Zephaniah 1:3

1:3 “I will destroy people and animals;

I will destroy the birds in the sky

and the fish in the sea.

(The idolatrous images of these creatures will be destroyed along with evil people.) ¹ 

I will remove ²  humanity from the face of the earth,” says the Lord.

Zephaniah 2:6

2:6 The seacoast ³  will be used as pasture lands ⁴  by the shepherds

and as pens for their flocks.

Zephaniah 2:5

2:5 Those who live by the sea, the people who came from Crete, ⁵  are as good as dead. ⁶ 

The Lord has decreed your downfall, ⁷  Canaan, land of the Philistines:

“I will destroy everyone who lives there!” ⁸ 

Zephaniah 2:7

2:7 Those who are left from the kingdom of Judah ⁹  will take possession of it. ¹⁰ 

By the sea ¹¹  they ¹²  will graze,

in the houses of Ashkelon they will lie down in the evening,

for the Lord their God will intervene for them ¹³  and restore their prosperity. ¹⁴ 

Zephaniah 2:11

2:11 The Lord will terrify them, ¹⁵ 

for ¹⁶  he will weaken ¹⁷  all the gods of the earth.

All the distant nations will worship the Lord in their own lands. ¹⁸ 

[1:3]  ¹ tn Heb “And the stumbling blocks [or, “ruins”] with the evil”; or “the things that make the evil stumble.” The line does not appear in the original form of the LXX; it may be a later scribal addition. The present translation assumes the “stumbling blocks” are idolatrous images of animals, birds, and fish. See J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 167, and Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB), 73-74.

[1:3]  ² tn Heb “cut off.”

[2:6]  ³ tn The NIV here supplies the phrase “where the Kerethites dwell” (“Kerethites” is translated in v. 5 as “the people who came from Crete”) as an interpretive gloss, but this phrase is not in the MT. The NAB likewise reads “the coastland of the Cretans,” supplying “Cretans” here.

[2:6]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew phrase here is נְוֹת כְּרֹת (nÿvot kÿrot). The first word is probably a plural form of נָוָה (navah, “pasture”). The meaning of the second word is unclear. It may be a synonym of the preceding word (cf. NRSV “pastures, meadows for shepherds”); there is a word כַּר (kar, “pasture”) in biblical Hebrew, but elsewhere it forms its plural with a masculine ending. Some have suggested the meaning “wells” or “caves” used as shelters (cf. NEB “shepherds’ huts”); in this case, one might translate, “The seacoast will be used for pasturelands; for shepherds’ wells/caves.”

[2:5]  ⁵ tn Heb “Kerethites,” a people settled alongside the Philistines in the coastal areas of southern Palestine (cf. 1 Sam 30:14; Ezek 25:16). They originally came from the island of Crete.

[2:5]  ⁶ tn Heb “Woe, inhabitants of the coast of the sea, nation of Kerethites.” The Hebrew term הוֹי (hoy, “ah, woe”), is used to mourn the dead and express outwardly one’s sorrow (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5). By using it here the prophet mourns in advance the downfall of the Philistines, thereby emphasizing the certainty of their demise (“as good as dead”). Some argue the word does not have its earlier connotation here and is simply an attention-getting interjection, equivalent to “Hey!”

[2:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “the word of the Lord is against you.”

[2:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “I will destroy you so there is no inhabitant [remaining].”

[2:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “the remnant of the house of Judah.”

[2:7]  ⁸ tn Or “the coast will belong to the remnant of the house of Judah.”

[2:7]  ⁹ tc Heb “on them,” but the antecedent of the masculine pronoun is unclear. It may refer back to the “pasture lands,” though that noun is feminine. It is preferable to emend the text from עֲלֵיהֶם (’alehem) to עַל־הַיָּם (’al-hayyam, “by the sea”) an emendation that assumes a misdivision and transposition of letters in the MT (cf. NEB “They shall pasture their flocks by the sea”). See J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 192.

[2:7]  ¹⁰ tn The referent of the pronominal subject (“they”) is unclear. It may refer (1) to the shepherds (in which case the first verb should be translated, “pasture their sheep,” cf. NEB), or (2) to the Judahites occupying the area, who are being compared to sheep (cf. NIV, “there they will find pasture”).

[2:7]  ¹¹ tn Or “will care for them.”

[2:7]  ¹² tn Traditionally, “restore their captivity,” i.e., bring back their captives, but it is more likely the expression means “restore their fortunes” in a more general sense (cf. NEB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[2:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “will be awesome over [or, “against”] them.”

[2:11]  ¹⁰ tn Or “certainly.”

[2:11]  ¹¹ tn The meaning of this rare Hebrew word is unclear. If the meaning is indeed “weaken,” then this line may be referring to the reduction of these gods’ territory through conquest (see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah [AB 25A], 110-11). Cf. NEB “reduce to beggary”; NASB “starve”; NIV “when he destroys”; NRSV “shrivel.”

[2:11]  ¹² tn Heb “and all the coastlands of the nations will worship [or, “bow down”] to him, each from his own place.”