Zechariah 7:1-7

New Living Translation

A Call to Justice and Mercy

7 On December 7^[a] of the fourth year of King Darius’s reign, another message came to Zechariah from the Lord. ² The people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regemmelech,^[b] along with their attendants, to seek the Lord’s favor. ³ They were to ask this question of the prophets and the priests at the Temple of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies: “Should we continue to mourn and fast each summer on the anniversary of the Temple’s destruction,^[c] as we have done for so many years?”

⁴ The Lord of Heaven’s Armies sent me this message in reply: ⁵ “Say to all your people and your priests, ‘During these seventy years of exile, when you fasted and mourned in the summer and in early autumn,^[d] was it really for me that you were fasting? ⁶ And even now in your holy festivals, aren’t you eating and drinking just to please yourselves? ⁷ Isn’t this the same message the Lord proclaimed through the prophets in years past when Jerusalem and the towns of Judah were bustling with people, and the Negev and the foothills of Judah^[e] were well populated?’”