And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.
The above, Zechariah 12:3, is referring to when Jerusalem has become as the foretold Nineveh, weakened, not knowing right hand from left, in constant fear of those whose lies and deception laid siege to her. In the verse before, we’re told the LORD has made her “a cup of trembling unto all the people round about.” The word “trembling” is the one time used Hebrew word ra’al, meaning, “from 7477; a reeling (from intoxication).” It is from an identical one time used word, (H7477) ra’al, meaning, “a primitive root; to reel, i.e. (figuratively) to brandish.” This root word appears, in Nahum 2:3, as the LORD describing His people in the day of their “preparation,” which verse 5 then tells of as when the defense is “prepared,” both from the word kuwn.
The word kuwn means, “to be erect (i.e. stand perpendicular); hence (causatively) to set up, in a great variety of applications, whether literal (establish, fix, prepare, apply), or figurative (appoint, render sure, proper or prosperous).” In the minor prophets, it (kuwn) appear once in each of three books before and after the two above described uses in Nahum. Before, they are Hosea 6:3, Amos 4:12, Micah 4:1 (then twice in Nahum), and after, Habakkuk 2:12, Zephaniah 1:7, Zechariah 5:11; all together speaking of this moment.
Hosea 6
1 Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he has torn, and he will heal us; he has smitten, and he will bind us up.
2 After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.
3 Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the LORD: his going forth is prepared [kuwn] as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.
4 O Ephraim, what shall I do unto you? O Judah, what shall I do unto you? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goes away [these are speaking of the understanding of God’s people leaving them, as it has].
5 Therefore have I hewed them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth: and your judgments are as the light that goes forth.
6 For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
7 But they like men have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me.
8 Gilead [this word of God left here with His people as they sleep in Shinar] is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood.
9 And as troops of robbers [false prophets and false teacher] wait for a man, so the company of priests murder in the way by consent: for they commit lewdness.
10 I have seen a horrible thing in the house of Israel: there is the whoredom [God’s people in this generation selling their soul for nothing of value] of Ephraim, Israel is defiled.
11 Also, O Judah [the elect remnant that is the first-fruits, the first awakened], he has set a harvest for you, when I returned the captivity of my people.
Amos 4
1 Hear this word, you kine of Bashan [first-fruits], that are in the mountain of Samaria [who are the watchmen in towers, still worshiping idol you’ve put in God’s place], which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say to their masters, Bring, and let us drink.
2 The LORD God has sworn by his holiness, that, lo, the days shall come upon you, that he will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fishhooks.
3 And you shall go out at the breaches, every cow [kine] at that which is before her [all they’ve been taught]; and you shall cast them into the palace, says the LORD.
4 Come to Bethel [the house of God, where they teach their own creation and take the LORD’s name in vain], and transgress; at Gilgal [where the waters {words} are always swirling, ever-changing images] multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years:
5 And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven [corruption], and proclaim and publish the free offerings [even though you take their tithes for yourselves]: for this like you, O you children of Israel, says the LORD God.
6 And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have you not returned unto me [the famine for hearing the real word of God], says the LORD.
7 And also I have withheld the rain [understanding from heaven as the latter rain] from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered [see Jonah 4:7 – this is ignorance that comes when the gourd “withers,” from the Hebrew word yabesh, meaning, “to be ashamed, confused or disappointed; also (as failing) to dry up (as water) or wither (as herbage).” It’s the word rendered “dry up” in Job 12:15, as we are told of when the LORD withholds the waters of heaven].
8 So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have you not returned unto me, says the LORD.
9 I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm [as the worm in Jonah 4, destroyed the gourd {qiyqayown – rain cloud}] devoured them: yet have you not returned unto me, says the LORD.
10 I have sent among you the pestilence [as the corona from our oppressors] after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink [the evidence of uncleanness and rot] of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have you not returned unto me, says the LORD.
11 I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have you not returned unto me, says the LORD.
12 Therefore thus will I do unto you, O Israel: and because I will do this unto you, prepare [kuwn] to meet your God, O Israel.
13 For, lo, he that formed the mountains, and created the wind, and declares unto man what is his thought, that makes the morning darkness [the ignorance of those who despise and mock wisdom when it comes], and tread upon [referring us to the only other use of the word darak by Amos, in Amos 9:13 Behold, the days come, says the LORD, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader {darak} of grapes him that sows seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. 14 And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them.] the high places of the earth, The LORD, The God of hosts, is his name.
Micah 4
1 But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established [kuwn – prepared] in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it.
2 And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
3 And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
4 But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken it.
5 For all people will walk every one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever.
6 In that day, says the LORD, will I assemble her that halts [is lame, strayed away from the LORD], and I will gather her that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted;
7 And I will make her that halted [those who strayed] a remnant [Judah, first raised as the elect remnant], and her that was cast far off a strong nation: and the LORD shall reign over them in mount Zion from henceforth, even forever.
8 And you, O tower of the flock, the strong hold of the daughter of Zion, unto you shall it come, even the first dominion; the kingdom shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem.
9 Now why do you cry out aloud? is there no king in you? is your counsellor perished? for pangs have taken you as a woman in travail.
10 Be in pain, and labor to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shall you go forth out of the city, and you shall dwell in the field, and you shall go even to Babylon [to confusion]; there shall you be delivered; there the LORD shall redeem you from the hand of your enemies.
11 Now also many nations are gathered against you, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion.
12 But they know not the thoughts of the LORD, neither understand they his counsel: for he shall gather them as the sheaves into the floor [goren – the threshing floor of His wrath, Isaiah 21: 5 Prepare the table, watch in the watchtower, eat, drink: arise, you princes, and anoint the shield. 6 For thus has the LORD said unto me, Go, set a watchman, let him declare what he sees. 7 And he saw a chariot with a couple of horsemen, a chariot of asses, and a chariot of camels; and he hearkened diligently with much heed: 8 And he cried, A lion: My LORD, I stand continually upon the watchtower in the daytime, and I am set in my ward whole nights: 9 And, behold, here comes a chariot of men, with a couple of horsemen. And he answered and said, Babylon [confusion] is fallen, is fallen; and all the graven images of her gods he has broken unto the ground. 10 O my threshing {goren}, and the corn [ben – sons] of my floor: that which I have heard of the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, have I declared unto you.].
13 Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will make your horn iron, and I will make your hoofs brass: and you shall beat in pieces many people: and I will consecrate their gain unto the LORD, and their substance unto the LORD of the whole earth.
Nahum 1
1 The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite [the comforter, who is also God the ensnarer].
2 God is jealous, and the LORD revenges; the LORD revenges, and is furious; the LORD will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserves wrath for his enemies.
3 The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the LORD has his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.
4 He rebukes the sea, and makes it dry, and dries up all the rivers: Bashan languishes, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon languishes.
5 The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein.
6 Who can stand before his indignation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? his fury is poured out like fire, and the rocks are thrown down by him.
7 The LORD is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knows them that trust in him.
8 But with an overrunning flood he will make an utter end [kalah] of the place thereof, and darkness shall pursue his enemies.
9 What do you imagine against the LORD? he will make an utter end [kalah]: affliction shall not rise up the second time.
10 For while they be folded together as thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
11 There is one come out of you, that imagines evil against the LORD, a wicked counsellor [ya’ats].
12 Thus says the LORD; Though they be quiet, and likewise many, yet thus shall they be cut down, when he shall pass through. Though I have afflicted you, I will afflict you no more.
13 For now will I break his yoke from off you, and will burst your bonds in sunder.
14 And the LORD has given a commandment concerning you, that no more of your name be sown: out of the house of your gods will I cut off [karath] the graven image and the molten image: I will make your grave; for you are vile.
15 Behold upon the mountains the feet of him that brings good tidings, that publishes peace! O Judah, keep your solemn feasts, perform your vows [neder]: for the wicked shall no more pass through you; he is utterly cut off [karath].
Nahum 2
1 He that dashes in pieces is come up before your face: keep the munition, watch the way, make your loins strong, fortify your power mightily.
2 For the LORD has turned away the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel: for the emptiers have emptied them out, and marred their vine branches.
3 The shield of his mighty men is made red, the valiant men are in scarlet: the chariots shall be with flaming torches in the day of his preparation [kuwn], and the fir trees shall be terribly shaken [ra’al].
4 The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall jostle one against another in the broad ways: they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightning [be quickened by understanding].
5 He shall recount his worthies: they shall stumble in their walk; they shall make haste to the wall thereof, and the defense shall be prepared [kuwn].
6 The gates of the rivers shall be opened, and the palace shall be dissolved.
7 And Huzzab shall be led away captive, she shall be brought up, and her maids shall lead her as with the voice of doves, tabering upon their breasts.
8 But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water: yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall they cry; but none shall look back.
9 Take you the spoil of silver, take the spoil of gold: for there is none end of the store and glory out of all the pleasant furniture.
10 She is empty, and void, and waste: and the heart melts, and the knees smite together, and much pain is in all loins, and the faces of them all gather blackness.
11 Where is the dwelling of the lions, and the feeding-place of the young lions, where the lion, even the old lion, walked, and the lion’s whelp, and none made them afraid?
12 The lion did tear in pieces enough for his whelps, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his holes with prey, and his dens with ravin [with what they’ve torn in pieces].
13 Behold, I am against you, says the LORD of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour your young lions: and I will cut off [karath] your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers shall no more be heard.
Nahum 3
1 Woe to the bloody city! it is all full of lies and robbery; the prey departs not;
2 The noise of a whip, and the noise of the rattling of the wheels, and of the prancing horses, and of the jumping chariots.
3 The horseman lifts up both the bright sword and the glittering spear: and there is a multitude of slain, and a great number of carcasses; and there is none end of their corpses; they stumble upon their corpses:
4 Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the well-favored harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that sells nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts.
5 Behold, I am against you, says the LORD of hosts; and I will discover your skirts upon your face, and I will show the nations your nakedness, and the kingdoms your shame.
6 And I will cast abominable filth upon you, and make you vile, and will set you as a gazing-stock.
7 And it shall come to pass, that all they that look upon you shall flee from you, and say, Nineveh is laid waste: who will bemoan her? whence shall I seek comforters for you?
8 Are you better than populous No, that was situate among the rivers, that had the waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was from the sea?
9 Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubim were your helpers.
10 Yet was she carried away, she went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honorable men, and all her great men were bound in chains.
11 You also shall be drunken: you shall be hid, you also shall seek strength because of the enemy.
12 All your strong holds shall be like fig trees with the first-ripe figs: if they be shaken, they shall even fall into the mouth of the eater.
13 Behold, your people in the midst of you are women: the gates of your land shall be set wide open unto your enemies: the fire shall devour your bars.
14 Draw you waters for the siege, fortify your strong holds: go into clay, and tread the mortar, make strong the brick-kiln [the furnace].
15 There shall the fire devour you; the sword shall cut you off, it shall eat you up like the cankerworm: make yourself many as the cankerworm, make yourself many as the locusts.
16 You have multiplied your merchants above the stars of heaven: the cankerworm spoils, and flees away.
17 Your crowned are as the locusts, and your captains as the great grasshoppers, which camp in the hedges in the cold day, but when the sun arises they flee away, and their place is not known where they are.
18 Your shepherds slumber, O king of Assyria [communists]: your nobles shall dwell in the dust: your people is scattered upon the mountains, and no man gathers them.
19 There is no healing of your bruise; your wound is grievous: all that hear the bruit of you shall clap the hands over you: for upon whom has not your wickedness passed continually?
Habakkuk 2
1 I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved.
2 And the LORD answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run [escape these corrupt houses] that reads it.
3 For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.
4 Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his [own] faith [apart from vain faith, the worthless trust in the corrupt houses].
5 Yea also, because he transgresses by wine [drunken with his power to deceive], he is a proud man, neither keeps at home, who enlarges his desire as hell, and is as death, and cannot be satisfied, but gathers unto him all nations, and heaps unto him all people:
6 Shall not all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, Woe to him that increases that which is not his! how long? and to him that lades himself with thick clay [hides his extortion]!
7 Shall they not rise up suddenly that shall bite you, and awake that shall vex you, and you shall be for booties unto them?
8 Because you have spoiled many nations, all the remnant of the people shall spoil you; because of men’s blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein.
9 Woe to him that covets an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil!
10 You have consulted shame to your house by cutting off many people, and have sinned against your soul.
11 For the stone shall cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer it.
12 Woe to him that builds a town with blood, and establishes [kuwn – prepares] a city by iniquity!
13 Behold, is it not of the LORD of hosts that the people shall labor in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves for very vanity?
14 For the earth shall be [is] filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.
15 Woe unto him that gives his neighbor drink, that puts your bottle to him, and makes him drunken also, that you may look on their nakedness!
16 You are filled with shame for glory: drink you also, and let your evil heart be uncovered: the cup of the LORD’s right hand shall be turned unto you, and shameful spewing shall be on your glory.
17 For the violence of Lebanon shall cover you, and the spoil of beasts, which made them afraid, because of men’s blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein.
18 What profits the graven image that the maker thereof has graven it; the molten image, and a teacher of lies, that the maker of his work trusts therein, to make dumb idols?
19 Woe unto him that says to the wood [the timber, that is dead wood that cannot shoot forth new life], Awake; to the dumb stone [with which he builds his house, which cannot speak], Arise, it shall teach! Behold, it is laid over with gold and silver, and there is no breath [life] at all in the midst of it.
20 But the LORD is in his holy temple [in His people]: let all the earth keep silence before him.
Zephaniah 1
1 The word of the LORD which came unto Zephaniah the son of Cushi [Jehovah has secreted us in deep darkness – as a swaddling-band to protect us from our lack of self-control], the son of Gedaliah [until we understand the greatness of Jehovah], the son of Amariah [as Jehovah speaks and fulfills His promises], the son of Hizkiah [and we realize Jehovah is our strength], in the days of Josiah [and we become founded upon the ways and ideas of Jehovah] the son of Amon [His master builder], king of Judah [His elect remnant].
2 I will utterly consume all things from off the land, says the LORD.
3 I will consume man and beast; I will consume the fowls of the heaven, and the fishes of the sea, and the stumbling blocks with the wicked: and I will cut off man from off the land, says the LORD.
4 I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place, and the name of the Chemarims [idolatry] with the priests;
5 And them that worship the host of heaven upon the housetops; and them that worship and that swear by the LORD, and that swear by Malcham [Molech – the rulers who cause people to sacrifice their children in the fire their ideas and ways cause];
6 And them that are turned back from the LORD; and those that have not sought the LORD, nor enquired for him.
7 Hold your peace at the presence of the LORD God: for the day of the LORD is at hand: for the LORD has prepared [kuwn] a sacrifice, he has bid his guests.
8 And it shall come to pass in the day of the LORD’s sacrifice, that I will punish the princes, and the king’s children, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel.
9 In the same day also will I punish all those that leap on the threshold, which fill their masters’ houses with violence and deceit.
10 And it shall come to pass in that day, says the LORD, that there shall be the noise of a cry from the fish gate, and a howling from the second, and a great crashing from the hills.
11 Howl, you inhabitants of Maktesh [the mortar – the lies that hold the wall together, which erode and their deception comes crashing down], for all the merchant people are cut down; all they that bear silver are cut off.
12 And it shall come to pass at that time, that I will search Jerusalem with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their lees: that say in their heart, The LORD will not do good, neither will he do evil.
13 Therefore their goods shall become a booty, and their houses a desolation: they shall also build houses, but not inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof.
14 The great day of the LORD is near, it is near, and hastens greatly, even the voice of the day of the LORD: the mighty man shall cry there bitterly.
15 That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasting and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness,
16 A day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers.
17 And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the LORD: and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the dung.
18 Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD’s wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance [kalah] of all them that dwell in the land.
This final carrying away is what Zachariah sees and records in Zechariah 5. There it’s the roll, the book, the word of God, that flies away. We’re told of the curse that enters the house of those who swear falsely in the LORD’s name. As a result, it’s then seen as an ephah, representing justice, corrupted by an unfaithful woman. She is next seen with another woman (faithful and the unfaithful) flying away into Shinar, another name for Babylon, from the word shenath meaning sleep. (In Daniel 1:2, we’re told the vessels of the house of God were carried into Shinar (sleep in confusion) into the house Nebuchadnezzar’s god.)
Zechariah 5
1 Then I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and behold a flying roll [megillah].
2 And he said unto me, What see you? And I answered, I see a flying roll; the length thereof is twenty cubits, and the breadth thereof ten cubits.
3 Then said he unto me, This is the curse that goes forth over the face of the whole earth: for every one that steals shall be cut off as on this side according to it; and every one that swears shall be cut off as on that side according to it.
4 I will bring it forth, says the LORD of hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief, and into the house of him that swears falsely by my name: and it shall remain in the midst of his house, and shall consume it with the timber thereof and the stones thereof.
5 Then the angel that talked with me went forth, and said unto me, Lift up now your eyes, and see what is this that goes forth.
6 And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah that goes forth. He said moreover, This is their resemblance through all the earth.
7 And, behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead: and this is a woman that sit in the midst of the ephah.
8 And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah; and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof [the words thereof].
9 Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold, there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings; for they had wings like the wings of a stork: and they lifted up the ephah between the earth and the heaven.
10 Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah?
11 And he said unto me, To build it a house in the land of Shinar: and it shall be established [kuwn – where it was left as a provision, for preparation], and set there upon her own base.
The word “set” is nuwach, meaning “to rest, i.e. settle down.” The deep meaning is in the one other time it appears in Zechariah, Zechariah 6:8, where it speaks of the Spirit of the LORD “quieted” in the north country. It has been quieted until now.
The “roll” is the same “volume” of the book, in which the LORD’s appearing is written. This is said in Psalms 40:7 and quoted in Hebrews 10:7. It’s the same roll spoken of in Ezekiel 2 & 3, which Ezekiel, the son of man, eats and becomes the words he says.
Hebrews 10
7 Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do your will, O God.
8 Above when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin you would not, neither had pleasure therein; which are offered by the law;
9 Then said he, Lo, I come to do your will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second.
10 By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
11 And every priest stands daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins:
12 But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;
13 From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.
14 For by one offering he has perfected for ever them that are sanctified.
15 Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before,
16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the LORD, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;
17 And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.
18 Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.
19 Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,
20 By a new and living way, which he has consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;
21 And having a high priest over the house of God;
22 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.
23 Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;)
24 And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:
25 Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as you see the day approaching.
26 For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins,
27 But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.
28 He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose you, shall he be thought worthy, who has trodden under foot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and has done despite unto the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know him that has said, Vengeance belongs unto me, I will recompense, says the LORD. And again, The LORD shall judge his people.
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
32 But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after you were illuminated, you endured a great fight of afflictions;
33 Partly, whilst you were made a gazing-stock both by reproaches and afflictions; and partly, whilst you became companions of them that were so used.
34 For you had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that you have in heaven a better and an enduring substance.
35 Cast not away therefore your confidence, which has great recompense of reward.
36 For you have need of patience, that, after you have done the will of God, you might receive the promise.
37 For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry.
38 Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.
39 But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition [apoleia]; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.
Psalms 40
1 I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.
2 He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established [kuwn] my goings.
3 And he has put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD.
4 Blessed is that man that makes the LORD his trust, and respects not the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.
5 Many, O LORD my God, are your wonderful works which you have done, and your thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto you: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.
6 Sacrifice and offering you did not desire; mine ears have you opened: burnt offering and sin offering have you not required.
7 Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book [megillah] it is written of me,
8 I delight to do your will, O my God: yea, your law is within my heart.
9 I have preached righteousness in the great congregation: lo, I have not refrained my lips, O LORD, you know.
10 I have not hid your righteousness within my heart; I have declared your faithfulness and your salvation: I have not concealed your lovingkindness and your truth from the great congregation.
11 Withhold not you your tender mercies from me, O LORD: let your lovingkindness and your truth continually preserve me.
12 For innumerable evils have compassed me about: mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of mine head: therefore my heart fails me.
13 Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me: O LORD, make haste to help me.
14 Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my soul to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame that wish me evil.
15 Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, Aha, aha.
16 Let all those that seek you rejoice and be glad in you: let such as love your salvation say continually, The LORD be magnified.
17 But I am poor and needy; yet the LORD thinks upon me: you are my help and my deliverer; make no tarrying, O my God.
