UTN uW Translation Notes:

Zephaniah 1 General Notes

Structure and Formatting

This chapter is the first of the three major parts of the book of Zephaniah. (See the outline in the General Introduction to the book.) This part describes how Yahweh will punish Judah and Jerusalem for their sinfulness and complacency.The ULT sets the lines of verses 2–18 farther to the right on the page than the rest of the text because they are poetry.

Important Figures of Speech in This Chapter

Litany

Verses 2 and 3 state in general terms that Yahweh’s judgment will be comprehensive. Then, in four places later in the chapter, prophecies emphasize a general point by making a series of specific statements that illustrate that point. These typically move from more obvious or central examples to more peripheral ones. In that way, they demonstrate how comprehensive Yahweh’s judgment will be: It will reach to the most distant and obscure places.Series of statements such as these are known as litanies. If your readers would recognize the litany form, you could translate and format these litanies the way the ULT does, as lines of poetry. If the litany form would not be familiar to your readers, you could format these litanies in a way that would illustrate how they work. You could format the general statement in a way that would set it off from the other poetry in the book. For example, if you have chosen to indent that poetry, you could present the general statement without any indentation. You could then put each sentence of the litany on a separate line. The format might look something like this:Verses 4–6:and I will cut off from this place> the remnant of Baal,> the name of the idol-priests with the priests,> and the ones bowing down on the housetops to the army of the skies,> and the ones bowing down, swearing to Yahweh but swearing by their king,> and the ones turning back from after Yahweh,> and who do not search for Yahweh and do not seek him.Verses 8–9:And it will happen on the day of the sacrifice of Yahweh that I will visit> upon the princes> and upon the sons of the king> and upon all the ones wearing foreign clothing,and on that day I will visit> upon all the ones leaping over the threshold,> the ones filling the house of their lords with violence and fraud.Verse 10:the sound of> a cry from the Fish Gate> and a wailing from the Second District> and a great ruin from the hills.Verses 15–16:That day will be> a day of wrath,> a day of distress and anguish,> a day of destruction and desolation,> a day of darkness and gloom,> a day of cloud and overcast,> a day of horn and battle-cry against the fortified cities and against the high towers.