Then the word of the Lord Almighty came to me: “Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted(A) and mourned in the fifth and seventh(B) months for the past seventy years,(C) was it really for me that you fasted? And when you were eating and drinking, were you not just feasting for yourselves?(D) Are these not the words the Lord proclaimed through the earlier prophets(E) when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were at rest(F) and prosperous, and the Negev and the western foothills(G) were settled?’”(H)

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Then the word of Yahweh of Armies came to me, saying, “Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh month for these seventy years, did you at all fast to me, really to me? When you eat, and when you drink, don’t you eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves? Aren’t these the words which Yahweh proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and its cities around her, and the South and the lowland were inhabited?’”

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