“Then the word
Of Yahweh of hosts
Came to me.
‘Say to all the people
Of the land
As well as the priests.
‘When you fasted,
When you lamented,
In the fifth month
As well as the seventh month,
For these seventy years,
Was it for me
That you fasted?
When you eat.
When you drink,
Do you not eat
Only for yourselves?
Do you not drink
Only for yourselves?
Were not these the words
That Yahweh proclaimed
By the former prophets?
This was when
Jerusalem was inhabited
In prosperity.
Was this not when
The towns around it
Were inhabited?
Was this not when
The Negeb
With the Shephelah
Were inhabited?’”
Yahweh sent another oracle to Zechariah about the fasting and lamenting that they had done for the past 70 years during the 5th and 7th months because of the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in 587 BCE and the murder of their governor. Zechariah was to ask the people of the land and the priests why they had fasted. Why did they not eat or drink? Did they do if for themselves or for Yahweh? Yahweh had warned them, via the prophets, when Jerusalem was prosperous and inhabited. The towns around Jerusalem, as well as desert Negeb and the low land Shephelah were inhabited at that time also.
Eugene Finnegan Bible Project 