And you are to say to them, These are the words of the Lord of armies: Come back to me, says the Lord of armies, and I will come back to you.

Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they go on living for ever?

Then I said, O my lord, what are these? And the angel who was talking to me said to me, I will make clear to you what they are.

And the man who was between the mountains, answering me, said, These are those whom the Lord has sent to go up and down through the earth.

And the angel who was talking to me said to me, Let your voice be loud and say, These are the words of the Lord of armies: I am greatly moved about the fate of Jerusalem and of Zion.

And I am very angry with the nations who are living untroubled: for when I was only a little angry, they made the evil worse.

And I said to the angel who was talking to me, What are these? And he said to me, These are the horns which have sent Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem in flight.

Then I said, What have these come to do? And he said, These are the horns which sent Judah in flight, and kept him from lifting up his head: but these men have come to send fear on them and to put down the nations who are lifting up their horns against the land of Judah to send it in flight.

And I said to him, Where are you going? And he said to me, To take the measure of Jerusalem, to see how wide and how long it is.

Ho! Zion, go in flight from danger, you who are living with the daughter of Babylon.

These are the words of the Lord of armies: If you will go in my ways and keep what I have put in your care, then you will be judge over my Temple and have the care of my house, and I will give you the right to come in among those who are there.

Give ear now, O Joshua, the high priest, you and your friends who are seated before you; for these are men who are a sign: for see, I will let my servant the Branch be seen.

For see, the stone which I have put before Joshua; on one stone are seven eyes: see, the design cut on it will be my work, says the Lord of armies, and I will take away the sin of that land in one day.

And he said to me, What do you see? And I said, I see a light-support, made all of gold, with its cup on the top of it and seven lights on it; and there are seven pipes to every one of the lights which are on the top of it;

And I made answer and said to the angel who was talking to me, What are these, my lord?

Then the angel who was talking to me, answering me, said, Have you no knowledge of what these are? And I said, No, my lord.

Who are you, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel you will become level: and he will let all see the headstone, with cries of Grace, grace, to it.

For who has had a poor opinion of the day of small things? for they will be glad when they see the weighted measuring-line in the hand of Zerubbabel. Then he said in answer to me, These seven lights are the eyes of the Lord which go quickly up and down through all the earth.

And I made answer and said to him, What are these two olive-trees on the right side of the light-support and on the left?

And answering a second time, I said to him, What are these two olive branches, through whose gold pipes the oil is drained out?

And he said in answer to me, Have you no knowledge what these are? And I said, No, my lord.

And he said, These are the two sons of oil, whose place is by the Lord of all the earth.

And I said to the angel who was talking to me, Where are they taking the ephah?

And I made answer and said to the angel who was talking to me, What are these, my lord?

The carriage in which are the black horses goes in the direction of the north country; the white go to the west; and those of mixed colour go in the direction of the south country.

Then crying out to me, he said, See, those who are going to the north country have given rest to the spirit of the Lord in the north country.

And say to him, These are the words of the Lord of armies: See, the man whose name is the Branch, under whom there will be fertile growth.

And those who are far away will come and be builders in the Temple of the Lord, and it will be clear to you that the Lord of armies has sent me to you.

And when you are feasting and drinking, are you not doing it only for yourselves?

Are not these the words which the Lord said to you by the earlier prophets, when Jerusalem was full of people and wealth, and the towns round about her and the South and the Lowland were peopled?

These are the words of the Lord of armies: I am angry about the fate of Zion, I am angry about her with great wrath.

This is what the Lord of armies has said: Let your hands be strong, you who are now hearing these words from the mouths of the prophets, that is to say, in the days when the base of the house of the Lord of armies has been put in place for the building of the house, that is the Temple.

These are the things which you are to do: Let every man say what is true to his neighbour; and let your judging give peace in your towns.

Let no one have any evil thought in his heart against his neighbour; and have no love for false oaths: for all these things are hated by me, says the Lord.

A word of the Lord: The Lord has come to the land of Hadrach, and Damascus is his resting-place: for the towns of Aram are the Lord's,

As well as Hamath, which is by its limit, and Tyre and Zidon, because they are very wise.

For the images have said what is not true, and the readers of signs have seen deceit; they have given accounts of false dreams, they give comfort to no purpose: so they go out of the way like sheep, they are troubled because they have no keeper.

The word of the Lord about Israel. The Lord by whom the heavens are stretched out and the bases of the earth put in place, and the spirit of man formed inside him, has said:

And if anyone goes on acting as a prophet, then his father and his mother who gave him life will say to him, You may not go on living, for you are saying what is false in the name of the Lord; and his father and his mother will put a sword through him when he does so.

And if anyone says to him, What are these wounds between your hands? then he will say, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.

And this will be the disease which the Lord will send on all the peoples which have been warring against Jerusalem: their flesh will be wasted away while they are on their feet, their eyes will be wasted in their heads and their tongues in their mouths.