Zechariah 7:14

Bible in Basic English (1941)

But with a storm-wind I sent them in flight among all the nations of whom they had no knowledge. So the land was waste after them, so that no man went through or came back: for they had made waste the desired land.

📖 Grammatical Analysis

Original Text

וְאֵ֣סָעֲרֵ֗ם עַ֤ל כָּל־הַגּוֹיִם֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר לֹֽא־יְדָע֔וּם וְהָאָ֙רֶץ֙ נָשַׁ֣מָּה אַֽחֲרֵיהֶ֔ם מֵֽעֹבֵ֖ר וּמִשָּׁ֑ב וַיָּשִׂ֥ימוּ אֶֽרֶץ־חֶמְדָּ֖ה לְשַׁמָּֽה׃ פ

Transliteration

And wə-ʾēsāʿărēm upon all the gôyim which not yəḏāʿûm, and the hāʾāreṣ nāšammāh ʾaḥărêhem from mēʿōḇēr and from miššāḇ. And wa-yāśîmû ʾereṣ-ḥemdāh to šammāh.

Grammar Details

• *wə-ʾēsāʿărēm*: conjunction + piel imperfect, 1st common singular + 3rd masculine plural suffix - and I will scatter them
• *gôyim*: noun, masculine plural - nations
• *yəḏāʿûm*: qal perfect, 3rd common plural + 3rd masculine plural suffix - they knew them
• *hāʾāreṣ*: definite article + noun, feminine singular - the land
• *nāšammāh*: niphal perfect, 3rd feminine singular - was desolate/was devastated
• *ʾaḥărêhem*: preposition + 3rd masculine plural suffix - after them
• *mēʿōḇēr*: preposition + qal participle, masculine singular - from passing
• *miššāḇ*: preposition + qal participle, masculine singular - from returning
• *wa-yāśîmû*: conjunction + qal imperfect, 3rd masculine plural - and they made/placed
• *ʾereṣ-ḥemdāh*: noun, feminine singular + noun, feminine singular - land of desire/pleasant land
• *šammāh*: noun, feminine singular - desolation/waste

Word Meanings

• *wə-ʾēsāʿărēm*: and I will scatter them/and I will storm them away/and I will whirl them
• *gôyim*: nations/gentiles/peoples
• *nāšammāh*: was desolate/was deserted/was devastated
• *mēʿōḇēr ûmiššāḇ*: from passing and from returning/from coming and going (idiom for all traffic)
• *ʾereṣ-ḥemdāh*: pleasant land/desirable land/delightful land
• *šammāh*: desolation/waste/astonishment

Referenced Verses

• Deut 28:33 : 33 The fruit of your land and all the work of your hands will be food for a nation which is strange to you and to your fathers; you will only be crushed down and kept under for ever:
• Deut 28:64 : 64 And the Lord will send you wandering among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other: there you will be servants to other gods, of wood and stone, gods of which you and your fathers had no knowledge.
• Jer 23:19 : 19 See, the storm-wind of the Lord, even the heat of his wrath, has gone out, a rolling storm, bursting on the heads of the evil-doers.
• Deut 4:27 : 27 And the Lord will send you wandering among the peoples; only a small band of you will be kept from death among the nations where the Lord will send you.
• Zeph 3:6 : 6 I have had the nations cut off, their towers are broken down; I have made their streets a waste so that no one goes through them: destruction has overtaken their towns, so that there is no man living in them.
• Zech 2:6 : 6 And I said to him, Where are you going? And he said to me, To take the measure of Jerusalem, to see how wide and how long it is.
• Zech 9:14 : 14 And the Lord will be seen over them, and his arrow will go out like the thunder-flame: and the Lord God, sounding the war-horn, will go in the storm-winds of the South.
• Jer 4:11-12 : 11 At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, A burning wind from the open hilltops in the waste land is blowing on the daughter of my people, not for separating or cleaning the grain; 12 A full wind will come for me: and now I will give my decision against them.
• Jer 5:15 : 15 See, I will send you a nation from far away, O people of Israel, says the Lord; a strong nation and an old nation, a nation whose language is strange to you, so that you may not get the sense of their words.
• Jer 25:32-33 : 32 This is what the Lord of armies has said: See, evil is going out from nation to nation, and a great storm will come up from the inmost parts of the earth. 33 And at that day, the bodies of those whom the Lord has put to death will be seen from one end of the earth even to the other end of the earth: there will be no weeping for them, their bodies will not be taken up or put to rest in the earth; they will be like waste on the face of the land.
• Jer 30:23 : 23 See, the storm-wind of the Lord, even the heat of his wrath, has gone out, a rolling storm, bursting on the heads of the evil-doers.
• Jer 36:19 : 19 Then the rulers said to Baruch, Go and put yourself in a safe place, you and Jeremiah, and let no man have knowledge of where you are.
• Jer 44:6 : 6 Because of this, my passion and my wrath were let loose, burning in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; and they are waste and unpeopled as at this day.
• Jer 52:30 : 30 In the twenty-third year of Nebuchadrezzar, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the armed men, took away as prisoners seven hundred and forty-five of the Jews: all the persons were four thousand and six hundred.
• Dan 8:9 : 9 And out of one of them came another horn, a little one, which became very great, stretching to the south and to the east and to the beautiful land.
• Dan 9:16-18 : 16 O Lord, because of your righteousness, let your wrath and your passion be turned away from your town Jerusalem, your holy mountain: because, through our sins and the evil-doing of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a cause of shame to all who are round about us. 17 And now, give ear, O our God, to the prayer of your servant and to his request for grace, and let your face be shining on your holy place which is made waste, because of your servants, O Lord. 18 O my God, let your ear be turned and give hearing; let your eyes be open and see how we have been made waste and the town which is named by your name: for we are not offering our prayers before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercies.
• Amos 1:14 : 14 And I will make a fire in the wall of Rabbah, burning up its great houses, with loud cries in the days of war, with a storm in the day of the great wind:
• Nah 1:3 : 3 The Lord is slow to get angry and great in power, and will not let the sinner go without punishment: the way of the Lord is in the wind and the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.
• Hab 3:14 : 14 You have put your spears through his head, his horsemen were sent in flight like dry stems; they had joy in driving away the poor, in making a meal of them secretly.
• 2 Chr 36:21 : 21 So that the words of the Lord, which he said by the mouth of Jeremiah, might come true, till the land had had pleasure in her Sabbaths; for as long as she was waste the land kept the Sabbath, till seventy years were complete.
• Ps 58:9 : 9 Before they are conscious of it, let them be cut down like thorns; let a strong wind take them away like waste growth.
• Isa 17:13 : 13 But he will put a stop to them, and make them go in flight far away, driving them like the waste of the grain on the tops of the mountains before the wind, and like the circling dust before the storm.
• Isa 21:1 : 1 The word about the waste land. As storm-winds in the South go rushing through, it comes from the waste land, from the land greatly to be feared.
• Deut 28:49 : 49 The Lord will send a nation against you from the farthest ends of the earth, coming with the flight of an eagle; a nation whose language is strange to you;
• Lev 26:22 : 22 I will let loose the beasts of the field among you, and they will take away your children and send destruction on your cattle, so that your numbers will become small and your roads become waste.
• Lev 26:33 : 33 And I will send you out in all directions among the nations, and my sword will be uncovered against you, and your land will be without any living thing, and your towns will be made waste.
• Isa 66:15 : 15 For the Lord is coming with fire, and his war-carriages will be like the storm-wind; to give punishment in the heat of his wrath, and his passion is like flames of fire.