Zechariah, 11
1. Open your gateways, Lebanon, and the fire shall burn down your cedar trees!
1. Open your doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars!
2. Wail, juniper, for the cedar tree has fallen, the majestic ones have been ravaged! Wail, oaks of Bashan, for the impenetrable forest has been felled!
2. Wail, O cypress, for the cedar has fallen, for the glorious trees are ruined! Wail, oaks of Bashan, for the thick forest has been felled!
3. The sound of the wailing of shepherds! Their majesty has been ravaged. The sound of the roaring of young lions! The pride of the Jordan has been ravaged.
3. Hark, the wail of the shepherds, for their glory is despoiled! Hark, the roar of the lions, for the jungle of the Jordan is laid waste!
4. Yahweh my God says this, 'Pasture the sheep for slaughter,
4. Thus said the LORD my God: "Become shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter.
5. whose buyers kill them and go unpunished, whose sellers say of them, "Blessed be Yahweh; now I am rich!" and whose own shepherds show them no pity.
5. Those who buy them slay them and go unpunished; and those who sell them say, `Blessed be the LORD, I have become rich'; and their own shepherds have no pity on them.
6. For I shall show no further pity for the inhabitants of the country -- Yahweh declares! Instead, I shall put everyone into the clutches of a neighbour, into the clutches of the king. They will crush the country and I shall not rescue anyone from their clutches.'
6. For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land, says the LORD. Lo, I will cause men to fall each into the hand of his shepherd, and each into the hand of his king; and they shall crush the earth, and I will deliver none from their hand."
7. Then I pastured for slaughter the sheep belonging to the sheep-dealers. I took two staves: the one I called 'Goodwill', the other 'Couplers'; and I pastured the sheep myself,
7. So I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to be slain for those who trafficked in the sheep. And I took two staffs; one I named Grace, the other I named Union. And I tended the sheep.
8. getting rid of three shepherds in one month. But I lost patience with them, and they equally detested me.
8. In one month I destroyed the three shepherds. But I became impatient with them, and they also detested me.
9. I then said, 'I am not going to pasture you any more; the one doomed to die can die; the one doomed to perish can perish; and the rest can devour one another.'
9. So I said, "I will not be your shepherd. What is to die, let it die; what is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed; and let those that are left devour the flesh of one another."
10. I then took my staff, 'Goodwill', and broke it in half, to break my covenant, which I had made with all the peoples.
10. And I took my staff Grace, and I broke it, annulling the covenant which I had made with all the peoples.
11. When it was broken, that day the sheep-dealers, who were watching me, realised that this had been a word of Yahweh.
11. So it was annulled on that day, and the traffickers in the sheep, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the LORD.
12. I then said to them, 'If you see fit, give me my wages; if not, never mind.' So they weighed out my wages: thirty shekels of silver.
12. Then I said to them, "If it seems right to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them." And they weighed out as my wages thirty shekels of silver.
13. Yahweh said to me, 'Throw it to the smelter, this princely sum at which they have valued me!' Taking the thirty shekels of silver, I threw them into the Temple of Yahweh, for the smelter.
13. Then the LORD said to me, "Cast it into the treasury" -- the lordly price at which I was paid off by them. So I took the thirty shekels of silver and cast them into the treasury in the house of the LORD.
14. I then broke my second staff, 'Couplers,' in half, to rupture the brotherly relationship between Judah and Israel.
14. Then I broke my second staff Union, annulling the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15. Next, Yahweh said to me, 'This time, take the gear of a good-for-nothing shepherd.
15. Then the LORD said to me, "Take once more the implements of a worthless shepherd.
16. For I am now going to raise a shepherd in this country, who will not bother about the lost, who will not go in search of the stray, who will not heal the injured, who will not support the swollen, but who will eat the meat of the fat ones, tearing off their very hoofs.
16. For lo, I am raising up in the land a shepherd who does not care for the perishing, or seek the wandering, or heal the maimed, or nourish the sound, but devours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hoofs.
17. Disaster to the shepherd who deserts his flock! May the sword attack his arm and his right eye! May his arm shrivel completely and his right eye be totally blinded!'
17. Woe to my worthless shepherd, who deserts the flock! May the sword smite his arm and his right eye! Let his arm be wholly withered, his right eye utterly blinded!"
