6. ‘And when you ate and when you drank, was it not for those eating and for those drinking?
7. ‘Are these not the words which יהוה proclaimed through the former prophets when Yerushalayim and the cities around it were inhabited and in safety, and the South and the low country were inhabited?’ ”
8. And the word of יהוה came to Zeḵaryah, saying,
9. “Thus said יהוה of hosts, ‘Execute true right-ruling, show kindness and compassion everyone to his brother.
10. “Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the stranger or the poor. And do not plot evil in your hearts against one another.’
11. “But they refused to listen, and they shrugged their shoulders, and stopped their ears from hearing.
12. “And they made their hearts like flint against hearing the Torah, and the words, which יהוה of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets. Therefore great wrath came from יהוה of hosts.
13. “And it came to be: as He called and they did not hear, so let them call, but I shall not hear,” said יהוה of hosts.
14. “And I scattered them with a storm wind among all the gentiles which they had not known. And the land was laid waste behind them, no one passing through or returning, for they made the pleasant land a waste.”