Zechariah 11:1-17

Open your borders, Lebanon. Let fire consume your cedar trees. Cry in sorrow, cypress, for the towering cedar trees have toppled— the high and mighty ones are destroyed. Wail, oaks of Bashan, for the thick forest has been felled. Listen! It’s the sound of the wailing of shepherds. Their glory is gone, their rich pastures destroyed. Listen! It’s the sound of the young lions roaring. The thickets of the Jordan have been ravaged. This is what my God, YAHWEH, says: “Shepherd the inhabitants of this land, for they are like a flock doomed for slaughter. Those who buy them slaughter them without remorse. And the merchants who sell them say, ‘Blessed be YAHWEH, I have become rich!’ Even the hirelings—their own shepherds—show no pity for the sheep. I will no longer show mercy to the inhabitants of the land,” declares YAHWEH. “Instead, I will cause each one to fall into the clutches of his neighbor and into the clutches of his king. They will devastate the land, and I will not rescue anyone from their power.” So I became a shepherd for the sheep doomed for slaughter, especially for those sheep who had been trafficked. I took two staffs in my hand; one I named “Affection,” and the other I named “Union,” and I cared for the sheep myself. So I removed three shepherds in one month, for I ran out of patience with the sheep-traffickers, and they hated me. And I told them, “I am not going to be your shepherd anymore. Those doomed to die can die; those doomed for destruction can perish; and the rest can devour one another.” Then I took my staff, “Affection,” and broke it in half to revoke the covenant that I had made with the whole nation of Israel. So it was annulled on that day, and the sheep-traffickers, who were watching me, realized that YAHWEH was speaking through me. Then I said to them, “If it seems right to you, give me my wages; if not, never mind.” So they weighed out my wages: thirty shekels of silver. YAHWEH said to me, “Now, hand your silver over to the treasury, these thirty pieces of silver—this wonderful sum at which they valued me.” So I took the thirty shekels of silver and handed them over to the treasury in the house of YAHWEH. Then I broke in half my second staff, “Union,” to symbolize the breaking of brotherly bonds between Judah and Israel. Next, YAHWEH said to me, “Once again, act the part of a worthless shepherd and take with you the shepherd’s gear. For behold, I am now raising up a shepherd in the land who will not care about the lost, who will not go in search of the stray, who will not heal the injured, who will not feed the healthy sheep, but instead, he will eat the meat of the fattest sheep and even tear off their hooves. “Doom is ahead for the worthless shepherd who deserts his flock! May the sword strike his arm and gouge his right eye! May his arm shrivel completely and his right eye be totally blind!”