Zechariah 7
1 The Lord sent a message to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Chislev. This was during the fourth year of king Darius' reign.
大流士王第四年九月，就是基斯流月初四日，耶和華的話臨到撒迦利亞。
2 Bethel-sharezer sent Regem-melech and his men to ask for the Lord's blessing.
那時伯特利人已經打發沙利色和利堅米勒，並跟從他們的人，去懇求耶和華的恩，
3 They were to ask the priests of the Temple of the Lord Almighty and the prophets, “Should I go on mourning and fasting in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?”
並問萬軍之耶和華殿中的祭司和先知說：「我歷年以來，在五月間哭泣齋戒，現在還當這樣行嗎？」
4 The Lord Almighty sent a message to me saying,
萬軍之耶和華的話就臨到我說：
5 Tell everyone in the land and the priests, when you fasted and mourned in the fifth month and the seventh month during these seventy years, was it really me you were fasting for?
「你要宣告國內的眾民和祭司，說：『你們這七十年，在五月、七月禁食悲哀，豈是絲毫向我禁食嗎？
6 And when you eat and drink, don't you eat and drink for yourselves?
你們吃喝，不是為自己吃，為自己喝嗎？
7 Isn't this what the Lord told you to do through the former prophets, when Jerusalem was prosperous and inhabited, and when people were living in the Negev and the Shephelah?
當耶路撒冷和四圍的城邑有居民，正興盛，南地高原有人居住的時候，耶和華藉從前的先知所宣告的話，你們不當聽嗎？』」
8 The Lord Almighty sent another message to me.
耶和華的話又臨到撒迦利亞說：
9 This is what the Lord says. Judge fairly and truthfully. Show mercy and kindness to one another.
「萬軍之耶和華曾對你們的列祖如此說：『要按至理判斷，各人以慈愛憐憫弟兄。
10 Don't exploit those who are widowed or fatherless, foreigners or the poor. Don't think up ways of mistreating one other.
不可欺壓寡婦、孤兒、寄居的，和貧窮人。誰都不可心裏謀害弟兄。』」
11 But they refused to listen. They were obstinate, turning their backs and closing their ears.
他們卻不肯聽從，扭轉肩頭，塞耳不聽，
12 They made their minds unreceptive, as hard as stone. They refused to listen to the law or to what the Lord Almighty told them by his Spirit through the former prophets. That's why the Lord Almighty became very angry with them.
使心硬如金鋼石，不聽律法和萬軍之耶和華用靈藉從前的先知所說的話。故此，萬軍之耶和華大發烈怒。
13 So since they didn't listen when I called out to them, I wouldn't listen when they called out to me, says the Lord Almighty.
萬軍之耶和華說：「我曾呼喚他們，他們不聽；將來他們呼求我，我也不聽！
14 With the winds of a storm I scattered them among the nations where they lived as foreigners. The land they left became so desolate that no one even traveled through it. They turned the Promised Land into a desert.
我必以旋風吹散他們到素不認識的萬國中。這樣，他們的地就荒涼，甚至無人來往經過，因為他們使美好之地荒涼了。」
