You must say to them: 'Thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Return to me," {declares} Yahweh of hosts, "and I will return to you," says Yahweh of hosts.

"Do not be like your ancestors, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, saying, 'Thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Return from your evil ways and your evil deeds!" ' But they did not hear and they did not pay attention to me," {declares} Yahweh.

And the angel who was talking with me said to me, "Proclaim, saying, 'Thus says Yahweh of hosts: "{I am very jealous} for Jerusalem and for Zion!

Therefore, thus says Yahweh: "I have returned to Jerusalem with compassion. My temple will be built in it," {declares} Yahweh of hosts, "and a measuring line will be stretched out over Jerusalem." '

Proclaim again, saying, 'Thus says Yahweh of hosts: "My cities shall again overflow from prosperity, and Yahweh will comfort Zion again, and he will choose Jerusalem again." '"

And he said to him, "Run, say to that young man, 'Jerusalem shall be inhabited {like villages without walls} because of the multitude of people and animals in its midst.

"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'If you will walk in my ways, and if you will keep my requirements, then you will judge my house, and you will also guard my courtyards, and I will give to you passageways among these that are standing here.

And he answered and said to me, "This [is] the word of Yahweh to Zerubbabel, saying, 'Not by strength and not by power, but [only] by my Spirit,' says Yahweh of hosts.

And say to him, 'Thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Look, [here is] a man whose name [is] Branch, and from his place he will sprout, and he will build the temple of Yahweh.

"Say to all the people of the land and to the priests: 'When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and seventh months for these seventy years, did you really fast for me?

"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'Judge [with] trustworthy justice, and show steadfast love and compassion {to one another}.

'Thus, just as I called and they would not hear, so they will call and I will not hear,' says Yahweh of hosts.

"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: '{I am exceedingly jealous for Zion}; I am jealous for it [with] great wrath.'

Thus says Yahweh: 'I have returned to Zion, and I will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem; and Jerusalem will be called the faithful city, and the mountain of Yahweh of hosts [will be called] the holy mountain.'

Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'Old men and old women shall again sit in the public squares of Jerusalem, each with staff in hand {because of great age}.

Thus says Yahweh of hosts: '[Even] if it seems impossible {to the remnant} of this people in those days, should it also seem impossible {to me}?' {declares} Yahweh of hosts.

Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'Look! I [am] going to save my people from the land of the east, and from the land of the west,

"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'Let your hands be strong, you who are hearing in these days these words from the mouth of the prophets who [were present] on [the] day {the foundation was laid for the rebuilding of the temple, the house of Yahweh of hosts}.

For thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Just as I planned to bring disaster on you when your ancestors provoked me to anger," says Yahweh of hosts, "and I did not regret [it],

"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'The fast of the fourth [month], the fifth [month], the seventh [month], and the tenth [month] will be for the house of Judah jubilation and joy and merry festivals; therefore love truth and peace.'

Thus says Yahweh of hosts: '[It will happen] again that nations and the inhabitants of many cities will come.

Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'In those days ten men from {all the nations of every language} will take hold of the hem of a Judean man, saying, "Let us go with you, for we have heard [that] God [is] with you!" '"

Thus says Yahweh my God: "Shepherd the flock [doomed] to slaughter.

The ones buying them kill them and go unpunished, and the ones selling them say, 'Blessed [be] Yahweh, for I have become rich.' Their own shepherds have no compassion for them.

And the clans of Judah will say {to themselves}, "The inhabitants of Jerusalem are a strength to us, through Yahweh of hosts, their God."

{And then}, if anyone prophesies again, his father and his mother who bore him will say to him, "You shall not live, because you have spoken a lie in the name of Yahweh!" And his father and his mother who bore him will pierce him through when he prophesies.

but he will say, "I [am] not a prophet; I am a tiller of the soil, for a man has acquired me since my youth."

And someone shall say to him, "What [are] these wounds {between your arms}?" and he will say, "Those I have received [in] the house of [the ones who] love me." '"

And I will bring the [remaining] third into the fire, and I will refine them like [one] refines silver, and I will test them like [one] tests gold. They will call my name, and I will answer them. I will say, 'They are my people,' and they will say, 'Yahweh [is] my God.'"