Zechariah 7:1

Justice and Mercy, Not Fasting

1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Kislev.

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Zechariah 7:1 in Other Translations

KJV

1 And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Darius, that the word of the LORD came unto Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu;

ESV

1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev.

NLT

1 On December 7 of the fourth year of King Darius’s reign, another message came to Zechariah from the LORD .

MSG

1 On the fourth day of the ninth month, in the fourth year of the reign of King Darius, God's Message again came to Zechariah.

CSB

1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev.

Zechariah 7:1 Meaning and Commentary

Zechariah 7:1

And it came to pass, in the fourth year of King Darius,
&c.] Near two years after the foundation of the temple was laid, ( Haggai 2:10 Haggai 2:18 ) and near two years before it was finished, ( Ezra 6:15 ) when the work was going forward, and there was a great deal of reason to believe it would be completed: [that] the word of the Lord came unto Zechariah, in the fourth
[day] of the ninth month, [even] in Chisleu:
which answers to part of our October, and part of November.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Zechariah 7:1 In-Context

1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Kislev.

2 The people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-Melek, together with their men, to entreat the LORD

3 by asking the priests of the house of the LORD Almighty and the prophets, “Should I mourn and fast in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?”

4 Then the word of the LORD Almighty came to me:

5 “Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted?

Cross References 2

1. S Ezra 5:1
2. Nehemiah 1:1