1. In the eighth month, during the second year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah, son of Berekiah, son of Iddo, saying:
2. The Lord was very angry with your fathers,
3. so you will say to them, Thus says the Lord of Hosts: Return to Me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of Hosts.
4. Do not be like your fathers to whom the former prophets cried, “Thus says the Lord of Hosts: Turn away from your evil ways and deeds!” But they did not listen or pay attention to Me, says the Lord.
5. So where are your fathers, and do the prophets live forever?
6. Surely My words and statutes that I commanded to My servants, the prophets, did they not persuade your fathers? They turned back and said, “Whatever the Lord of Hosts planned to do to us according to our ways and deeds, so He has done to us.”
7. On the twenty-fourth day, in the eleventh month, which is the month Shebat, during the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah, son of Berekiah, son of Iddo:
8. I saw during the night a man riding on a red horse. But he was standing among the myrtle trees that were in the ravine, and behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses.
9. And I said, “What are these, my lord?”Then the angel who was speaking with me said, “I will show you what these are.”
10. Then the man who was standing among the myrtle trees responded and said, “These are the ones whom the Lord has sent out to walk to and fro on the earth.”
11. They answered and said to the angel of the Lord who was standing among the myrtle trees, “We have gone to and fro on the earth, and all the earth is resting and peaceful.”
12. Then the angel of the Lord said, “How much longer, O Lord of Hosts, will You withhold mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah with which You have been angry these seventy years?”