Zechariah 14:1-2

The Sovereignty of the Lord

14:1 A day of the Lord ¹  is about to come when your possessions ²  will be divided as plunder in your midst. 14:2 For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem ³  to wage war; the city will be taken, its houses plundered, and the women raped. Then half of the city will go into exile, but the remainder of the people will not be taken away. ⁴ 

Isaiah 6:13

6:13 Even if only a tenth of the people remain in the land, it will again be destroyed, ⁵  like one of the large sacred trees ⁶  or an Asherah pole, when a sacred pillar on a high place is thrown down. ⁷  That sacred pillar symbolizes the special chosen family.” ⁸ 

Jeremiah 30:11

30:11 For I, the Lord, affirm ⁹  that

I will be with you and will rescue you.

I will completely destroy all the nations where I scattered you.

But I will not completely destroy you.

I will indeed discipline you, but only in due measure.

I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished.” ¹⁰ 

Joel 2:31-32

2:31 The sunlight will be turned to darkness

and the moon to the color of blood, ¹¹ 

before the day of the Lord comes –

that great and terrible day!

2:32 It will so happen that

everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be delivered. ¹² 

For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem ¹³  there will be those who survive, ¹⁴ 

just as the Lord has promised;

the remnant ¹⁵  will be those whom the Lord will call. ¹⁶ 

Amos 9:8-9

9:8 Look, the sovereign Lord is watching ¹⁷  the sinful nation, ¹⁸ 

and I will destroy it from the face of the earth.

But I will not completely destroy the family ¹⁹  of Jacob,” says the Lord.

9:9 “For look, I am giving a command

and I will shake the family of Israel together with all the nations.

It will resemble a sieve being shaken,

when not even a pebble falls to the ground. ²⁰ 

Matthew 24:22

24:22 And if those days had not been cut short, no one would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.

Mark 13:20

13:20 And if the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would be saved. But because of the elect, whom he chose, he has cut them ²¹  short.

Romans 9:27-29

9:27 And Isaiah cries out on behalf of Israel, “Though the number of the children ²²  of Israel are as the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved, 9:28 for the Lord will execute his sentence on the earth completely and quickly.” ²³  9:29 Just ²⁴  as Isaiah predicted,

“If the Lord of armies ²⁵  had not left us descendants,

we would have become like Sodom,

and we would have resembled Gomorrah.” ²⁶ 

Romans 11:1-5

Israel’s Rejection not Complete nor Final

11:1 So I ask, God has not rejected his people, has he? Absolutely not! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. 11:2 God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew! Do you not know what the scripture says about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel? 11:3 “Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars; I alone am left and they are seeking my life!” ²⁷  11:4 But what was the divine response ²⁸  to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand people ²⁹  who have not bent the knee to Baal.” ³⁰ 

11:5 So in the same way at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace.

[14:1]  ¹ sn The eschatological day of the Lord described here (and through v. 8) is considered by many interpreters to refer to the period known as the great tribulation, a seven year time of great suffering by God’s (Jewish) people culminating in the establishing of the millennial reign of the Lord (vv. 9-21). For other OT and NT references to this aspect of the day of the Lord see Amos 9:8-15; Joel 1:15–2:11; Isa 1:24-31; 2:2-4; 4:2-6; 26:16–27:6; 33:13-24; 59:1–60:22; 65:13-25; Jer 30:7-11; 32:36-44; Ezek 20:33-44; Dan 11:40; 12:1; Matt 24:21, 29; 25:31-46; Rev 19:11-16.

[14:1]  ² tn Heb “your plunder.” Cf. NCV “the wealth you have taken.”

[14:2]  ³ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[14:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “not be cut off from the city” (so NRSV); NAB “not be removed.”

[6:13]  ⁵ tn Or “be burned” (NRSV); NIV “laid waste.”

[6:13]  ⁶ tn Heb “like a massive tree or like a big tree” (perhaps, “like a terebinth or like an oak”).

[6:13]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew text has “which in the felling, a sacred pillar in them.” Some take מַצֶּבֶת (matsevet) as “stump,” and translate, “which, when chopped down, have a stump remaining in them.” But elsewhere מַצֶּבֶת refers to a memorial pillar (2 Sam 18:18) and the word resembles מַצֶּבָה (matsevah, “sacred pillar”). בָּם (bam, “in them”) may be a corruption of בָּמָה (bamah, “high place”; the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a has במה). אֳשֶׁר (’asher, “which”) becomes a problem in this case, but one might emend the form to וּכְּאֲשֵׁרָה (ukÿ’asherah, “or like an Asherah pole”) and translate, “like one of the large sacred trees or an Asherah pole.” Though the text is difficult, the references to sacred trees and a sacred pillar suggest that the destruction of a high place is in view, an apt metaphor for the judgment of idolatrous Judah.

[6:13]  ⁸ tn Heb “a holy offspring [is] its sacred pillar.” If מַצֶּבֶת (matsevet) is taken as “stump,” one can see in this statement a brief glimpse of hope. The tree (the nation) is chopped down, but the stump (a righteous remnant) remains from which God can restore the nation. However, if מַצֶּבֶת is taken as “sacred pillar” (מַצֶּבָה, matsevah; see the previous note), it is much more difficult to take the final statement in a positive sense. In this case “holy offspring” alludes to God’s ideal for his covenant people, the offspring of the patriarchs. Ironically that “holy” nation is more like a “sacred pillar” and it will be thrown down like a sacred pillar from a high place and its land destroyed like the sacred trees located at such shrines. Understood in this way, the ironic statement is entirely negative in tone, just like the rest of the preceding announcement of judgment. It also reminds the people of their failure; they did not oppose pagan religion, instead they embraced it. Now they will be destroyed in the same way they should have destroyed paganism.

[30:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[30:11]  ¹⁰ tn The translation “entirely unpunished” is intended to reflect the emphatic construction of the infinitive absolute before the finite verb.

[2:31]  ¹¹ tn Heb “to blood,” but no doubt this is intended to indicate by metonymy the color of blood rather than the substance itself. The blood red color suggests a visual impression here – something that could be caused by fires, volcanic dust, sandstorms, or other atmospheric phenomena.

[2:32]  ¹² tn While a number of English versions render this as “saved” (e.g., NIV, NRSV, NLT), this can suggest a “spiritual” or “theological” salvation rather than the physical deliverance from the cataclysmic events of the day of the Lord described in the context.

[2:32]  ¹³ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[2:32]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “deliverance”; or “escape.” The abstract noun “deliverance” or “escape” probably functions here as an example of antimeria, referring to those who experience deliverance or escape with their lives: “escaped remnant” or “surviving remnant” (Gen 32:8; 45:7; Judg 21:17; 2 Kgs 19:30, 31; Isa 4:2; 10:20; 15:9; 37:31, 32; Ezek 14:22; Obad 1:17; Ezra 9:8, 13-15; Neh 1:2; 1 Chr 4:43; 2 Chr 30:6).

[2:32]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and among the remnant.”

[2:32]  ¹⁶ tn The participle used in the Hebrew text seems to indicate action in the imminent future.

[9:8]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “the eyes of the sovereign Lord are on.”

[9:8]  ¹⁸ tn Or “kingdom.”

[9:8]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “house” (also in the following verse).

[9:9]  ²⁰ tn Heb “like being shaken with a sieve, and a pebble does not fall to the ground.” The meaning of the Hebrew word צְרוֹר (tsÿror), translated “pebble,” is unclear here. In 2 Sam 17:13 it appears to refer to a stone. If it means “pebble,” then the sieve described in v. 6 allows the grain to fall into a basket while retaining the debris and pebbles. However, if one interprets צְרוֹר as a “kernel of grain” (cf. NASB, NIV, NKJV, NLT) then the sieve is constructed to retain the grain and allow the refuse and pebbles to fall to the ground. In either case, the simile supports the last statement in v. 8 by making it clear that God will distinguish between the righteous (the grain) and the wicked (the pebbles) when he judges, and will thereby preserve a remnant in Israel. Only the sinners will be destroyed (v. 10).

[13:20]  ²¹ tn Grk “the days.”

[9:27]  ²² tn Grk “sons.”

[9:28]  ²³ tc In light of the interpretive difficulty of this verse, a longer reading seems to have been added to clarify the meaning. The addition, in the middle of the sentence, makes the whole verse read as follows: “For he will execute his sentence completely and quickly in righteousness, because the Lord will do it quickly on the earth.” The shorter reading is found largely in Alexandrian mss (Ì⁴⁶ א* A B 6 1506 1739 1881 pc co), while the longer reading is found principally in Western and Byzantine mss (א² D F G Ψ 33 Ï lat). The longer reading follows Isa 10:22-23 (LXX) verbatim, while Paul in the previous verse quoted the LXX loosely. This suggests the addition was made by a copyist trying to make sense out of a difficult passage rather than by the author himself.

[9:29]  ²⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[9:29]  ²⁵ tn Traditionally, “Lord of hosts”; Grk “Lord Sabaoth,” which means “Lord of the [heavenly] armies,” sometimes translated more generally as “Lord Almighty.”

[9:29]  ²⁶ sn A quotation from Isa 1:9.

[11:3]  ²⁷ sn A quotation from 1 Kgs 19:10, 14.

[11:4]  ²⁸ tn Grk “the revelation,” “the oracle.”

[11:4]  ²⁹ tn The Greek term here is ἀνήρ (anhr), which only exceptionally is used in a generic sense of both males and females. In this context, it appears to be a generic usage (“people”) since when Paul speaks of a remnant of faithful Israelites (“the elect,” v. 7), he is not referring to males only. It can also be argued, however, that it refers only to adult males here (“men”), perhaps as representative of all the faithful left in Israel.

[11:4]  ³⁰ sn A quotation from 1 Kgs 19:18.