CHAPTER ONE

 

 

1:1:  “Hizkiah” = The specification of his father, grandfather, and great grandfather, implies he was sprung from men of note.  However, the omission of the designation “king,” or “king of Judah,” is against the notion that this “Hizkiah” means king Hezekiah (compare with those who do make that note:  Pro. 25:1; Isa. 38:9).  However again, “Amon, king of Judah,” tells us that Zephaniah is of royal blood, in the line of king David.

 

1:3:  “man and beast. . . fowls. . . fish” = What is interesting to note is the reverse order from creation:  “fish,” Genesis 1:20a; “birds,” Genesis 1:20b; “animals,” Genesis 1:24; then “man,” Genesis 1:26.

 

1:4:  “upon Judah”.= Judgment begins at the “household of God,” First Peter 4:17.

 

“Chemarims” = Meaning, “black priests,” priests dealing with the dark underworld.

 

1:5:  “Malchim” = An idol of the Ammonites; the same as Molech, or Milcom.

 

1:7:  “He hath bid His guests” = God calls all to repentance.

 

1;8:  “strange apparel” = The only acceptable “apparel” is the “white robes” of righteousness (Rev. 3:4 & 5; 4:4; 6:11; 7:9 & 13 & 14; 19:8).

 

1:9:  “that leap on the threshold” = This had something to do with the way they worshipped Malchim.

 

1:11:  “Maktesh” = Meaning, “mortar, or deep hollow.”  It was a depression where the marketplace was situated in the Tyropean Valley, known as the “Cheesemakers’ valley.”  It was alongside the Temple where the “Wailing Wall” is today.

 

1:12:  “with candles” = No place will be left unsearched.

 

“settled on their lees” = Like wine on the “lees,” quiet and undisturbed.  As the “Targum” paraphrases it:  “Like Moab, having never been emptied from vessel to vessel,”  In other words, lazy, couldn’t-care-less; careless.  This is a quote from Jeremiah 48:11.

 

1:14-2:3:  “The great day of the Lord is near” = Zephaniah specified “plainly the results of continued apostasy and calling the attention of the true Church to the glorious prospect beyond.  His prophecies of impending judgment upon Judah apply with equal force to the judgments that are to fall upon an impenitent world at the time of the Second Advent of Christ.”  RH, July 15, 1915; PK:389.

 

1:16:  “trumpet” = The “trumpet,” meaning warning, always precedes the coming wrath.

 

 

CHAPTER TWO

 

 

2:2:  “Before the decree bring forth” = This could be rendered as, “Before the day, which passes as chaff, brings forth the decree.”  Meaning, before their close of probation.

 

2:4:  “Gaza. . . Ashkelon. . . Ashdod. . . Ekron” = These equal 4 of the 5 cities of the Philistines.  Gath had already been destroyed by the Assyrian king Sargon II.

 

2:5:  “inhabitants of the sea coast, the nation of the Cherethites” = The sea-coasts mean all the country lying on the Mediterranean coast from Egypt to Joppa and Gaza.  The Cherethites would be the Cretans who were probably a colony of the Phoenicians (see 1Sa. 30:14 & Amos 9:7).

 

2:6:  “sea coast” = The “Septuagint” and the “Syriac” versions translate this as “Crete.”

 

“dwellings and cottages” = A better translation would be, “dwellings with cisterns.”  This is, water-tanks dug into the earth for the shepherds.  The Hebrew word for “dug cisterns,” which is, “ceroth,” seems to be a play on sounds, alluding to their name of “Cherethites.”  And their land was known as “a land of cisterns.”

 

2:9:  “the breeding of nettles” = That is, their land would become so desolate such that only thorns and thistles could only thrive there for want of cultivation.

 

2:10:  “their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the LORD” = Here is the reason for all of these nations’ destruction.

 

2:11:  “every one from his place” = According to Revelation 15:4, “for all nations shall come and worship before Thee.”

 

2:14:  “both the cormorant and the bittern shall lodge in the upper lintels” = According to Revelation 19:17, the birds of prey will feast upon the unrighteous after the Second Coming of Christ.  A certain point might be made that these are unclean birds (Lev. 11:18; Deu. 14:17), which feed on unclean men.

 

2:15:  “I am” = In other words, no one can touch (hurt) me.  Never are we to think that.  See my Bible Study:  “ONCE SAVED ALWAYS SAVED.”

 

 

CHAPTER THREE

 

 

3:1:  “oppressing city” = According to verses 4 & 14, this “city” would be referring to Jerusalem.

 

3:3:  “they gnaw not the bones till the morrow” = Meaning, the leave nothing left by the time it is morning.

 

3:9:  “a pure language” = It is according to this verse that we come up with the concept of ONE LANGUAGE to be spoken in Heaven (compare to Rom. 15:6).

 

3:11:  “take away out of the midst of thee them that rejoice in thy pride” = Separation of the wheat from the tares,” Matthew 13:30.

 

3:18:  “to whom the reproach of it was a burden” = The “burden” of having her children in exile was a “reproach” to the city of Jerusalem.