Zechariah 11 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

The Flock Doomed to Slaughter

Zec 11:1Open your doors, O Lebanon,
that the fire may devour your cedars!

Zec 11:2Wail, O cypress, for the cedar has fallen,
for the glorious trees are ruined!
Wail, oaks of Bashan,
for the thick forest has been felled!

Zec 11:3

Zec 11:3The sound of the wail of the shepherds,
for their glory is ruined!
The sound of the roar of the lions,
for the thicket of the Jordan is ruined!

Zec 11:4

Zec 11:4Thus said the LORD my God: “Become shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter.

Zec 11:5

Zec 11:5Those who buy them slaughter them and go unpunished, and those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the LORD, I have become rich,’ and their own shepherds have no pity on them.

Zec 11:6

Zec 11:6For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land, declares the LORD. Behold, I will cause each of them to fall into the hand of his neighbor, and each into the hand of his king, and they shall crush the land, and I will deliver none from their hand.”

Zec 11:7

Zec 11:7So I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to be slaughtered by the sheep traders. And I took two staffs, one I named Favor, the other I named Union. And I tended the sheep.

Zec 11:8

Zec 11:8In one month I destroyed the three shepherds. But I became impatient with them, and they also detested me.

Zec 11:9

Zec 11:9So I said, “I will not be your shepherd. What is to die, let it die. What is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed. And let those who are left devour the flesh of one another.”

Zec 11:10

Zec 11:10And I took my staff Favor, and I broke it, annulling the covenant that I had made with all the peoples.

Zec 11:11

Zec 11:11So it was annulled on that day, and the sheep traders, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the LORD.

Zec 11:12

Zec 11:12Then I said to them, “If it seems good to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.” And they weighed out as my wages thirty pieces of silver.

Zec 11:13

Zec 11:13Then the LORD said to me, “Throw it to the potter”—the lordly price at which I was priced by them. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the LORD, to the potter.

Zec 11:14

Zec 11:14Then I broke my second staff Union, annulling the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.

Zec 11:15

Zec 11:15Then the LORD said to me, “Take once more the equipment of a foolish shepherd.

Zec 11:16

Zec 11:16For behold, I am raising up in the land a shepherd who does not care for those being destroyed, or seek the young or heal the maimed or nourish the healthy, but devours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hoofs.

Zec 11:17

Zec 11:17“Woe to my worthless shepherd,
who deserts the flock!
May the sword strike his arm
and his right eye!
Let his arm be wholly withered,
his right eye utterly blinded!”

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