“The Lord was extremely angry with your ancestors.

I looked out in the night and saw a man riding on a red horse. He was standing among the myrtle trees in the valley. Behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses.

I asked, “What are these, my lord?”

The angel who was talking to me replied, “I will show you what they are.”

The Lord replied with kind and comforting words to the angel who was speaking with me.

So the angel who was speaking with me said, “Proclaim: The Lord of Hosts says: I am extremely jealous for Jerusalem and Zion.

I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease, for I was a little angry, but they made it worse.

So I asked the angel who was speaking with me, “What are these?”

And he said to me, “These are the horns that scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem.”

Then the angel who was speaking with me went out, and another angel went out to meet him.

Now Joshua was dressed with filthy clothes as he stood before the Angel.

Then I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So a clean turban was placed on his head, and they clothed him in garments while the Angel of the Lord was standing nearby.

The angel who was speaking with me then returned and roused me as one awakened out of sleep.

Then I asked the angel who was speaking with me, “What are these, my lord?”

“Don’t you know what they are?” replied the angel who was speaking with me.

I said, “No, my lord.”

Then the angel who was speaking with me came forward and told me, “Look up and see what this is that is approaching.”

Then a lead cover was lifted, and there was a woman sitting inside the basket.

So I asked the angel who was speaking with me, “Where are they taking the basket?”

So I inquired of the angel who was speaking with me, “What are these, my lord?”

Aren’t these the words that the Lord proclaimed through the earlier prophets when Jerusalem was inhabited and secure, along with its surrounding cities, and when the southern region and the Judean foothills were inhabited?”

“I scattered them with a windstorm over all the nations that had not known them, and the land was left desolate behind them, with no one coming or going. They turned a pleasant land into a desolation.”

For prior to those days neither man nor beast had wages. There was no safety from the enemy for anyone who came or went, for I turned everyone against his neighbor.

It was annulled on that day, and so the afflicted of the flock who were watching me knew that it was the word of the Lord.

“Throw it to the potter,” the Lord said to me—this magnificent price I was valued by them. So I took the 30 pieces of silver and threw it into the house of the Lord, to the potter.

“On that day a fountain will be opened for the house of David and for the residents of Jerusalem, to wash away sin and impurity.