my garment with violence!” says Yahweh of Armies. “Therefore take heed to your spirit, that you don’t deal treacherously.

17 And you have wearied Yahweh God with your words. Yet you say, ‘How have we wearied him?’ In that you say, ‘Everyone who does evil is good in Yahweh’s sight, and he delights in them;’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’   

Malachi 3

01 “Therefore behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me; and the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, behold, he comes!” says Yahweh of Armies.

02 “But who can endure the day of his coming them? They come. And who will stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire, and like launderers’ soap;

03 and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer to Yahweh offerings in righteousness.

04 Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasant to Yahweh, as in the days of old, and as in ancient years.

05 I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against the perjurers, and against those who oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and who deprive the foreigner of justice, and don’t fear me,” says Yahweh of Armies.

06 “For I, Yahweh, don’t change; therefore you, sons of Jacob, are not consumed.

07 From the days of your fathers you have turned away from my ordinances, and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you,” says Yahweh of Armies. “But you say, ‘How shall we return?’

08 Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me! But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In tithes and offerings.

09 You are cursed with the curse are looking at appearances; for you rob me, even this whole nation.

10 Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and test me now in this,” says Yahweh of Armies, “if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a the blessing, that there will not be room enough for.

11 I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast its fruit before its time in the field,” says Yahweh of Armies.

12 “All nations shall call you blessed, for you will be a delightful land,” says Yahweh of Armies.

13 “Your words have been stout against me,” says Yahweh. “Yet you say, ‘What have we spoken against you?’

14 You have said, ‘It is vain to serve God;’ and ‘What profit is it that we have followed his instructions, and that we have walked mournfully before Yahweh of Armies?

15 Now we call the proud happy; yes, those who work wickedness are built up; and yes, they tempt God, and escape.’

16 Then those who feared Yahweh spoke one with another; and Yahweh listened, and heard, and a book of memory was written before him, for those who feared Yahweh, and who honored his name.

17 They shall be mine,” says Yahweh of Armies, “my own possession in the day that I make, and I will spare them, as a man spares his own son who serves him.

18 Then you shall return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God and him who doesn’t serve him.   

Malachi 4

01 “For, behold, the day comes, it burns as a furnace; and all the proud, and all who work wickedness, will be stubble; and the day that comes will burn them up,” says Yahweh of Armies, “that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.

02 But to you who fear my name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in its wings. You will go out, and leap like calves a calf of the stall.

03 You shall tread down counsel the wicked; for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I make,” says Yahweh of Armies.

04 “Remember the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded to him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances.

05 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes.

06 He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.”

 [1] The significant change in the latter part of

Malachi 2:13 is due to only one Hebrew letter difference in the scroll as compared to the MT.

4Q77 Minor Prophetsb

Language: Hebrew

Date: 150-125 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents:

Zephaniah 1:1-2, 18; 2:13-15; 3:19-20;

Haggai 1:1-2; 2:2-4   

Zephaniah 1

01 Yahweh’s word which came to

Zephaniah, the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah, the son of Amon, king of Judah.

02 I will utterly sweep away everything from the surface of the earth, says Yahweh.

[..]

18 Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them in the day of Yahweh’s wrath, but the whole land will be devoured by the fire of his jealousy; for he will make an end, yes, a terrible end, of all those who dwell in the land.   

Zephaniah 2

13 He will stretch out his hand against the north, destroy Assyria, and will make Nineveh a desolation, as dry as the wilderness.

14 Herds will lie down in the middle of her, all the animals of the nations. Both the pelican and the porcupine will lodge in its capitals. Their calls will echo through the windows. Desolation will be in the thresholds, for he has laid bare the cedar beams.

15 This is the joyous city that lived carelessly, that said in her heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me.” How she has become a desolation, a place for animals to lie down in! Everyone who passes by her will hiss, and shake their fists.   

Zephaniah 3

19 Behold, at that time I will deal with all those who afflict you, and I will save those who are lame, and gather those who were driven away. I will give them praise and honor, whose shame has been in all the earth.

20 At that time I will bring you in, and at that time I will gather you; for I will give you honor and praise among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says Yahweh.   

Haggai 1

01 In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month, Yahweh’s word came by

Haggai, the prophet, to Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, saying,

02 “This is what Yahweh of Armies says: These people say, ‘The time hasn’t yet come, the time for Yahweh’s house to be built.’”

[..]   

Haggai 2

02 “Speak now to Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, saying,

03 ‘Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? How do you see it now? Isn’t it in your eyes as nothing?

04 Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel,’ says Yahweh. ‘Be strong, Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land,’ says Yahweh, ‘and work, for I am with you,’ says Yahweh of Armies.

4Q78 Minor Prophetsc

Language: Hebrew

Date:  75-50 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4 Contents (English verse numbers):

Hosea 2:11-13; 3:2, 4; 4:1-4, 6-7, 9-16, 18-19; 5:1; 7:12-13; 13:3-5, 7-8, 10, 15, 16; 14:2-3, 5;

Joel 1:10-20; 2:1, 8-14, 16-23;

Joel 3:6, (excludes 3:7), 8-10, 12-19, 21;

Amos 2:11 - 4:2; 6:13-14; 7:1-4, 7-9, 12-16;

Zephaniah 2:15; 3:2;

Malachi 3:6-7   

Hosea 2

11 I will also cause all her celebrations to cease: her feasts, her new moons, her Sabbaths, and all her solemn assemblies.

12 I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, about which she has said, ‘These are my wages that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest,’ and the animals of the field shall eat them.

13 I will visit on her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot me,” says Yahweh.

[..]

Hosea 3

02 So I bought her for myself for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer  and a half of barley.

[..]

04 For the children of Israel shall live many days without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without sacred stone, and without ephod or idols.

[..]

Hosea 4

01 Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land.

02 There is cursing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery; they break boundaries, and bloodshed causes bloodshed.

03 Therefore the land will mourn, and everyone who dwells therein will waste away. all living things in her, even the animals of the field and the birds of the sky; yes, the fish of the sea also die.  

04 “Yet let no man bring a charge, neither let any man accuse; For your people are like those who bring charges against a priest.

[..]

06 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, that you may be no priest to me. Because you have forgotten your God’s law, I will also forget your children.

07 As they were multiplied, so they sinned against me. I will change their glory into shame.

[..]

09 It will be, like people, like priest; and I will punish them for their ways, and will repay them for their deeds.

10 They will eat, and not have enough. They will play the prostitute, and will not increase; because they have abandoned giving to Yahweh.

11 Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding.

12 My people consult with their wooden idol, and answer to a stick of wood. Indeed the spirit of prostitution has led them astray, and they have been unfaithful to their God.

13 They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and burn incense on the hills, under oaks and poplars and terebinths, because its shade is good. Therefore your daughters play the prostitute, and your brides commit adultery.

14 I will not punish your daughters when they play the prostitute, nor your brides when they commit adultery; because the men consort with prostitutes, and they sacrifice with the shrine prostitutes; so the people without understanding will come to ruin.  

15 “Though you, Israel, play the prostitute, yet don’t let Judah offend; and don’t come to Gilgal, neither go up to Beth Aven, nor swear, ‘As Yahweh lives.’

16 For Israel has behaved extremely stubbornly, like a stubborn heifer. Then how will Yahweh feed them like a lamb in a meadow.

[..]

18 Their drink has become sour. They play the prostitute continually. Her rulers dearly love their shameful way.

19 The wind has wrapped her up in its wings; and they shall be disappointed because of their sacrifices.   

Hosea 5

01 “Listen to this, you priests! Listen, house of Israel, and give ear, house of the king! For the judgment is against you; for you have been a snare at Mizpah, and a net spread on Tabor.

[..]

Hosea 7

12 When they go, I will spread my net on them. I will bring them down like the birds of the sky. I will chastise them, as their congregation has heard.

13 Woe to them! For they have wandered from me. Destruction to them! For they have trespassed against me. Though I would redeem them, yet they have spoken lies against me.

[..]

Hosea 13

03 Therefore they will be like the morning mist, and like the dew that passes away early, like the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the threshing floor, and like the smoke out of the chimney.  

04 “Yet I am Yahweh your God who fortifies heaven and purchases earth, whose hands create all the host of heaven, and I did not show them to you to follow them, but I brought you up[1] from the land of Egypt; and you shall acknowledge no god but me, and besides me there is no savior.

05 I knew you in the wilderness, in the land of great drought.

[..]

07 Therefore I am like a lion to them. Like a leopard, I will lurk by the path.

08 I will meet them like a bear that is bereaved of her cubs, and will tear the covering of their heart. There I will devour them like a lioness. The wild animal will tear them.

[..]

10 Where is your king now, that he may save you in all your cities? And your judges, of whom you said, ‘Give me a king and princes?’

[..]

15 Though he is fruitful among his brothers, an east wind will come, the breath of Yahweh coming up from the wilderness; and his spring will become dry, and his fountain will be dried up. He will plunder the storehouse of treasure.

16 Samaria will bear her guilt; for she has rebelled against her God. They will fall by the sword. Their infants will be dashed in pieces, and their pregnant women will be ripped open.”   

Hosea

14 02 Take words with you, and return to Yahweh. Tell him, “Forgive all our sins, and accept that which is good: so we offer our lips like bulls.

03 Assyria can’t save us. We won’t ride on horses; neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, ‘Our gods!’ for in you the fatherless finds mercy.”

[..]

05 I will be like the dew to Israel. He will blossom like the lily, and send down his roots like Lebanon.

[..]

Joel 1

10 The field is laid waste. The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, The new wine has dried up, and the oil languishes.

11 Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers; for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.

12 The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered; the palm tree also, and the apple tree, the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all of the trees of the field are withered; for joy has withered away from the sons of men.

13 Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests! Wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your God’s house.

14 Sanctify a fast. And call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders, and all the inhabitants of the land, to the house of Yahweh, your God, and cry to Yahweh.

15 Alas for the day! For the day of Yahweh is at hand, and it will come as destruction from the Almighty.

16 Isn’t the food cut off before our eyes; joy and gladness from the house of our God?

17 The seeds rot under their clods. The granaries are laid desolate. The barns are broken down, for the grain has withered.

18 How the animals groan! The herds of livestock are perplexed, because they have no pasture. Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.

19 Yahweh, I cry to you, For the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame has burned all the trees of the field.

20 Yes, the animals of the field pant to you, for the water brooks have dried up, And the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.   

Joel 2

01 Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of Yahweh comes, for it is close at hand:

[..]

08 Neither does one jostle another; they march everyone in his path, and they burst through the defenses, and don’t break ranks.

09 They rush on the city. They run on the wall. They climb up into the houses. They enter in at the windows like thieves.

10 The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

11 Yahweh thunders his voice before his army; for his forces are very great; for he is strong who obeys his command; for the day of Yahweh is great and very awesome, and who can endure bear it?

12 “Yet even now,” says Yahweh, “turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning.”

13 Tear your heart, and not your garments goats[2], and turn to Yahweh, your God; for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and relents from sending calamity.

14 Who knows? He may turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, even a meal offering and a drink offering to Yahweh, your God.

[..]

16 Gather the people. Sanctify the assembly. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, and those who nurse from breasts. Let the bridegroom go out of his room, and the bride out of her room.

17 Let the priests, the ministers of Yahweh, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, “Spare your people, Yahweh, and don’t give your heritage to reproach, that the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’ ”

18 Then Yahweh was jealous for his land, And had pity on his people.

19 Yahweh answered his people, “Behold, I will send you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will eat and you will be satisfied with them; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.

20 But I will remove the northern army far away from you, and will drive it into a barren and desolate land, its front into the eastern sea, and its back into the western sea; and its stench will come up, and its bad smell will rise.” Surely he has done great things.

21 Land, don’t be afraid. Be glad and rejoice, for Yahweh has done great things.

22 Don’t be afraid, you animals of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness spring up, for the tree bears its fruit. The fig tree and the vine yield their strength.  

23 “Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in Yahweh, your God; for he gives you the former rain in just measure, and he causes the rain to come down for you, the former rain and the latter rain, as before.

[..]

Joel 3

06 and have sold the children of Judah and the children of Jerusalem to the sons of the Greeks, that

 [3]you may remove them far from their border.

07 Behold, I will stir them up out of the place where you have sold them, and will return your repayment on your own head;

08 and I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the children of Judah, and they will sell them to the men of Sheba, to a faraway nation, for Yahweh has spoken it.”  

09 Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for war! Stir up the mighty men. Let all the warriors draw near. Let them come up.

10 Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weak say, ‘I am strong.’

[..]

12 “Let the nations arouse themselves, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat; for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations.

13 Put in the sickle; for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full, the vats overflow, for their wickedness is great.”

14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of Yahweh is near, in the valley of decision.

15 The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

16 Yahweh will roar from Zion, and thunder from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth will shake; but Yahweh will be a refuge to his people, and a stronghold to the children of Israel.

17 “So you will know that I am Yahweh, your God, the one dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain. Then Jerusalem will be holy, and no strangers will pass through her any more.

18 It will happen in that day, that the mountains will drop down sweet wine, the hills will flow with milk, all the brooks of Judah will flow with waters, and a fountain will flow out from Yahweh’s house, and will water all the valley of Shittim.

19 Egypt will be a desolation, and Edom will be a wilderness, a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.

[..]

21 I will cleanse their blood, that I have not cleansed: for Yahweh dwells in Zion.”   

Amos 2

11 I raised up some of your sons for prophets, and some of your young men for Nazirites. Isn’t this true, you children of Israel?” says Yahweh.

12 “But you gave the Nazirites wine to drink, and commanded the prophets, saying, ‘Don’t prophesy!’

13 And behold, I will crush you in your place, as a cart crushes that is full of grain.

14 Flight will perish from the swift; and the strong won’t strengthen his force; neither shall the mighty deliver himself;

15 neither shall he stand who handles the bow; and he who is swift of foot won’t escape; neither shall he who rides the horse deliver himself;

16 and he who is courageous finds heart among the mighty will flee away naked on that day,” says Yahweh.

Amos 3

01 Hear this word that Yahweh has spoken against you, children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up out of the land of Egypt, saying:

02 “I have only chosen you of all the families of the earth. Therefore I will punish you for all of your sins.”

[..]

04 Will a lion roar in the thicket, when he has no prey? Does a young lion cry out of his den, if he has caught nothing?

05 Can a bird fall in a trap on the earth, where no snare is set for him? Does a snare spring up from the ground, when there is nothing to catch?

06 Does the trumpet alarm sound in a city, without the people being afraid? Does evil happen to a city, and Yahweh hasn’t done it?

07 Surely the Lord Yahweh will do nothing, unless he reveals his secret to his servants the prophets.

08 The lion has roared. Who will not fear? The Lord Yahweh has spoken. Who can but prophesy?

09 Proclaim in the palaces at Ashdod, and in the palaces in the land of Egypt, and say, “Assemble yourselves on the mountains of Samaria, and see what unrest is in her, and what oppression is among them.”

10 “Indeed they don’t know to do right,” says Yahweh, “Who hoard plunder and loot in their palaces.”

11 Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: “An adversary will overrun the land; and he will pull down your strongholds, and your fortresses will be plundered.”

12 Yahweh says: “As the shepherd rescues out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear, so shall the children of Israel be rescued who sit in Samaria on the corner of a couch, and on the silken cushions of a bed.”

13 “Listen, and testify against the house of Jacob,” says the Lord Yahweh, the God of Armies.

14 “For in the day that I visit the transgressions of Israel on him, I will also visit the altars of Bethel; and the horns of the altar will be cut off, and fall to the ground.

15 I will strike the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory will perish, and the great houses will have an end,” says Yahweh.

Amos  4

01 Listen to this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who tell their husbands, “Bring us drinks!”

02 The Lord Yahweh has sworn by his holiness that behold, “The days shall come on you that they will take you away with hooks, and the last of you with fish hooks.

[..]

Amos 6

13 you who rejoice in a thing of nothing, who say, ‘Haven’t we taken for ourselves horns by our own strength?’

14 For, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, house of Israel,” says Yahweh, the God of Armies; “and they will afflict you from the entrance of Hamath to the brook of the Arabah.”   

Amos 7

01 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me: and behold, he formed locusts in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and behold, it was the latter growth after the king’s harvest.

02 When they finished eating the grass of the land, then I said, “Lord Yahweh, forgive, I beg you! How could Jacob stand? For he is small.”

[..]

04 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me and behold, the Lord Yahweh called for judgment by fire; and it dried up the great deep, and would have devoured the land.

[..]

07 Thus he showed me and behold, the Lord stood beside a wall made by a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand.

08 Yahweh said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said, “Behold, I will set a plumb line in the middle of my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more.

09 The high places of Isaac will be desolate, the sanctuaries of Israel will be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”

[..]

12 Amaziah also said to Amos, “You seer, go, flee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there:

13 but don’t prophesy again any more at Bethel; for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a royal house!”

14 Then Amos answered Amaziah, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdsman, and a farmer of sycamore figs;

15 and Yahweh took me from following the flock, and Yahweh said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

16 Now therefore listen to Yahweh’s word: ‘You say, Don’t prophesy against Israel, and don’t preach against the house of Isaac.’

[..]

Zephaniah 2

15 This is the joyous city that lived carelessly, that said in her heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me.” How she has become a desolation, a place for animals to lie down in! Everyone who passes by her will hiss, and shake their fists.   

Zephaniah 3

02 She didn’t obey the voice. She didn’t receive correction. She didn’t trust in Yahweh. She didn’t draw near to her God.

[..]

Malachi 3

06 “For I, Yahweh, don’t change; therefore you, sons of Jacob, are not consumed.

07 For from the days of your fathers you have turned away from my ordinances, and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you,” says Yahweh of Armies God. “But you say, ‘How shall we return?’    

 [1] This reading matches the LXX.

 [2] While the scroll does say goats, this is probably because the scribe left the first Hebrew letter of the word for “garments” off, thus changing it to “goats.”

 [3] The scribe apparently failed to copy some of the text, perhaps skipping from the word for “sold” in 3:6 to the same word in 3:8.

4Q79 Minor Prophetsd

Language: Hebrew

Date: 75-50 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents:

Hosea 1:6-2:3 (Hebrew 1:6 - 2:5)   

Hosea 1

06 She conceived again, and bore a daughter. Then he said to him, “Call her name Lo-Ruhamah; for I will no longer have mercy on the house of Israel, that I should in any way pardon them.

07 But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and will save them by Yahweh their God, and will not save them by bow, sword, battle, horses, or horsemen.”

08 Now when she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, she conceived, and bore a son.

09 He said, “Call his name Lo-Ammi; for you are not my people, and I will not be yours.

10 Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured or counted; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’

11 The children of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint themselves one head, and will go up from the land; for great will be the day of Jezreel.   

Hosea 2

01 “Say to your brothers, ‘My people!’ and to your sisters, ‘My loved one!’

02 Contend with your mother! Contend, for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her prostitution from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

03 Lest I strip her naked, and make her bare as in the day that she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and kill her with thirst.

4Q80 Minor Prophetse

Language: Hebrew

Date: 75-50 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents:

Haggai 2:18-21;

Zechariah 1:4-6, 9-10, 13-14; 2:6-10 (Hebrew 2:10-14); 3:2-10; 4:1-2, 4; 5:8-11; 6:1-3, 5; 8:2-4, 6-7; 12:7-12   

Haggai 2

18 ‘Consider, please, from this day and backward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, since the day that the foundation of Yahweh’s temple was laid, consider it.

19 Is the seed yet in the barn? Yes, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree haven’t produced. From today I will bless you.’ ”

20 Yahweh’s word came the second time to

Haggai in the twenty-fourth day of the month, saying,

21 “Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, ‘I will shake the heavens and the earth.

[..]

Zechariah 1

04 Don’t you be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, saying: Yahweh of Armies says, ‘Return now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings;’ but they didn’t hear, nor listen to me, says Yahweh.

05 Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?

06 But my words and my decrees, which I commanded my servants the prophets, didn’t they overtake your fathers? “Then they repented and said, ‘Just as Yahweh of Armies determined to do to us, according to our ways, and according to our practices, so he has dealt with us.’ ”

[..]

09 Then I asked, ‘My lord, what are these?’ ” The angel who talked with me said to me, “I will show you what these are.”

10 The man who stood among the myrtle trees answered, “They are the ones Yahweh has sent to go back and forth through the earth.”

[..]

13 Yahweh answered the angel who talked with me with kind and comforting words.

14 So the angel who talked with me said to me, “Proclaim, saying, ‘Yahweh of Armies says: “I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy.

[..]

Zechariah 2

06 Come! Come! Flee from the land of the north,’ says Yahweh; ‘for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the sky,’ says Yahweh.

07 ‘Come, Zion! Escape, you who dwell with the daughter of Babylon.’

08 For Yahweh of Armies says: ‘For honor he has sent me to the nations which plundered you; for he who touches you touches the apple of his eye.

09 For, behold, I will shake my hand over them, and they will be a plunder to those who served them; and you will know that Yahweh of Armies has sent me.

10 Sing and rejoice, daughter of Zion; for, behold, I come, and I will dwell within you,’ says Yahweh.

[..]   

Zechariah 3

02 Yahweh said to Satan, “Yahweh rebuke you, Satan! Yes, Yahweh who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Isn’t this a burning stick plucked out of the fire?”

03 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and was standing before the angel.

04 He answered and spoke to those who stood before him, saying, “Take the filthy garments off him.” To him he said, “Behold, I have caused your iniquity to pass from you, and I will clothe you with rich clothing.”

05 I said, “Let them set a clean turban on his head.” So they set a clean turban on his head, and clothed him; and Yahweh’s angel was standing by.

06 Yahweh’s angel protested to Joshua, saying,

07 “Yahweh of Armies says: ‘If you will walk in my ways, and if you will follow my instructions, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access among these who stand by.

08 Hear now, Joshua the high priest, you and your fellows who sit before you; for they are men who are a sign: for, behold, I will bring out my servant, the Branch.

09 For, behold, the stone that I have set before Joshua; on one stone are seven eyes: behold, I will engrave its engraving,’ says Yahweh of Armies, ‘and I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day.

10 In that day,’ says Yahweh of Armies, ‘you will invite every man his neighbor under the vine and under the fig tree.’ ”

[..]

Zechariah 4

01 The angel who talked with me came again, and wakened me, as a man who is wakened out of his sleep.

02 He said to me, “What do you see?” I said, “I have seen, and behold, a lamp stand all of gold, with its bowl on the top of it, and its seven lamps on it; there are seven pipes to each of the lamps, which are on the top of it;

[..]

04 I answered and spoke to the angel who talked with me, saying, “What are these, my lord?”

[..]

Zechariah 5

08 He said, “This is Wickedness;” and he threw her down into the middle of the ephah basket; and he threw the weight of lead on its mouth.

09 Then lifted I up my eyes, and saw, and behold, there were two women, and the wind was in their wings. Now they had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the ephah basket between earth and the sky.

10 Then I said to the angel who talked with me, “Where are these carrying the ephah basket?”

11 He said to me, “To build her a house in the land of Shinar. When it is prepared, she will be set there in her own place.”   

Zechariah 6

01 Again I lifted up my eyes, and saw, and behold, four chariots came out from between two mountains; and the mountains were mountains of bronze.

02 In the first chariot were red horses; in the second chariot black horses;

03 in the third chariot white horses; and in the fourth chariot dappled horses, all of them powerful.

[..]

05 The angel answered me, “These are the four winds of the sky, which go out from standing before the Lord of all the earth.

[..]

Zechariah 8

02 Yahweh of Armies says: “I am jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I am jealous for her with great wrath.”

03 Yahweh says: “I have returned to Zion, and will dwell in the middle of Jerusalem. Jerusalem shall be called ‘The City of Truth;’ and the mountain of Yahweh of Armies, ‘The Holy Mountain.’ ”

04 Yahweh of Armies says: “Old men and old women will again dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, every man with his staff in his hand for very age.

[..]

06 Yahweh of Armies says: “If it is marvelous in the eyes of the remnant of this people in those days, should it also be marvelous in my eyes?” says Yahweh of Armies.

07 Yahweh of Armies says: “Behold, I will save my people from the east country, and from the west country;

[..]

Zechariah 12

07 Yahweh also will save the tents of Judah first, that the glory of David’s house and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem not be magnified above Judah.

08 In that day Yahweh will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem. He who is feeble among them at that day will be like David, and David’s house will be like God, like Yahweh’s angel before them.

09 It will happen in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

10 I will pour on David’s house, and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplication; and they will look to me whom they have pierced; and they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for his only son, and will grieve bitterly for him, as one grieves for his firstborn.

11 In that day there will be a great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon.

12 The land will mourn, every family apart; the family of David’s house apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart;  

4Q81 Minor Prophets

Language: Hebrew

Date: 175 -

50 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents:

Jonah 1:6-8. 10-16;

Micah 5:2-3 (Hebrew 5:1-2)   

Jonah 1

06 So the ship master came to him, and said to him, “What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God! Maybe your God will notice us, so that we won’t perish.”

07 They all said to each other, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know who is responsible for this evil that is on us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

08 Then they asked him, “Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? Of what people are you?”

[..]

10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, “What have you done?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of Yahweh, because he had told them.

11 Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may be calm to us?” For the sea grew more and more stormy.

12 He said to them, “Take me up, and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will be calm for you; for I know that because of me this great storm is on you.”

13 Nevertheless the men rowed hard to get them back to the land; but they could not, for the sea grew more and more stormy against them.

14 Therefore they cried to Yahweh, and said, “We beg you, Yahweh, we beg you, don’t let us die for this man’s life, and don’t lay on us innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you.”

15 So they took up Jonah, and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging.

16 Then the men feared Yahweh exceedingly; and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh, and made vows.   

Micah 5

02 But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, being small among the clans of Judah, Will not[1] one come out of you out of you one will come out to me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings out are from of old, from ancient times?

03 Therefore he will abandon them until the time that she who is in labor gives birth. Then the rest of his brothers will return to the children of Israel.  

 [1] The presence of the negative particle in Hebrew is difficult in light of the context, so I have chosen to translate it as a rhetorical question.

4Q82 Minor Prophetsg

Language: Hebrew

Date:  30-1 B.C.

Location: Qumran Cave 4

Contents: (English verse numbers)

Hosea 1:10-11; 2:2-3, 12-17, 20-23; 3:1-5; 4:1, 9-11, 13-14; 6:3-4, 8-11; 7:1, 12-16; 8:1; 9:1-4, 9-17; 10:1-6, 8-14; 11:2-6, 8-12; 12:1-4, 6-9, 11-14; 13:1, 6-8, 11-13; 14:8-9;

Joel 1:12-14; 2:2-3, 5-13; 3:4-5, 7-9, 11-15, 17, 19-20;

Amos 1:3-7, 9-15; 2:1, 7-9, 15-16; 3:1-2; 4:4-9; 5:1-2, 9, 11-18; 6:1-4, 6, 8-14; 7:1, 7-12, 14-17; 8:1-5, 11-14; 9:1, 5-6, 14-15;

Obadiah 1-5, 8-15;

Jonah 1:1-9; 2:2-10; 3:1-3, 4:5-11;

Micah 1:7, 12-15; 2:3-4; 3:12; 4:1-2; 5:7-8; 7:2-3, 20;

Nahum 1:7-9; 2:8-10; 3:1-3, 17;

Habakkuk 2:4;

Zephaniah 3:3-5;

Zechariah 10:11-12; 11:1-2; 12:1-3   

Hosea 1

10 Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured or counted; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’

11 The children of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint themselves one head, and will go up from the land; for great will be the day of Jezreel.   

Hosea 2

02 Contend with your mother! Contend, for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her prostitution from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

03 Lest I strip her naked, and make her bare as in the day that she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and kill her with thirst.

[..]

12 I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, about which she has said, ‘These are my wages that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest,’ and the animals of the field shall eat them.

13 I will visit on her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot me,” says Yahweh.

14 “Therefore behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her.

15 I will give her vineyards from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she will respond there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

16 It will be in that day,” says Yahweh, “that you will call me ‘my husband,’ and no longer call me ‘my master.’

17 For I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and they will no longer be mentioned by name.

[..]

20 I will even betroth you to me in faithfulness; and you shall know Yahweh.

21 It will happen in that day, I will respond,” says Yahweh, “I will respond to the heavens, and they will respond to the earth;

22 and the earth will respond to the grain, and the new wine, and the oil; and they will respond to Jezreel.

23 I will sow her to me in the earth; and I will have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy; and I will tell those who were not my people, ‘You are my people;’ and they will say, ‘My God!’ ”   

Hosea 3

01 Yahweh said to me, “Go again, love a woman loved by another, and an adulteress, even as Yahweh loves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods, and love cakes of raisins.”

02 So I bought her for myself for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer  and a half of barley.

03 I said to her, “You shall stay with me many days. You shall not play the prostitute, and you shall not be with any other man. I will also be so toward you.”

04 For the children of Israel shall live many days without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without sacred stone, and without ephod or idols.

05 Afterward the children of Israel shall return, and seek Yahweh their God, and David their king, and shall come with trembling to Yahweh and to his blessings in the last days.   

Hosea 4

01 Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land.

[..]

09 It will be, like people, like priest; and I will punish them for their ways, and will repay them for their deeds.

10 They will eat, and not have enough. They will play the prostitute, and will not increase; because they have abandoned giving to Yahweh.

11 Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding.

[..]

13 They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and burn incense on the hills, under oaks and poplars and terebinths, because its shade is good. Therefore your daughters play the prostitute, and your brides commit adultery.

14 I will not punish your daughters when they play the prostitute, nor your brides when they commit adultery; because the men consort with prostitutes, and they sacrifice with the shrine prostitutes; so the people without understanding will come to ruin.

[..]

Hosea 6

03 Let’s acknowledge Yahweh. Let’s press on to know Yahweh. As surely as the sun rises, Yahweh will appear. He will come to us like the rain, like the spring rain that waters the earth.”  

04 “Ephraim, what shall I do to you? Judah, what shall I do to you? For your love is like a morning cloud, and like the dew that disappears early.

[..]

08 Gilead is a city of those who work iniquity; it is stained with blood.

09 As gangs of robbers wait to ambush a man, so the company of priests murder on the path toward Shechem, committing shameful crimes.

10 In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing. There is prostitution in Ephraim. Israel is defiled.  

11 “Also, Judah, there is a harvest appointed for you, when I restore the fortunes of my people.   

Hosea 7

01 When I would heal Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim is uncovered, also the wickedness of Samaria; for they commit falsehood, and the thief enters in, and the gang of robbers ravages outside.

[..]

12 When they go, I will spread my net on them. I will bring them down like the birds of the sky. I will chastise them, as their congregation has heard.

13 Woe to them! For they have wandered from me. Destruction to them! For they have trespassed against me. Though I would redeem them, yet they have spoken lies against me.

14 They haven’t cried to me with their heart, but they howl on their beds. They assemble themselves for grain and new wine. They turn away from me.

15 Though I have taught and strengthened their arms, yet they plot evil against me.

16 They return, but not to the Most High. They are like a faulty bow. Their princes will fall by the sword for the rage of their tongue. This will be their derision in the land of Egypt.   

Hosea 8

01 “Put the trumpet to your lips! Something like an eagle is over Yahweh’s house, because they have broken my covenant, and rebelled against my law.

[..]

Hosea 9

01 Don’t rejoice, Israel, to jubilation like the nations; for you were unfaithful to your God. You love the wages of a prostitute at every grain threshing floor.

02 The threshing floor and the wine press won’t feed them, and the new wine will fail her.

03 They won’t dwell in Yahweh’s land; but Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

04 They won’t pour out wine offerings to Yahweh, neither will they be pleasing to him. Their sacrifices will be to them like the bread of mourners; all who eat of it will be polluted; for their bread will be for their appetite. It will not come into Yahweh’s house.

[..]

09 They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah. He will remember their iniquity. He will punish them for their sins.

10 I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness. I saw your fathers as the first ripe in the fig tree at its first season; but they came to Baal Peor, and consecrated themselves to the shameful thing, and became abominable like that which they loved.

11 As for Ephraim, their glory will fly away like a bird. There will be no birth, no one with child, and no conception.

12 Though they bring up their children, yet I will bereave them, so that not a man shall be left. Indeed, woe also to them when I depart from them!

13 I have seen Ephraim, like Tyre, planted in a pleasant place; but Ephraim will bring out his children to the murderer.

14 Give them—Yahweh what will you give? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.  

15 “All their wickedness is in Gilgal; for there I hated them. Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of my house! I will love them no more. All their princes are rebels.

16 Ephraim is struck. Their root has dried up. They will bear no fruit. Even though they give birth, yet I will kill the beloved ones of their womb.”  

17 My God will cast them away, because they didn’t listen to him; and they will be wanderers among the nations.   

Hosea 10

01 Israel is a luxuriant vine that produces his fruit. According to the abundance of his fruit he has multiplied his altars. As their land has prospered, they have adorned their sacred stones.

02 Their heart is divided. Now they will be found guilty. He will demolish their altars. He will destroy their sacred stones.

03 Surely now they will say, “We have no king; for we don’t fear Yahweh; and the king, what can he do for us?”

04 They make promises, swearing falsely in making covenants. Therefore judgment springs up like poisonous weeds in the furrows of the field.

05 The inhabitants of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth Aven; for its people will mourn over it, Along with its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it.

06 It also will be carried to Assyria for a present to a great king. Ephraim will receive shame, and Israel will be ashamed of his own counsel.

[..]

08 The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, will be destroyed. The thorn and the thistle will come up on their altars. They will tell the mountains, “Cover us!” and the hills, “Fall on us!”  

09 “Israel, you have sinned from the days of Gibeah. There they remained. The battle against the children of iniquity doesn’t overtake them in Gibeah.

10 When it is my desire, I will chastise them; and the nations will be gathered against them, when they are bound to their two transgressions.

11 Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thresh; so I will put a yoke on her beautiful neck. I will set a rider on Ephraim. Judah will plow. Jacob will break his clods.

12 Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap according to kindness. Break up your fallow ground; for it is time to seek Yahweh, until he comes and rains righteousness on you.

13 You have plowed wickedness. You have reaped iniquity. You have eaten the fruit of lies, for you trusted in your way, in the multitude of your mighty men.

14 Therefore a battle roar will arise among your people, and all your fortresses will be destroyed, as Shalman destroyed Beth Arbel in the day of battle. The mother was dashed in pieces with her children.

[..]

Hosea 11

02 They called to them, so they went from them. They sacrificed to the Baals, and burned incense to engraved images.

03 Yet I taught Ephraim to walk. I took them by his arms; but they didn’t know that I healed them.

04 I drew them with cords of a man, with ties of love; and I was to them like those who lift up the yoke on their necks; and I bent down to him and I fed him.  

05 “They won’t return into the land of Egypt; but the Assyrian will be their king, because they refused to repent.

06 The sword will fall on their cities, and will destroy the bars of their gates, and will put an end to their plans.

[..]

08 “How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I make you like Zeboiim? My heart is turned within me, my compassion is aroused.

09 I will not execute the fierceness of my anger. I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One among you; and I will not come in wrath.

10 They He will walk after Yahweh, and who will roar like a lion; for he will roar, and the children will come trembling from the west.

11 They will come trembling like a bird birds out of Egypt, and like a dove out of the land of Assyria; and I will settle them in their houses,” says Yahweh.

12 Ephraim surrounds me with falsehood, and the house of Israel with deceit. Judah still strays from God, and is unfaithful to the Holy One.   

Hosea 12

01 Ephraim feeds on wind, and chases the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and desolation. They make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt.

02 Yahweh also has a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; and according to his deeds he will repay him.

03 In the womb he took his brother by the heel; and in his manhood he contended with God.

04 Indeed, he struggled with the angel, and prevailed; he wept, and made supplication to him. He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with us,

[..]

06 Therefore turn to your God. Keep kindness and justice, and wait continually for your God.  

07 A merchant has dishonest scales in his hand. He loves to defraud.

08 Ephraim said, “Surely I have become rich, I have found myself wealth. In all my wealth they won’t find in me any iniquity that is sin.”  

09 “But I am Yahweh your God since you came up from the land of Egypt. I will yet again make you dwell in tents, as in the days of the solemn feast.

[..]

11 If Gilead is wicked, surely they are worthless. In Gilgal they sacrifice bulls. Indeed, their altars are like heaps in the furrows of the field.

12 Jacob fled into the country of Aram, and Israel served to get a wife, and for a wife he tended flocks and herds.

13 By a prophet Yahweh brought Israel up out of Egypt, and by a prophet he was preserved.

14 Ephraim has bitterly provoked anger. Therefore his blood will be left on him, and his Lord will repay his contempt.   

Hosea 13

01 When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling. He exalted himself in Israel, but when he became guilty in Baal, he died.

[..]

06 According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted rose up. Therefore they have forgotten me.

07 Therefore I am like a lion to them. Like a leopard, I will lurk by the path.

08 I will meet them like a bear that is bereaved of her cubs, and will tear the covering of their heart. There I will devour them like a lioness. The wild animal will tear them.

[..]

11 I have given you a king in my anger, and have taken him away in my wrath.

12 The guilt of Ephraim is stored up. His sin is stored up.

13 The sorrows of a travailing woman will come on him. He is an unwise son; for when it is time, he doesn’t come to the opening of the womb.

[..]

Hosea 14

08 Ephraim, what have I to do any more with idols? I answer, and will take care of him. I am like a green cypress tree; from me your fruit is found.”  

09 Who is wise, that he may understand these things? Who is prudent, that he may know them? For the ways of Yahweh are right, and the righteous walk in them; But the rebellious stumble in them.   

Joel 1

12 The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all of the trees of the field are withered; for joy has withered away from the sons of men.

13 Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests! Wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your God’s house.

14 Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders, and all the inhabitants of the land, to the house of Yahweh, your God, and cry to Yahweh.

[..]

Joel 2

02 A day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. As the dawn spreading on the mountains, a great and strong people; there has never been the like, neither will there be any more after them, even to the years of many generations.

03 A fire devours before them, and behind them, a flame burns. The land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them, a desolate wilderness. Yes, and no one has escaped them.

[..]

05 Like the noise of chariots on the tops of the mountains do they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array.

06 At their presence the peoples are in anguish. All faces have grown pale.

07 They run like mighty men. They climb the wall like warriors. They each march in his line, and they don’t swerve off course.

08 Neither does one jostle another; they march everyone in his path, and they burst through the defenses, and don’t break ranks.

09 They rush on the city. They run on the wall. They climb up into the houses. They enter in at the windows like thieves.

10 The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

11 Yahweh thunders his voice before his army; for his forces are very great; for he is strong who obeys his command; for the day of Yahweh is great and very awesome, and who can endure it?

12 “Yet even now,” says Yahweh, “turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning.”

13 Tear your heart, and not your garments, and turn to Yahweh, your God; for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and relents from sending calamity.

[..]

Joel 3

04 “Yes, and what are you to me, Tyre, and Sidon, and all the regions of Philistia? Will you repay me? And if you repay me, I will swiftly and speedily return your repayment on your own head.

05 Because you have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried my finest treasures into your temples,

[..]

07 Behold, I will stir them up out of the place where you have sold them, and will return your repayment on your own head;

08 and I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the children of Judah, and they will sell them to the men of Sheba, to a faraway nation, for Yahweh has spoken it.”  

09 Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for war! Stir up the mighty men. Let all the warriors draw near. Let them come up.

[..]

11 Hurry and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves together.” Cause your mighty ones to come down there, Yahweh.

12 “Let the nations arouse themselves, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat; for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations.

13 Put in the sickle; for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full, the vats overflow, for their wickedness is great.”

14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of Yahweh is near, in the valley of decision.

15 The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

[..]

17 “So you will know that I am Yahweh, your God, dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain. Then Jerusalem will be holy, and no strangers will pass through her any more.

[..]

19 Egypt will be a desolation, and Edom will be a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.

20 But Judah will be inhabited forever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.

[..]

Amos 1

03 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Damascus, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron;

04 but I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, and it will devour the palaces of Ben Hadad.

05 I will break the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the valley of Aven, and him who holds the scepter from the house of Eden; and the people of Syria shall go into captivity to Kir,” says Yahweh.

06 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Gaza, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they carried away captive the whole community, to deliver them up to Edom;

07 but I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, and it will devour its palaces.

[..]

09 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Tyre, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole community to Edom, and didn’t remember the brotherly covenant;

10 but I will send a fire on the wall of Tyre, and it will devour its palaces.”

11 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Edom, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he pursued his brother with the sword, and cast off all pity, and his anger raged continually, and he kept his wrath forever;

12 but I will send a fire on Teman, and it will devour the palaces of Bozrah.”

13 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of the children of Ammon, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead, that they may enlarge their border.

14 But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it will devour its palaces, with shouting in the day of battle, with a storm in the day of the whirlwind;

15 and their king will go into captivity, he and his princes together,” says Yahweh.   

Amos 2

01 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Moab, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime;

[..]

07 They trample on the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and deny justice to the oppressed; and a man and his father use the same maiden, to profane my holy name;

08 and they lay themselves down beside every altar on clothes taken in pledge; and in the house of their God they drink the wine of those who have been fined.

09 Yet I destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath.

[..]

15 neither shall he stand who handles the bow; and he who is swift of foot won’t escape; neither shall he who rides the horse deliver himself;

16 and he who is courageous among the mighty will flee away naked on that day,” says Yahweh.   

Amos 3

01 Hear this word that Yahweh has spoken against you, children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up out of the land of Egypt, saying:

02 “I have only chosen you of all the families of the earth. Therefore I will punish you for all of your sins.”

[..]

Amos 4

04 “Go to Bethel, and sin; to Gilgal, and sin more. Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days,

05 offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving of that which is leavened, and proclaim free will offerings and brag about them: for this pleases you, you children of Israel,” says the Lord Yahweh.

06 “I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of bread in every town; yet you haven’t returned to me,” says Yahweh.

07 “I also have withheld the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest; and I caused it to rain on one city, and caused it not to rain on another city. One place was rained on, and the piece where it didn’t rain withered.

08 So two or three cities staggered to one city to drink water, and were not satisfied: yet you haven’t returned to me,” says Yahweh.

09 “I struck you with blight and mildew many times in your gardens and your vineyards; and the swarming locusts have devoured your fig trees and your olive trees; yet you haven’t returned to me,” says Yahweh.

[..]

Amos 5

01 Listen to this word which I take up for a lamentation over you, O house of Israel.

02 “The virgin of Israel has fallen; She shall rise no more. She is cast down on her land; there is no one to raise her up.”

[..]

09 who brings sudden destruction on the strong, so that destruction comes on the fortress.

[..]

11 Therefore, because you trample on the poor, and take taxes from him of wheat: You have built houses of cut stone, but you will not dwell in them. You have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine.

12 For I know how many your offenses, and how great are your sins— you who afflict the just, who take a bribe, and who turn away the needy in the courts.

13 Therefore a prudent person keeps silent in such a time, for it is an evil time.

14 Seek good, and not evil, that you may live; and so Yahweh, the God of Armies, will be with you, as you say.

15 Hate evil, love good, and establish justice in the courts. It may be that Yahweh, the God of Armies, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”

16 Therefore Yahweh, the God of Armies, the Lord, says: “Wailing will be in all the wide ways; and they will say in all the streets, ‘Alas! Alas!’ and they will call the farmer to mourning, and those who are skillful in lamentation to wailing.

17 In all vineyards there will be wailing; for I will pass through the middle of you,” says Yahweh.

18 “Woe to you who desire the day of Yahweh! Why do you long for the day of Yahweh? It is darkness, and not light.

[..]

Amos 6

01 Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and to those who are secure on the mountain of Samaria, the notable men of the chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel come!

02 Go to Calneh, and see; and from there go to Hamath the great; then go down to Gath of the Philistines. are they better than these kingdoms? or is their border greater than your border?

03 Those who put far away the evil day, and cause the seat of violence to come near;

04 Who lie on beds of ivory, and stretch themselves on their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the middle of the stall;

[..]

06 who drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the best oils; but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph.

[..]

08 “The Lord Yahweh has sworn by himself,” says Yahweh, the God of Armies: “I abhor the pride of Jacob, and detest his fortresses. Therefore I will deliver up the city with all that is in it.

09 It will happen, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die.

10 “When a man’s relative carries him, even he who burns him, to bring bodies out of the house, and asks him who is in the innermost parts of the house, ‘Is there yet any with you?’ And he says, ‘No;’ then he will say, ‘Hush! Indeed we must not mention Yahweh’s name.’  

11 “For, behold, Yahweh commands, and the great house will be smashed to pieces, and the little house into bits.

12 Do horses run on the rocky crags? Does one plow there with oxen? But you have turned justice into poison, and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness;

13 you who rejoice in a thing of nothing, who say, ‘Haven’t we taken for ourselves horns by our own strength?’

14 For, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, house of Israel,” says Yahweh, the God of Armies; “and they will afflict you from the entrance of Hamath to the brook of the Arabah.”   

Amos 7

01 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me: and behold, he formed locusts in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and behold, it was the latter growth after the king’s harvest.

[..]

07 Thus he showed me and behold, the Lord stood beside a wall made by a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand.

08 The Lord Yahweh said to me, “

Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord Yahweh said, “Behold, I will set a plumb line in the middle of my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more.

09 The high places of Isaac will be desolate, the sanctuaries of Israel will be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”

10 Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “

Amos has conspired against you in the middle of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words.

11 For

Amos says, ‘Jeroboam will die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.’ ”

12 Amaziah also said to

Amos, “You seer, go, flee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there:

[..]

14 Then

Amos answered Amaziah, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdsman, and a farmer of sycamore figs;

15 and Yahweh took me from following the flock, and Yahweh said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

16 Now therefore listen to Yahweh’s word: ‘You say, Don’t prophesy against Israel, and don’t preach against the house of Isaac.’

17 Therefore the Lord Yahweh says: ‘Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided by line; and you yourself shall die in a land that is unclean, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.’ ”   

Amos 8

01 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me: behold, a basket of summer fruit.

02 He said, “

Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then Yahweh said to me, “The end has come on my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more.

03 The songs of the temple will be wailings in that day,” says the Lord Yahweh. “The dead bodies will be many. In every place they will throw them out with silence.

04 Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail,

05 Saying, ‘When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell grain be satisfied? And the Sabbath, that we may market wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel large, and dealing falsely with balances of deceit;

[..]

11 Behold, the days come,” says the Lord Yahweh, “that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing Yahweh’s words.

12 They will wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east; they will run back and forth to seek Yahweh’s word, and will not find it.

13 In that day the beautiful virgins and the young men will faint for thirst.

14 Those who swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, ‘As your god, Dan, lives;’ and, ‘As the way of Beersheba lives;’ they will fall, and never rise up again.”   

Amos 9

01 I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and he said, “Strike the tops of the pillars, that the thresholds may shake; and break them in pieces on the head of all of them; and I will kill the last of them with the sword: there shall not one of them flee away, and there shall not one of them escape.

[..]

05 For the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, is he who touches the land and it melts, and all who dwell in it will mourn; and it will rise up wholly like the River, and will sink again, like the River of Egypt.

06 It is he who builds his rooms in the heavens, and has founded his vault on the earth; he who calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out on the surface of the earth; Yahweh is his name.

[..]

14 I will bring my people Israel back from captivity, and they will rebuild the ruined cities, and inhabit them; and they will plant vineyards, and drink wine from them. They shall also make gardens, and eat their fruit.

15 I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them,” says Yahweh your God.   

Obadiah

01 The vision of

Obadiah. This is what the Lord Yahweh says about Edom. We have heard news from Yahweh, and an ambassador is sent among the nations, saying, “Arise, and let’s rise up against her in battle.

02 Behold, I have made you small among the nations. You are greatly despised.

03 The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who dwell in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high, who says in his heart, ‘Who will bring me down to the ground?’

04 Though you mount on high as the eagle, and though you will set your nest is set among the stars, I will bring you down from there,” says Yahweh.

05 “If thieves came to you, if robbers by night—oh, what disaster awaits you—wouldn’t they only steal until they had enough? If grape pickers came to you, wouldn’t they leave some gleaning grapes?

[..]

08 “Won’t I in that day”, says Yahweh, “destroy the wise men out of Edom, and understanding out of the mountain of Esau?

09 Your mighty men, Teman, will be dismayed, to the end that everyone may be cut off from the mountain of Esau by slaughter.

10 For the violence done to your brother Jacob, shame will cover you, and you will be cut off forever.

11 In the day that you stood on the other side, in the day that strangers carried away his substance, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots for Jerusalem, even you were like one of them.

12 But don’t look down on your brother in the day of his disaster, and don’t rejoice over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction. Don’t speak proudly in the day of distress.

[..]

14 Don’t stand in the crossroads to cut off those of his who escape. Don’t deliver up those of his who remain in the day of distress.

15 For the day of Yahweh is near all the nations! As you have done, it will be done to you. Your deeds will return upon your own head.   

Jonah 1

01 Now Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me.”

03 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh.

04 But Yahweh sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty storm on the sea, so that the ship was likely to break up.

05 Then the mariners were afraid, and every man cried to his god. They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone down into the innermost parts of the ship, and he was laying down, and was fast asleep.

06 So the ship master came to him, and said to him, “What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God! Maybe your God will notice us, so that we won’t perish.”

07 They all said to each other, “Come! Let’s cast lots, that we may know who is responsible for this evil that is on us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

08 Then they asked him, “Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? And what is your country? Of what people are you?”

09 He said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear Yahweh, the God of heaven, who has made the sea and the dry land.”

[..]

Jonah 2

02 He said, “I called because of my affliction to Yahweh. He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried. You heard my voice.

03 For you threw me into the depths, in the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.

04 I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’

05 The waters surrounded me, even to the soul. The deep was around me. The weeds were wrapped around my head.

06 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth barred me in forever: yet have you brought up my life, my soul, from the pit, Yahweh my God.  

07 “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered Yahweh. My prayer and it came in to you, into your holy temple.

08 Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.

09 But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation belongs to Yahweh.”

10 Then Yahweh spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.   

Jonah 3

01 Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the second time, saying,

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you.”

03 So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to Yahweh’s word. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey across.

[..]

Jonah 4

05 Then Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made himself a booth, and sat under it in the shade, until he might see what would become of the city.

06 The Lord Yahweh God prepared a vine, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the vine.

07 But God prepared a worm at dawn the next day, and it chewed on the vine, so that it withered.

08 When the sun arose, God prepared a sultry east wind; and the sun beat on

Jonah’s head, so that he fainted, and requested for himself that he might die, and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.”

09 God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the vine?” He said, “I am right to be angry, even to death.”

10 Yahweh said, “You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not labored, neither made it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night.

11 Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much livestock?”   

Micah 1

07 All her idols will be beaten to pieces, and all her temple gifts will be burned with fire, and all her images I will destroy; for of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them, and to the hire of a prostitute shall they return.”

[..]

12 For the inhabitant of Maroth waits anxiously for good, because evil has come down from Yahweh to the gate of Jerusalem.

13 Harness the chariot to the swift steed, inhabitant of Lachish. She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion; For the transgressions of Israel were found in you.

14 Therefore you will give a parting gift to Moresheth Gath. The houses of Achzib will be a deceitful thing to the kings of Israel.

15 I will yet bring to you, inhabitant of Mareshah. He who is the glory of Israel will come to Adullam.

[..]

Micah 2

03 Therefore Yahweh says: “Behold, I am planning against these people a disaster, from which you will not remove you’re their necks, neither will you walk haughtily; for it is an evil time.

04 In that day they will take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, saying, ‘We are utterly ruined! My people’s possession is divided up. Indeed he takes it from me and assigns our fields to traitors!’ ”

[..]

Micah 3

12 Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.   

Micah 4

01 But in the latter days, it will happen that the mountain of Yahweh’s temple will be established on the top of the mountains, and it will be exalted above the hills; and peoples will stream to it.

02 Many nations will go and say, “Come! Let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths.” For the law will go out of Zion, and Yahweh’s word from Jerusalem;

[..]

Micah 5

07 The remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples, like dew from Yahweh, like showers on the grass, that don’t wait for man, nor wait for the sons of men.

08 The remnant of Jacob will be among the nations, among many peoples, like a lion among the animals of the forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep; who, if he goes through, treads down and tears in pieces, and there is no one to deliver.

[..]

Micah 7

02 The godly man has perished out of the earth, and there is no one upright among men. They all lie in wait for blood; every man hunts his brother with a net.

03 Their hands are on that which is evil to do it diligently. The ruler and judge ask for a bribe; and the powerful man dictates the evil desire of his soul. Thus they conspire together.

[..]

20 You will give truth to Jacob, and mercy to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.   

Nahum 1

07 Yahweh is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; and he knows those who take refuge in him.

08 But with an overflowing flood, he will make a full end of her place, and will pursue his enemies into darkness.

09 What do you plot against Yahweh? He will make a full end. Affliction won’t rise up the second time.

[..]

Nahum 2

08 But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water, yet they flee away. “Stop! Stop!” they cry, but no one looks back.

09 Take the plunder of silver. Take the plunder of gold, for there is no end of the store, the glory of all goodly furniture.

10 She is empty, void, and waste. The heart melts, the knees knock together, their bodies and faces have grown pale.

[..]

Nahum  3

01 Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. The prey doesn’t depart.

02 The noise of the whip, the noise of the rattling of wheels, prancing horses, and bounding chariots,

03 the horseman mounting, and the flashing sword, the glittering spear, and a multitude of slain, and a great heap of corpses, and there is no end of the bodies. They stumble on their bodies,

[..]

17 Your guards are like the locusts, and your officials like the swarms of locusts, which settle on the walls on a cold day, but when the sun appears, they flee away, and their place is not known where they are.

[..]

Habakkuk 2

04 Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith.

[..]

Zephaniah 3

03 Her princes within her are roaring lions. Her judges are evening wolves. They leave nothing until the next day.

04 Her prophets are arrogant and treacherous people. Her priests have profaned the sanctuary. They have done violence to the law.

05 Yahweh, within her, is righteous. He will do no wrong. Every morning he brings his justice to light. He doesn’t fail, but the unjust know no shame.

[..]

Zechariah

10 11 He will pass through the sea of affliction, and will strike the waves in the sea, and all the depths of the Nile will dry up; and the pride of Assyria will be brought down, and the scepter of Egypt will depart.

12 I will strengthen them in Yahweh; and they will walk up and down praise in his name,” says Yahweh.   

Zechariah

11 01 Open your doors, Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars.

02 Wail, cypress tree, for the cedar has fallen, because the stately ones are destroyed. Wail, you oaks of Bashan, for the strong forest has come down.

[..]

Zechariah

12 01 A revelation, Yahweh’s word concerning Israel. Yahweh, who stretches out the heavens, and lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him says:

02 “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of reeling to all the surrounding peoples, and it will also be on Judah in the siege against Jerusalem.

03 It will happen in that day, that I will make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all the peoples. All who burden themselves with it will be severely wounded, and all the nations of the earth will be gathered together against it.

5Q4

Amos

Language: Hebrew

Date: Before

68 A.D.

Location: Qumran Cave 5

Contents:

Amos 1:2-5   

Amos 1

02 He said: “Yahweh will roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the pastures of the shepherds will mourn, and the top of Carmel will wither.”

03 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Damascus, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have threshed the pregnant women of Gilead with threshing instruments of iron;

04 but I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, and it will devour the palaces of Ben Hadad.

05 I will break the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the valley of Aven, and him who holds the scepter from the house of Eden; and the people of Syria shall go into captivity to Kir,” says Yahweh.   

Nahal Hever Minor Prophets

Language: Greek

Date:  About

25 B.C.

Location: Nahal Hever

Contents: (English Bible numbering)

Jonah 1:14-17; 2:1-6; 3:1-10; 4:1-2, 5;

Micah 1:1-8; 2:7-8; 3:5-6; 4:3-10; 5:2-7;

Nahum 1:13-14; 2:4-11; 3:3-16;

Habakkuk 1:5-17; 2:1-8, 13-20; 3:8-15;

Zephaniah 1:1-6, 13-18; 2:9-10; 3:6-7;

Zechariah 1:1-4, 12-14, 19-21; 2:3-5, 7-8, 12-13; 3:   

Jonah 1

14 Therefore they cried to Yahweh, and said, “We beg you, Yahweh, we beg you, don’t let us die for this man’s life, and don’t lay on us innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you.”

15 So they took up Jonah, and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging.

16 Then the men feared Yahweh[1] exceedingly; and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh, and made vows.

17 Yahweh prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.   

Jonah 2

01 Then Jonah prayed to Yahweh, his God, out of the fish’s belly.

02 He said, “I called because of my affliction to Yahweh. He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried. You heard my voice.

03 For you threw me into the depths, in the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.

04 I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’

05 The waters surrounded me, even to the soul. The deep was around me. The weeds were wrapped around my head.[2]

06 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth barred me in forever: yet have you brought up my life from the pit, Yahweh my God.

[..]

Jonah 3

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you.”

03 So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to Yahweh’s word. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey across.

04 Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried out, and said, “In forty[3] days, Nineveh will be overthrown!”

05 The people of Nineveh believed God; and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from their greatest even to their least.

[..]

07 He made a proclamation and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, “Let neither man nor animal, herd nor flock, taste anything; let them not feed, nor drink water;

08 but let them be covered with sackcloth, both man and animal, and let them cry mightily to God. Yes, let them him turn everyone from his evil way, and from the violence that is in his hands.

09 Who knows whether God will not turn and relent, and turn away from his fierce anger, so that we might not perish?”

10 God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way. God relented of the disaster which he said he would do to them, and he didn’t do it.   

Jonah 4

01 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry.

02 He prayed to Yahweh, and said, “Please, Yahweh, wasn’t this what I said when I was still in my own country? Therefore I hurried to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and you relent of doing harm.

[..]

05 Then Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made himself a booth, and sat under it in the shade, until he might see what would become of the city.   

Micah 1

01 Yahweh’s word that came to

Micah the Morashtite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

02 Hear, you peoples, all of you. Listen, O earth, and all that is therein: and let the Lord Yahweh be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple.

03 For, behold, Yahweh comes out of his place, and will come down and tread on the high places of the earth.

04 The mountains melt under him, and the valleys split apart, like wax before the fire, like waters that are poured down a steep place.  

05 “All this is for the disobedience of Jacob, and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the disobedience of Jacob? Isn’t it Samaria? And what are the high places of Judah? Aren’t they Jerusalem?

06 Therefore I will make Samaria like a rubble heap of the field, like places for planting vineyards; and I will pour down its stones into the valley, and I will uncover its foundations.

07 All her idols will be beaten to pieces, and all her temple gifts will be burned with fire, and all her images I will destroy; for of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them, and to the hire of a prostitute shall they return.”  

08 For this I will lament and wail; I will go stripped and naked; I will howl like the jackals, and moan like the daughters of owls.

[..]

Micah 2

07 Shall it be said, O house of Jacob: “Is Yahweh’s Spirit angry? Are these his doings? Don’t my words do good to him who walks blamelessly?”

08 But lately my people have risen up as an enemy. You strip the robe and clothing from those who pass by without a care, returning from battle.  

[..]

Micah 3

05 Yahweh says concerning the prophets who lead my people astray; for those who feed their teeth, they proclaim, “Peace!” and whoever doesn’t provide for their mouths, they prepare war against him:

06 “Therefore night is over you, with no vision, and it is dark to you, that you may not divine; and the sun will go down on the prophets, and the day will be black over them.

[..]

Micah 4

03 and he will judge between many peoples, and will decide concerning strong nations afar off. They will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, neither will they learn war any more.

04 But they will sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and no one will make them afraid: For the mouth of Yahweh of Armies has spoken.

05 Indeed all the nations may walk in the name of their gods; but we will walk in the name of Yahweh our God forever and ever.

06 “In that day,” says Yahweh, “I will assemble that which is lame, and I will gather that which is driven away, and that which I have afflicted;

07 and I will make that which was lame a remnant, and that which was cast far off a strong nation: and Yahweh will reign over them on Mount Zion from then on, even forever.”

08 You, tower of the flock, the hill of the daughter of Zion, to you it will come, yes, the former dominion will come, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.

09 Now why do you cry out aloud? Is there no king in you? Has your counselor perished, that pains have taken hold of you as of a woman in travail?

10 Be in pain, and labor to give birth, daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail; for now you will go out of the city, and will dwell in the field, and will come even to Babylon. There you will be rescued. There Yahweh will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.

[..]

Micah 5

02 But you, Bethlehem house of Ephrathah, being small among the clans thousands[4] of Judah, out of you one will come out to me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings out are from of old, from ancient times.

03 Therefore he will abandon them until the time that she who is in labor gives birth. Then the rest of his brothers will return to the children of Israel.

04 He shall stand, and shall shepherd in the strength of Yahweh, in the majesty of the name of Yahweh his God: and they will live, for then he will be great to the ends of the earth.

05 He will be our peace when Assyria invades our land, and when he marches through our fortresses, then we will raise against him seven shepherds, and eight leaders of men.

06 They will rule the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in its gates. He will deliver us from the Assyrian, when he invades our land, and when he marches within our border.

07 The remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples, like dew from Yahweh, like showers on the grass, that don’t wait for man, nor wait for the sons of men.

[..]

Nahum 1

13 Now I will break his yoke from off you, and will burst your bonds apart.”

14 Yahweh has commanded concerning you: “No more descendants will bear your name. Out of the house of your gods, I will cut off the engraved image and the molten image. I will make your grave, for you are vile.”

[..]

Nahum 2

04 The chariots rage in the streets. They rush back and forth in the wide ways. Their appearance is like torches. They run like the lightnings.

05 He summons his picked troops. They stumble on their way. They dash to its wall, and the protective shield is put in place.

06 The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace is dissolved.

07 It is decreed: she is uncovered, she is carried away; and her servants moan as with the voice of doves, beating on their breasts.

08 But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water, yet they flee away. “Stop! Stop!” they cry, but no one looks back.

09 Take the plunder of silver. Take the plunder of gold, for there is no end of the store, the glory of all goodly furniture.

[..]

12 The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with the kill, and his dens den with prey.

13 “Behold, I am against you,” says Yahweh of Armies, “and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword will devour your young lions; and I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers will no longer be heard.”   

Nahum 3

03 the horseman mounting, and the flashing sword, the glittering spear, and a multitude of slain, and a great heap of corpses, and there is no end of the bodies. They stumble on their bodies,

[..]

06 I will throw abominable filth on you, and make you vile, and will set you a spectacle.

07 It will happen that all those who look at you will flee from you, and say, ‘Nineveh is laid waste! Who will mourn for her?’ Where will I seek comforters for you?”

08 Are you better than No-Amon, who was situated among the rivers, who had the waters around her; whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was of the sea?

09 Cush and Egypt were her boundless strength. Put and Libya were her helpers.

10 Yet was she carried away. She went into captivity. Her young children also were dashed in pieces at the head of all the streets, and they cast lots for her honorable men, and all her great men were bound in chains.

11 You also will be drunken. You will be hidden. You also will seek a stronghold because of the enemy.

12 All your fortresses will be like fig trees with the first-ripe figs: if they are shaken, they fall into the mouth of the eater.

13 Behold, your troops among you are women. The gates of your land are set wide open to your enemies. The fire has devoured your bars.

14 Draw water for the siege. Strengthen your fortresses. Go into the clay, and tread the mortar. Make the brick kiln strong.

15 There the fire will devour you. The sword will cut you off. It will devour you like the grasshopper. Multiply like grasshoppers. Multiply like the locust.

16 You have increased your merchants more than like the stars of the skies. The grasshopper strips, and flees away.

[..]

Habakkuk 1

05 “Look among the nations, watch, and wonder marvelously; for I am working a work in your days, which you will not believe though it is told you.

06 For, behold, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, that march through the width of the earth, to possess dwelling places that are not theirs.

07 They are feared and dreaded. Their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves.

08 Their horses also are swifter than leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves. Their horsemen press proudly on. Yes, their horsemen come from afar. They fly as an eagle that hurries to devour.

09 All of them come for violence. Their hordes face the desert. He gathers prisoners like sand.

10 Yes, he scoffs at kings, and princes are a derision to him. He laughs at every stronghold, for he builds up an earthen ramp, and takes it.

11 Then he sweeps by like the wind, and goes on. He is indeed guilty, whose strength is his god.”

[..]

14 and make men like the fish of the sea, like the creeping things, that have no ruler over them?

15 He takes up all of them with the hook. He catches them in his net, and gathers them in his dragnet. Therefore he rejoices and is glad.

16 Therefore he sacrifices to his net, and burns incense to his dragnet, because by them his life bread is luxurious, and his food is good.

17 Will he therefore continually empty his net sword, and kill the nations without mercy?   

Habakkuk 2

01 I will stand at my watch, and set myself on the ramparts, and will look out to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint.

02 Yahweh answered me, “Write the vision, and make it plain on tablets, that he who runs may read it.

03 For the vision is yet for the appointed time, and it hurries toward the end, and won’t prove false. Though it takes time, wait for it; because it will surely come. It won’t delay.

04 Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith.

05 Yes, moreover, wine is treacherous. An arrogant man who doesn’t stay at home, who enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and can’t be satisfied, but gathers to himself all nations, and heaps to himself all peoples.

06 Won’t all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, ‘Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches loads himself by extortion with thick mud! How long?’

07 Won’t your debtors rise up suddenly, and wake up those who make you tremble, and you will be their victim?

08 Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men’s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it.

[..]

13 Behold, isn’t it of Yahweh of Armies that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity?

14 For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of Yahweh’s glory, as the waters cover the sea.

15 “Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies!

16 You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed! The cup of Yahweh’s right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory.

17 For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals, which made them afraid; because of men’s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to every city and to those who dwell in them it.

18 “What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies lying appearance, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?

19 Woe to him who says to the wood, ‘Awake!’ or to the mute stone, ‘Arise!’ Shall this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all within it.

20 But Yahweh is in his holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before him!”   

Habakkuk 3

08 Was Yahweh displeased with the rivers? Was your anger against the rivers, or your wrath against the sea, that you rode on your horses, on your chariots of salvation?

09 You uncovered your bow. You called for your sworn arrows. Selah. You He split the earth with rivers.

10 The mountains saw you, and were afraid. The storm of waters passed by. The deep roared and lifted up its hands on high.

11 The sun and moon stood still in the sky, at the light of your arrows as they went, at the shining of your glittering spear.

12 You marched through the land in wrath. You threshed the nations in anger.

13 You went out for the salvation of your people, for the salvation of your anointed. You crushed the head of the land of wickedness. You stripped them head to foot. Selah.  

14 You pierced the heads of his warriors with their own spears. They came as a whirlwind to scatter me us, gloating as if to devour the wretched in secret.

15 You trampled the sea with your horses, churning mighty waters.

[..]

Zephaniah 1

01 Yahweh’s word which came to

Zephaniah, the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah, the son of Amon, king of Judah.

02 I will utterly sweep away everything from the surface of the earth, says Yahweh.

03 I will sweep away man and animal. I will sweep away the birds of the sky, the fish of the sea, and the heaps of rubble with the wicked. I will cut off man from the surface of the earth, says Yahweh.

04 I will stretch out my hand against Judah, and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place: the name of the idolatrous and pagan priests,

05 those who worship the army of the sky on the housetops, those who worship and swear by Yahweh and also swear by Malcam,

06 those who have turned back from following Yahweh, and those who haven’t sought Yahweh nor inquired after him.

[..]

13 Their wealth will become a plunder, and their houses a desolation. Yes, they will build houses, but won’t inhabit them. They will plant vineyards, but won’t drink their wine.

14 The great day of Yahweh is near. It is near, and hurries greatly, the voice of the day of Yahweh. The mighty man cries there bitterly.

15 That day is a day of wrath, a day of distress and anguish, a day of trouble and ruin, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness,

16 a day of the trumpet and alarm, against the fortified cities, and against the high battlements.

17 I will bring distress on men, that they will walk like blind men, because they have sinned against Yahweh, and their blood will be poured out like dust, and their flesh like dung.

18 Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them in the day of Yahweh’s wrath, but the whole land will be devoured by the fire of his jealousy; for he will make an end, yes, a terrible end, of all those who dwell in the land.   

Zephaniah 2

09 Therefore as I live, says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, surely Moab will be as Sodom, and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah, a possession of nettles, and salt pits, and a perpetual desolation. The remnant of my people will plunder them, and the survivors of my nation will inherit them.

10 This they will have for their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of Yahweh of Armies.

[..]

Zephaniah 3

06 I have cut off nations. Their battlements are desolate. I have made their streets waste, so that no one passes by. Their cities are destroyed, so that there is no man, so that there is no inhabitant.

07 I said, “Just fear me. Receive correction, so that her dwelling spring won’t be cut off, according to all that I have appointed concerning her.” But they rose early and corrupted all their doings.

[..]

Zechariah 1

01  In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, Yahweh’s word came to

Zechariah the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, the prophet, saying,

02 “Yahweh was very displeased with your fathers.

03 Therefore tell them: Yahweh of Armies says: ‘Return to me,’ says Yahweh of Armies, ‘and I will return to you,’ says Yahweh of Armies.

04 Don’t you be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, saying: Yahweh of Armies says, ‘Return now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings;’ but they didn’t hear, nor listen to me, says Yahweh.

[..]

12 Then Yahweh’s angel replied, “O Yahweh of Armies, how long will you not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, against which you have had indignation these seventy years?”

13 Yahweh answered the angel who talked with me with kind and comforting words.

14 So the angel who talked with me said to me, “Proclaim, saying, ‘Yahweh of Armies says: “I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy.

[..]

19 I asked the angel who talked with me, “What are these?” He answered me, “These are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem.”

20 Yahweh showed me four craftsmen.

21 Then I asked, “What are these coming to do?” He said, “These are the horns which scattered Judah, so that no man lifted up his head; but these have come to terrify them, to cast down the horns of the nations, which lifted up their horn against the land of Judah to scatter it.”   

Zechariah 2

03 Behold, the angel who talked with me went out, and another angel went out to meet him,

04 and said to him, “Run, speak to this young man, saying, ‘Jerusalem will be inhabited as villages without walls, because of the multitude of men and livestock in it.

05 For I,’ says Yahweh, ‘will be to her a wall of fire around it, and I will be the glory in the middle of her.

[..]

07 ‘Come, Zion! Escape, you who dwell with the daughter of Babylon.’

08 For Yahweh of Armies says: ‘For honor he has sent me to the nations which plundered you; for he who touches you touches the apple of his eye.

[..]

12 Yahweh will inherit Judah as his portion in the holy land, and will again choose Jerusalem.

13 Be silent, all flesh, before Yahweh; for he has roused himself from his holy habitation!”   

Zechariah 3

01 He showed me Joshua the high priest standing before Yahweh’s angel, and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary.

02 Yahweh said to Satan, “Yahweh rebuke you, Satan! Yes, Yahweh who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Isn’t this a burning stick plucked out of the fire?”

03 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and was standing before the angel.

04 He answered and spoke to those who stood before him, saying, “Take the filthy garments off him.” To him he said, “Behold, I have caused your iniquity to pass from you, and I will clothe you with rich clothing.”

05 I said, “Let them set a clean turban on his head.” So they set a clean turban on his head, and clothed him; and Yahweh’s angel was standing by.

06 Yahweh’s angel protested to Joshua, saying,

07 “Yahweh of Armies says: ‘If you will walk in my ways, and if you will follow my instructions, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access among these who stand by.

[..]

Zechariah 8

19 Yahweh of Armies says: “The fasts of the fourth, fifth, seventh, and tenth months shall be for the house of Judah joy and gladness, and cheerful feasts. Therefore love truth and peace.”

20 Yahweh of Armies says: “Many peoples, and the inhabitants of many cities will yet come;

21 and the inhabitants of one shall go to another, saying, ‘Let’s go speedily to entreat the favor of Yahweh, and to seek Yahweh of Armies. I will go also.’

[..]

23 Yahweh of Armies says: “In those days, ten men will take hold, out of all the languages of the nations, they will take hold of the skirt of him who is a Jew, saying, ‘We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’ ”   

Zechariah 9

01 A revelation. Yahweh’s word is against the land of Hadrach, and will rest upon Damascus; for the eye of man and of all the tribes of Israel is toward Yahweh;

02 and Hamath, also, which borders on it; Tyre and Sidon, because they are very wise.

03 Tyre built herself a stronghold, and heaped up silver like the dust, and fine gold like the mire of the streets.

04 Behold, the Lord will dispossess her, and he will strike her power in the sea; and she will be devoured with fire.

05 Ashkelon will see it, and fear; Gaza also, and will writhe in agony; as will Ekron, for her expectation will be disappointed; and the king will perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon will not be inhabited.  

 [1] Although this scroll is in Greek, whenever the word “kurios” (the Greek word for Lord) is used, instead of “kurios,” the scroll substitutes the Hebrew word “Yahweh” written in the Paleo-Hebrew script.

 [2] The last phrase of verse

06 matches the Hebrew MT and does not match the Greek Septuagint. Although this scroll is in Greek, when there are differences between the Hebrew MT and the Greek Septuagint, this scroll usually matches the MT.

 [3] The Septuagint says “three” days. This scroll and the MT say forty days.

 [4] The Hebrew word normally translated as “clans” in this passage can also be translated as “thousands.” This Greek scroll used “thousands.” Wadi Muraba’at Minor Prophets

Language: Hebrew

Date: About 135 A.D.

Location: Wadi Muraba’at

Contents:

Joel 2:20, 26-32; 3:1-21;

Amos 1:5-15; 2:1; 7:3-6, 8-17; 8:3-7, 11-14; 9:1-15;

Obadiah;

Jonah;

Micah 1:1-5:2, 6-15; 6:1-7, 11-16; 7:1-20;

Nahum;

Habakkuk 1:3-13, 15; 2:2-11, 18-20; 3:1-19;

Zephaniah 1:1, 11-18; 2:1-15; 3:1-6, 8-20;

Haggai 1:1-15; 2:1-8, 10, 12-23;

Zechariah 1:1-4   

Joel 2

20 But I will remove the northern army far away from you, and will drive it into a barren and desolate land, its front into the eastern sea, and its back into the western sea; and its stench will come up, and its bad smell will rise.” Surely he has done great things.

[..]

26 You will have plenty to eat, and be satisfied, and will praise the name of Yahweh, your God, who has dealt wondrously with you; and my people will never again be disappointed.

27 You will know that I am among Israel, and that I am Yahweh, your God, and there is no one else; and my people will never again be disappointed.  

28 “It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions.

29 And also on the servants and on the handmaids in those days, I will pour out my Spirit.

30 I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood, fire, and pillars of smoke.

31 The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes.

32 It will happen that whoever will call on Yahweh’s name shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as Yahweh has said, and among the remnant, those whom Yahweh calls.   

Joel 3

01 “For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem,

02 I will gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat; and I will execute judgment on them there for my people, and for my heritage, Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations. They have divided my land,

03 and have cast lots for my people, and have given a boy for a prostitute, and sold a girl for wine, that they may drink.  

04 “Yes, and what are you to me, Tyre, and Sidon, and all the regions of Philistia? Will you repay me? And if you repay me, I will swiftly and speedily return your repayment on your own head.

05 Because you have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried my finest treasures into your temples,

06 and have sold the children of Judah and the children of Jerusalem to the sons of the Greeks, that you may remove them far from their border.

07 Behold, I will stir them up out of the place where you have sold them, and will return your repayment on your own head;

08 and I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the children of Judah, and they will sell them to the men of Sheba, to a faraway nation, for Yahweh has spoken it.”  

09 Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for war! Stir up the mighty men. Let all the warriors draw near. Let them come up.

10 Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weak say, ‘I am strong.’

11 Hurry and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves together.” Cause your mighty ones to come down there, Yahweh.

12 “Let the nations arouse themselves, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat; for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations.

13 Put in the sickle; for the harvest is ripe. Come, tread, for the wine press is full, the vats overflow, for their wickedness is great.”

14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of Yahweh is near, in the valley of decision.

15 The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining.

16 Yahweh will roar from Zion, and thunder from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth will shake; but Yahweh will be a refuge to his people, and a stronghold to the children of Israel.

[..]

Amos 1

05 I will break the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the valley of Aven, and him who holds the scepter from the house of Eden; and the people of Syria shall go into captivity to Kir,” says Yahweh.

06 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Gaza, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they carried away captive the whole community, to deliver them up to Edom;

07 but I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, and it will devour its palaces.

08 I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him who holds the scepter from Ashkelon; and I will turn my hand against Ekron; and the remnant of the Philistines will perish,” says the Lord Yahweh.

09 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Tyre, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole community to Edom, and didn’t remember the brotherly covenant;

10 but I will send a fire on the wall of Tyre, and it will devour its palaces.”

11 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Edom, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he pursued his brother with the sword, and cast off all pity, and his anger raged continually, and he kept his wrath forever;

12 but I will send a fire on Teman, and it will devour the palaces of Bozrah.”

13 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of the children of Ammon, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead, that they may enlarge their border.

14 But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it will devour its palaces, with shouting in the day of battle, with a storm in the day of the whirlwind;

15 and their king will go into captivity, he and his princes together,” says Yahweh.   

Amos 2

01 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Moab, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime;

[..]

Amos 7

03 Yahweh relented concerning this. “It shall not be,” says Yahweh.

04 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me and behold, the Lord Yahweh called for judgment by fire; and it dried up the great deep, and would have devoured the land.

05 Then I said, “Lord Yahweh, stop, I beg you! How could Jacob stand? For he is small.”

06 Yahweh relented concerning this. “This also shall not be,” says the Lord Yahweh.

[..]

08 Yahweh said to me, “

Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said, “Behold, I will set a plumb line in the middle of my people Israel. I will not again pass by them.

09 The high places of Isaac will be desolate, the sanctuaries of Israel will be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”

10 Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “

Amos has conspired against you in the middle of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words.

11 For

Amos says, ‘Jeroboam will die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.’ ”

12 Amaziah also said to

Amos, “You seer, go, flee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there:

13 but don’t prophesy again any more at Bethel; for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a royal house!”

14 Then

Amos answered Amaziah, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdsman, and a farmer of sycamore figs;

15 and Yahweh took me from following the flock, and Yahweh said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to against my people Israel.’

16 Now therefore listen to Yahweh’s word: ‘You say, Don’t prophesy against Israel, and don’t preach against any more the house of Isaac.’

17 Therefore Yahweh says: ‘Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided by line; and you yourself shall die in a land that is unclean, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.’ ”   

Amos 8

03 The songs of the temple will be wailings in that day,” says the Lord Yahweh. “The dead bodies will be many. In every place they will throw them out with silence.

04 Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail,

05 Saying, ‘When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may market wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel large, and dealing falsely with balances of deceit;

06 that we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes, and sell the sweepings with the wheat?’ ”

07 Yahweh has sworn by the pride of Jacob, “Surely I will never forget any of their works.

[..]

11 Behold, the days come,” says the Lord Yahweh, “that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing Yahweh’s words.

12 They will wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east; they will run back and forth to seek Yahweh’s word, and will not find it.

13 In that day the beautiful virgins and the young men will faint for thirst.

14 Those who swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, ‘As your god, Dan, lives;’ and, ‘As the way of Beersheba lives;’ they will fall, and never rise up again.”   

Amos 9

01 I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and he said, “Strike the tops of the pillars, that the thresholds may shake; and break them in pieces on the head of all of them; and I will kill the last of them with the sword: there shall not one of them flee away, and there shall not one of them escape.

02 Though they dig into Sheol, there my hand will take them; and though they climb up to heaven, there I will bring them down.

03 Though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out there; and though they be hidden from my sight in the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent, and it will bite them.

04 Though they go into captivity before their enemies, there I will command the sword, and it will kill them. I will set my eyes on them for evil, and not for good.

05 For the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, is he who touches the land and it melts, and all who dwell in it will mourn; and it will rise up wholly like the River, and will sink again, like the River of Egypt.

06 It is he who builds his rooms in the heavens, and has founded his vault on the earth; he who calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out on the surface of the earth; Yahweh is his name.

07 Are you not like the children of the Ethiopians to me, children of Israel?” says Yahweh. “Haven’t I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir?

08 Behold, the eyes of the Lord Yahweh are on the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the surface of the earth; except that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,” says Yahweh.

09 “For, behold, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all the nations, as grain is sifted in a sieve, yet not the least kernel will fall on the earth.

10 All the sinners of my people will die by the sword, who say, ‘Evil won’t overtake nor meet us.’

11 In that day I will raise up the tent of David who is fallen, and close up its breaches, and I will raise up its ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old;

12 that they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the nations who are called by my name,” says Yahweh who does this.

13 “Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh, “that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the one treading grapes him who sows seed; and sweet wine will drip from the mountains, and flow from the hills.

14 I will bring my people Israel back from captivity, and they will rebuild the ruined cities, and inhabit them; and they will plant vineyards, and drink wine from them. They shall also make gardens, and eat their fruit.

15 I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them,” says Yahweh your God.   

Obadiah 01

01 The vision of Obadiah. This is what the Lord Yahweh says about Edom. We have heard news from Yahweh, and an ambassador is sent among the nations, saying, “Arise, and let’s rise up against her in battle.

02 Behold, I have made you small among the nations. You are greatly despised.

03 The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who dwell in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high, who says in his heart, ‘Who will bring me down to the ground?’

04 Though you mount on high as the eagle, and though your nest is set among the stars, I will bring you down from there,” says Yahweh.

05 “If thieves came to you, if robbers by night—oh, what disaster awaits you—wouldn’t they only steal until they had enough? If grape pickers came to you, wouldn’t they leave some gleaning grapes?

06 How Esau will be ransacked! How his hidden treasures are sought out!

07 All the men of your alliance have brought you on your way, even to the border. The men who were at peace with you have deceived you, and prevailed against you. Friends who eat your bread lay a snare under you. There is no understanding in him.”

08 “Won’t I in that day”, says Yahweh, “destroy the wise men out of Edom, and understanding out of the mountain of Esau?

09 Your mighty men, Teman, will be dismayed, to the end that everyone may be cut off from the mountain of Esau by slaughter.

10 For the violence done to your brother Jacob, shame will cover you, and you will be cut off forever.

11 In the day that you stood on the other side, in the day that strangers carried away his substance, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots for Jerusalem, even you were like one of them.

12 But don’t look down on your brother in the day of his disaster, and don’t rejoice over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction. Don’t speak proudly in the day of distress.

13 Don’t enter into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity. Don’t look down on their affliction in the day of their calamity, neither seize their wealth on the day of their calamity.

14 Don’t stand in the crossroads to cut off those of his who escape. Don’t deliver up those of his who remain in the day of distress.

15 For the day of Yahweh is near all the nations! As you have done, it will be done to you. Your deeds will return upon your own head.

16 For as you have drunk on my holy mountain, so will all the nations drink continually. Yes, they will drink, swallow down, and will be as though they had not been.

17 But in Mount Zion, there will be those who escape, and it will be holy. The house of Jacob will possess their possessions.

18 The house of Jacob will be a fire, the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble. They will burn among them, and devour them. There will not be any remaining to the house of Esau.” Indeed, Yahweh has spoken.

19 Those of the South will possess the mountain of Esau, and those of the lowland, the Philistines. They will possess the field of Ephraim, and the field of Samaria. Benjamin will possess Gilead.

20 The captives of this army of the children of Israel, who are among the Canaanites, will possess even to Zarephath; and the captives of Jerusalem, who are in Sepharad, will possess the cities of the Negev.

21 Saviors will go up on Mount Zion to judge the mountains of Esau, and the kingdom will be Yahweh’s.   

Jonah 1

01 Now Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me.”

03 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh.

04 But Yahweh sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty storm on the sea, so that the ship was likely to break up.

05 Then the mariners were afraid, and every man cried to his god. They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone down into the innermost parts of the ship, and he was laying down, and was fast asleep.

06 So the ship master came to him, and said to him, “What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God! Maybe your God will notice us, so that we won’t perish.”

07 They all said to each other, “Come! Let’s cast lots, that we may know who is responsible for this evil that is on us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

08 Then they asked him, “Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? Of what people are you?”

09 He said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear Yahweh, the God of heaven, who has made the sea and the dry land.”

10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, “What have you done?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of Yahweh, because he had told them.

11 Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may be calm to us?” For the sea grew more and more stormy.

12 He said to them, “Take me up, and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will be calm for you; for I know that because of me this great storm is on you.”

13 Nevertheless the men rowed hard to get them back to the land; but they could not, for the sea grew more and more stormy against them.

14 Therefore they cried to Yahweh, and said, “We beg you, Yahweh, we beg you, don’t let us die for this man’s life, and don’t lay on us innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you.”

15 So they took up Jonah, and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging.

16 Then the men feared Yahweh exceedingly; and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh, and made vows.

17 Yahweh prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.   

Jonah 2

01 Then Jonah prayed to Yahweh, his God, out of the fish’s belly.

02 He said, “I called because of my affliction to Yahweh. He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried. You heard my voice.

03 For you threw me into the depths, in the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.

04 I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’

05 The waters surrounded me, even to the soul. The deep was around me. The weeds were wrapped around my head.

06 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth barred me in forever: yet have you brought up my life from the pit, Yahweh my God.  

07 “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered Yahweh. My prayer came in to you, into your holy temple.

08 Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.

09 But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation belongs to Yahweh.”

10 Then Yahweh spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.   

Jonah 3

01 Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the second time, saying,

02 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you.”

03 So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to Yahweh’s word. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey across.

04 Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried out, and said, “In forty days, Nineveh will be overthrown!”

05 The people of Nineveh believed God; and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from their greatest even to their least.

06 The news reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and took off his royal robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

07 He made a proclamation and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, “Let neither man nor animal, herd nor flock, taste anything; let them not feed, nor drink water;

08 but let them be covered with sackcloth, both man and animal, and let them cry mightily to God. Yes, let them turn everyone from his evil way, and from the violence that is in his hands.

09 Who knows whether God will not turn and relent, and turn away from his fierce anger, so that we might not perish?”

10 God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way. God relented of the disaster which he said he would do to them, and he didn’t do it.   

Jonah 4

01 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry.

02 He prayed to Yahweh, and said, “Please, Yahweh, wasn’t this what I said when I was still in my own country? Therefore I hurried to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and you relent of doing harm.

03 Therefore now, Yahweh, take, I beg you, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.”

04 Yahweh said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”

05 Then Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made himself a booth, and sat under it in the shade, until he might see what would become of the city.

06 Yahweh God prepared a vine, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the vine.

07 But God prepared a worm at dawn the next day, and it chewed on the vine, so that it withered.

08 When the sun arose, God prepared a sultry east wind; and the sun beat on

Jonah’s head, so that he fainted, and requested for himself that he might die, and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.”

09 God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the vine?” He said, “I am right to be angry, even to death.”

10 Yahweh said, “You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not labored, neither made it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night.

11 Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much livestock?”   

Micah 1

01 Yahweh’s word that came to

Micah the Morashtite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

02 Hear, you peoples, all of you. Listen, O earth, and all that is therein: and let the Lord Yahweh be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple.

03 For, behold, Yahweh comes out of his place, and will come down and tread on the high places of the earth.

04 The mountains melt under him, and the valleys split apart, like wax before the fire, like waters that are poured down a steep place.  

05 “All this is for the disobedience of Jacob, and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the disobedience of Jacob? Isn’t it Samaria? And what are the high places of Judah? Aren’t they Jerusalem?

06 Therefore I will make Samaria like a rubble heap of the field, like places for planting vineyards; and I will pour down its stones into the valley, and I will uncover its foundations.

07 All her idols will be beaten to pieces, and all her temple gifts will be burned with fire, and all her images I will destroy; for of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them, and to the hire of a prostitute shall they return.”  

08 For this I will lament and wail; I will go stripped and naked; I will howl like the jackals, and moan like the daughters of owls.

09 For her wounds are incurable; for it has come even to Judah. It reaches to the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem.

10 Don’t tell it in Gath. Don’t weep at all. At Beth Ophrah I have rolled myself in the dust.

11 Pass on, inhabitant of Shaphir, in nakedness and shame. The inhabitant of Zaanan won’t come out. The wailing of Beth Ezel will take from you his protection.

12 For the inhabitant of Maroth waits anxiously for good, because evil has come down from Yahweh to the gate of Jerusalem.

13 Harness the chariot to the swift steed, inhabitant of Lachish. She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion; For the transgressions of Israel were found in you.

14 Therefore you will give a parting gift to Moresheth Gath. The houses of Achzib will be a deceitful thing to the kings of Israel.

15 I will yet bring to you, inhabitant of Mareshah. He who is the glory of Israel will come to Adullam.

16 Shave your heads, and cut off your hair for the children of your delight. Enlarge your baldness like the vulture; for they have gone into captivity from you!   

Micah 2

01 Woe to those who devise iniquity and work evil on their beds! When the morning is light, they practice it, because it is in the power of their hand.

02 They covet fields, and seize them; and houses, and take them away: and they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

03 Therefore Yahweh says: “Behold, I am planning against these people a disaster, from which you will not remove your necks, neither will you walk haughtily; for it is an evil time.

04 In that day they will take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, saying, ‘We are utterly ruined! My people’s possession is divided up. Indeed he takes it from me and assigns our fields to traitors!’ ”

05 Therefore you will have no one who divides the land by lot in Yahweh’s assembly.

06 “Don’t prophesy!” They prophesy. “Don’t prophesy about these things. Disgrace won’t overtake us.”

07 Shall it be said, O house of Jacob: “Is Yahweh’s Spirit angry? Are these his doings? Don’t my words do good to him who walks blamelessly?”

08 But lately my people have risen up as an enemy. You strip the robe and clothing from those who pass by without a care, returning from battle.

09 You drive the women of my people out from their pleasant houses; from their young children you take away my blessing forever.

10 Arise, and depart! For this is not your resting place, because of uncleanness that destroys, even with a grievous destruction.

11 If a man walking in a spirit of falsehood lies: “I will prophesy to you of wine and of strong drink;” he would be the prophet of this people.

12 I will surely assemble, Jacob, all of you; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel; I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah, as a flock in the middle of their pasture; they will swarm with people.

13 He who breaks open the way goes up before them. They break through the gate, and go out. And their king passes on before them, with Yahweh at their head.   

Micah 3

01 I said, “Please listen, you heads of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel: Isn’t it for you to know justice?

02 You who hate the good, and love the evil; who tear off their skin, and their flesh from off their bones;

03 who also eat the flesh of my people, and peel their skin from off them, and break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as meat within the cauldron.

04 Then they will cry to Yahweh, but he will not answer them. Yes, he will hide his face from them at that time, because they made their deeds evil.”

05 Yahweh says concerning the prophets who lead my people astray; for those who feed their teeth, they proclaim, “Peace!” and whoever doesn’t provide for their mouths, they prepare war against him:

06 “Therefore night is over you, with no vision, and it is dark to you, that you may not divine; and the sun will go down on the prophets, and the day will be black over them.

07 The seers shall be disappointed, and the diviners confounded. Yes, they shall all cover their lips; for there is no answer from God.”

08 But as for me, I am full of power by Yahweh’s Spirit, and of judgment, and of might, to declare to Jacob his disobedience, and to Israel his sin.

09 Please listen to this, you heads of the house of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel, who abhor justice, and pervert all equity.

10 They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.

11 Her leaders judge for bribes, and her priests teach for a price, and her prophets of it tell fortunes for money: yet they lean on Yahweh, and say, “Isn’t Yahweh among us? No disaster will come on us.”

12 Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.   

Micah 4

01 But in the latter days, it will happen that the mountain of Yahweh’s temple will be established on the top of the mountains, and it will be exalted above the hills; and peoples will stream to it.

02 Many nations will go and say, “Come! Let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths.” For the law will go out of Zion, and Yahweh’s word from Jerusalem;

03 and he will judge between many peoples, and will decide concerning strong nations afar off. They will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, neither will they learn war any more.

04 But they will sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and no one will make them afraid: For the mouth of Yahweh of Armies has spoken.

05 Indeed all the nations may walk in the name of their gods; but we will walk in the name of Yahweh our God forever and ever.

06 “In that day,” says Yahweh, “I will assemble that which is lame, and I will gather that which is driven away, and that which I have afflicted;

07 and I will make that which was lame a remnant, and that which was cast far off a strong nation: and Yahweh will reign over them on Mount Zion from then on, even forever.”

08 You, tower of the flock, the hill of the daughter of Zion, to you it will come, yes, the former dominion will come, the kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem.

09 Now why do you cry out aloud? Is there no king in you? Has your counselor perished, that pains have taken hold of you as of a woman in travail?

10 Be in pain, and labor to give birth, daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail; for now you will go out of the city, and will dwell in the field, and will come even to Babylon. There you will be rescued. There Yahweh will redeem you from the hand of your enemies.

11 Now many nations have assembled against you, that say, “Let her be defiled, and let our eye gloat over Zion.”

12 But they don’t know the thoughts of Yahweh, neither do they understand his counsel; for he has gathered them like the sheaves to the threshing floor.

13 Arise and thresh, daughter of Zion; for I will make your horn iron, and I will make your hoofs bronze; and you will beat in pieces many peoples: and I will devote their gain to Yahweh, and their substance to the Lord of the whole earth.   

Micah 5

01 Now you shall gather yourself in troops, daughter of troops. He has laid siege against us. They will strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek.

02 But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, being small among the clans of Judah, out of you one will come out to me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings out are from of old, from ancient times.

[..]

06 They will rule the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in its gates. He will deliver us from the Assyrian, when he invades our land, and when he marches within our border.

07 The remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples, like dew from Yahweh, like showers on the grass, that don’t wait for man, nor wait for the sons of men.

08 The remnant of Jacob will be among the nations, among many peoples, like a lion among the animals of the forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep; who, if he goes through, treads down and tears in pieces, and there is no one to deliver.

09 Let your hand be lifted up above your adversaries, and let all of your enemies be cut off.

10 “It will happen in that day”, says Yahweh, “that I will cut off your horses out from among you, and will destroy your chariots.

11 I will cut off the cities of your land, and will tear down all your strongholds.

12 I will destroy witchcraft from your hand; and you shall have no soothsayers.

13 I will cut off your engraved images and your pillars out from among you; and you shall no more worship the work of your hands.

14 I will uproot your Asherah poles out from among you; and I will destroy your cities.

15 I will execute vengeance in anger, and wrath on the nations that didn’t listen.”   

Micah 6

01 Listen now to what Yahweh says: “Arise, plead your case before the mountains, and let the hills hear what you have to say.

02 Hear, you mountains, Yahweh’s controversy, and you enduring foundations of the earth; for Yahweh has a controversy with his people, and he will contend with Israel.

03 My people, what have I done to you? How have I burdened you? Answer me!

04 For I brought you up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage. I sent before you Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.

05 My people, remember now what Balak king of Moab devised, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim to Gilgal, that you may know the righteous acts of Yahweh.”  

06 How shall I come before Yahweh, and bow myself before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?

07 Will Yahweh be pleased with thousands of rams? With tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my disobedience? The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

[..]

11 Shall I be pure with dishonest scales, and with a bag of deceitful weights?

12 Her rich men are full of violence, her inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their speech.

13 Therefore I also have struck you with a grievous wound. I have made you desolate because of your sins.

14 You shall eat, but not be satisfied. Your humiliation will be within you. You will store up, but not save; and that which you save I will give up to the sword.

15 You will sow, but won’t reap. You will tread the olives, but won’t anoint yourself with oil; and crush grapes, but won’t drink the wine.

16 For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of Ahab’s house. You walk in their counsels, that I may make you a ruin, and her inhabitants a hissing; And you will bear the reproach of my people.”   

Micah 7

01 Misery is mine! Indeed, I am like one who gathers the summer fruits, as gleanings of the vineyard: There is no cluster of grapes to eat. My soul desires to eat the early fig.

02 The godly man has perished out of the earth, and there is no one upright among men. They all lie in wait for blood; every man hunts his brother with a net.

03 Their hands are on that which is evil to do it diligently. The ruler and judge ask for a bribe; and the powerful man dictates the evil desire of his soul. Thus they conspire together.

04 The best of them is like a brier. The most upright is worse than a thorn hedge. The day of your watchmen, even your visitation, has come; now is the time of their confusion.

05 Don’t trust in a neighbor. And don’t put confidence in a friend. With the woman lying in your embrace, be careful of the words of your mouth!

06 For the son dishonors the father, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house.

07 But as for me, I will look to Yahweh. I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.

08 Don’t rejoice against me, my enemy. When I fall, I will arise. When I sit in darkness, Yahweh will be a light to me.

09 I will bear the indignation of Yahweh, because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my case, and executes judgment for me. He will bring me out to the light. I will see his righteousness.

10 Then my enemy will see it, and shame will cover her who said to me, where is Yahweh your God? Then my enemy will see me and will cover her shame. Now she will be trodden down like the mire of the streets.

11 A day to build your walls— In that day, he will extend your boundary.

12 In that day they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, and from Egypt even to the River, and from sea to sea, and mountain to mountain.

13 Yet the land will be desolate because of those who dwell therein, for the fruit of their doings.

14 Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your heritage, who dwell by themselves in a forest, in the middle of fertile pasture land, let them feed; in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.

15 “As in the days of your coming out of the land of Egypt, I will show them marvelous things.”

16 The nations will see and be ashamed of all their might. They will lay their hand on their mouth. Their ears will be deaf.

17 They will lick the dust like a serpent. Like crawling things of the earth they shall come trembling out of their dens. They will come with fear to Yahweh our God, and will be afraid because of you.

18 Who is a God like you, who pardons iniquity, and passes over the disobedience of the remnant of his heritage? He doesn’t retain his anger forever, because he delights in loving kindness.

19 He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities under foot; and you will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.

20 You will give truth to Jacob, and mercy to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.   

Nahum 1

01 A revelation about Nineveh. The book of the vision of

Nahum the Elkoshite.

02 Yahweh is a jealous God and avenges. Yahweh avenges and is full of wrath. Yahweh takes vengeance on his adversaries, and he maintains wrath against his enemies.

03 Yahweh is slow to anger, and great in power, and will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. Yahweh has his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.

04 He rebukes the sea, and makes it dry, and dries up all the rivers. Bashan languishes, and Carmel; and the flower of Lebanon languishes.

05 The mountains quake before him, and the hills melt away. The earth trembles at his presence, yes, the world, and all who dwell in it.

06 Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the fierceness of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire, and the rocks are broken apart by him.

07 Yahweh is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble; and he knows those who take refuge in him.

08 But with an overflowing flood, he will make a full end of her place, and will pursue his enemies into darkness.

09 What do you plot against Yahweh? He will make a full end. Affliction won’t rise up the second time.

10 For entangled like thorns, and drunken as with their drink, they are consumed utterly like dry stubble.

11 There is one gone out of you, who devises evil against Yahweh, who counsels wickedness.

12 Yahweh says: “Though they be in full strength, and likewise many, even so they will be cut down, and he shall pass away. Though I have afflicted you, I will afflict you no more.

13 Now I will break his yoke from off you, and will burst your bonds apart.”

14 Yahweh has commanded concerning you: “No more descendants will bear your name. Out of the house of your gods, I will cut off the engraved image and the molten image. I will make your grave, for you are vile.”

15 Behold, on the mountains the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace! Keep your feasts, Judah! Perform your vows, for the wicked one will no more pass through you. He is utterly cut off.   

Nahum 2

01 He who dashes in pieces has come up against you. Keep the fortress! Watch the way! Strengthen your waist! Fortify your power mightily!

02 For Yahweh restores the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel; for the destroyers have destroyed them, and ruined their vine branches.

03 The shield of his mighty men is made red. The valiant men are in scarlet. The chariots flash with steel in the day of his preparation,   are brandished.

04 The chariots rage in the streets. They rush back and forth in the wide ways. Their appearance is like torches. They run like the lightnings.

05 He summons his picked troops. They stumble on their way. They dash to its wall, and the protective shield is put in place.

06 The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace is dissolved.

07 It is decreed: she is uncovered, she is carried away; and her servants moan as with the voice of doves, beating on their breasts.

08 But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water, yet they flee away. “Stop! Stop!” they cry, but no one looks back.

09 Take the plunder of silver. Take the plunder of gold, for there is no end of the store, the glory of all goodly furniture.

10 She is empty, void, and waste. The heart melts, the knees knock together, their bodies and faces have grown pale.

11 Where is the den of the lions, and the feeding place of the young lions, where the lion and the lioness walked, the lion’s cubs, and no one made them afraid?

12 The lion tore in pieces enough for his cubs, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his caves with the kill, and his dens with prey.

13 “Behold, I am against you,” says Yahweh of Armies, “and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword will devour your young lions; and I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers will no longer be heard.”   

Nahum 3

01 Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. The prey doesn’t depart.

02 The noise of the whip, the noise of the rattling of wheels, prancing horses, and bounding chariots,

03 the horseman mounting, and the flashing sword, the glittering spear, and a multitude of slain, and a great heap of corpses, and there is no end of the bodies. They stumble on their bodies,

04 because of the multitude of the prostitution of the alluring prostitute, the mistress of witchcraft, who sells nations through her prostitution, and families through her witchcraft.

05 “Behold, I am against you,” says Yahweh of Armies, “and I will lift your skirts over your face. I will show the nations your nakedness, and the kingdoms your shame.

06 I will throw abominable filth on you, and make you vile, and will set you a spectacle.

07 It will happen that all those who look at you will flee from you, and say, ‘Nineveh is laid waste! Who will mourn for her?’ Where will I seek comforters for you?”

08 Are you better than No-Amon, who was situated among the rivers, who had the waters around her; whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was of the sea?

09 Cush and Egypt were her boundless strength. Put and Libya were her helpers.

10 Yet was she carried away. She went into captivity. Her young children also were dashed in pieces at the head of all the streets, and they cast lots for her honorable men, and all her great men were bound in chains.

11 You also will be drunken. You will be hidden. You also will seek a stronghold because of the enemy.

12 All your fortresses will be like fig trees with the first-ripe figs: if they are shaken, they fall into the mouth of the eater.

13 Behold, your troops among you are women. The gates of your land are set wide open to your enemies. The fire has devoured your bars.