1This is a revelation, Yahweh's message about Israel. Yahweh, who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the human spirit within them, says:
2"Watch out, I will make Jerusalem a cup that makes all the surrounding peoples stumble and reel. This will also affect Judah during the siege against Jerusalem.
3On that day, I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the nations. Everyone who tries to lift it will be severely injured, and all the nations of the earth will gather against it.
4On that day," says Yahweh, "I will strike every horse with panic, and its rider with madness. I will keep watch over the house of Judah, but I will strike every horse of the other nations with blindness.
5The leaders of Judah will say to themselves, 'The people of Jerusalem are my strength through Yahweh of Armies, their God.'
6On that day, I will make the leaders of Judah like a hot pan of fire among wood, and like a flaming torch among bundles of grain. They will destroy all the surrounding peoples on every side. And Jerusalem will once again live in its own place, right there in Jerusalem.
7Yahweh will also save the tents of Judah first, so that the glory of David’s family and the glory of the people of Jerusalem will not be greater than Judah’s.
8On that day, Yahweh will protect the people of Jerusalem. The weakest among them on that day will be as strong as David, and David’s family will be like God, like Yahweh’s angel leading them.
9On that day, I will seek to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.
10I will pour out on David’s family and on the people of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and prayer. They will look at me, the one they pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only son. They will grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn child.
11On that day, there will be great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning for Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddo.
12The land will mourn, each family separately: the family of David’s house separately, and their wives separately; the family of Nathan’s house separately, and their wives separately;
13the family of Levi’s house separately, and their wives separately; the family of the Shimeites separately, and their wives separately;
14all the remaining families, each family separately, and their wives separately.