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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zephaniah 3:9 - 3:9
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“For then will I turn to the nations a pure lip, that they may all call upon the name of Jehovah, to serve Him with one shoulder. Zep 3:10. From beyond the rivers of Cush will they bring my worshippers, the daughter of my dispersed ones, as a meat-offering to me.†By the explanatory kı̄ the promise is connected with the threat of judgment. The train of thought is this: the believers are to wait for the judgment, for it will bring them redemption. The first clause in Zep 3:9 is explained in different ways. Many commentators understand by saÌ‚phaÌ‚h bheruÌ„raÌ‚h the lip of God, which He will turn to the nations through His holy servants. According to this view, Luther has adopted the rendering: “Then will I cause the nations to be preached to otherwise, with friendly lips, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord.†But this view, which has been defended by Cocceius, Mark, and Hofmann (Schriftbeweis, ii. 2, pp. 573-4), would only be admissible if bâruur signified clear, evident, - a meaning which Hofmann assumes as the ground of his explanation: “A clear, easily intelligible, unmistakeable language does God turn to the nations, to call them all in the name of Jehovah, that they may serve Him as one man.†But, apart from the inadmissible rendering of ×§Ö°×¨Ö¹× ×‘Ö°×©Öµ×× ×™×™, this explanation is proved to be erroneous by the fact that baÌ‚ruÌ„r does not mean clear, intelligible; that even in Job 33:3 it has not this meaning; but that it simply means pure, purified, sinless; and that saÌ‚phaÌ‚h bheruÌ„raÌ‚h, the opposite of ×˜Ö°×žÖµ× ×©Ö°×‚×¤Ö¸×ªÖ·×™Ö´× in Isa 6:5, cannot be used at all of the lip or language of God, but simply of the lip of a man who is defiled by sin. Consequently הָפַךְ ×ֶל must be explained according to 1Sa 10:9, since the circumstance that we have הָפַךְ לְ in this passage does not make any material difference in the meaning. The construction in both passages is a pregnant one. God turns to the nations a pure lip, by purifying their sinful lips, i.e., He converts them, that they may be able to call upon Him with pure lips. Lip does not stand for language, but is mentioned as the organ of speech, by which a man expresses the thoughts of his heart, so that purity of the lips involves or presupposes the purification of the heart. The lips are defiled by the names of the idols whom they have invoked (cf. Hos 2:19; Psa 16:4). The fruit of the purification is this, that henceforth they call upon the name of Jehovah, and serve Him. ×§Ö¸×¨Ö¸× ×‘Ö°×©Öµ×× ×™×™, when used of men, always signifies to call solemnly or heartily upon the name of Jehovah. To serve shekhem 'echaÌ‚d, with one shoulder, is to serve together or with unanimity. The metaphor is taken from bearers who carry a burden with even shoulders; cf. Jer 32:39.
As an example of the way in which they will serve the Lord, it is stated in Zep 3:10 that they will offer the widely scattered members of the Israelitish church as a sacrifice to the Lord. Compare Isa 66:20, where this thought is applied to the heathen of all quarters of the globe; whereas Zephaniah, while fixing his eye upon that passage, has given it more briefly, and taken the expression “from beyond the rivers of Cush†from Isa 18:1, for the purpose of naming the remotest heathen nations instar omnium. The rivers of Cush are the Nile and the Astaboras, with their different tributaries. עֲתָרַי בַּת פּוּצַי is the accusative of the nearest object, and ×žÖ´× Ö°×—Ö¸×ªÖ´×™ that of the more remote. ‛AthaÌ‚r does not mean fragrance (Ges., Ewald, Maurer), but worshipper, from ‛aÌ‚thar, to pray, to entreat. The worshippers are more precisely defined by bath puÌ„tsai, the daughter of my dispersed ones (puÌ„ts, part. pass.), i.e., the crowd or congregation consisting of the dispersed of the Lord, the members of the Israelitish congregation of God scattered about in all the world. They are presented to the Lord by the converted Gentiles as minchaÌ‚h, a meat-offering, i.e., according to Isa 66:20, just as the children of Israel offered a meat-offering. In the symbolism of religious worship, the presentation of the meat-offering shadowed forth diligence in good works as the fruit of justification. The meaning is therefore the following: The most remote of the heathen nations will prove that they are worshippers of Jehovah, by bringing to Him the scattered members of His nation, or by converting them to the living God. We have here in Old Testament form the thought expressed by the Apostle Paul in Romans 11, namely, that the Gentiles have been made partakers of salvation, that they may incite to emulation the Israelites who have fallen away from the call of divine grace. The words of the prophet treat of the blessing which will accrue, from the entrance of the Gentiles into the kingdom of God, to the Israelites who have been rejected on account of their guilt, and refer not only to the missionary work of Christians among the Jews in the stricter sense of the term, but to everything that is done, both directly and indirectly, through the rise and spread of Christianity among the nations, for the conversion of the Jews to the Saviour whom they once despised. Their complete fulfilment, however, will only take place after the pleroma of the Gentiles has come in, when the πωÌÏωσις, which in part has happened to Israel, shall be removed, and “all Israel†shall be saved (Rom 11:25-26). On the other hand, Mark, Hitzig, and others, have taken ‛ăthaÌ‚rai bath puÌ„tsai as the subject, and understand it as referring to the heathen who have escaped the judgment by flying in all directions to their own homes, for example even to Cush, and who having become converted, offer to the Lord the gift that is His due. But, apart from the parallel passage in Isa 66:20, which alone is quite decisive, this view is proved to be untenable by bath puÌ„tsai, daughter of my dispersed ones. The thought that Jehovah disperses the heathen, either at the judgment or through the judgment, is foreign to the whole of the Old Testament, as Hitzig himself appears to have felt, when he changed puÌ„ts, to disperse, into its very opposite - namely, to come home. The thought, on the other hand, that God will disperse His people Israel among all nations on account of their sins, and will hereafter gather them together again, is a truth expressed even in the song of Moses, and one which recurs in all the prophets, so that every hearer or reader of our prophet must think at once of the Israel scattered abroad in connection with the expression “my (i.e., Jehovah's) dispersed ones.†The objection, that Judah is first spoken of in Zep 3:11 (Hitzig), is thereby deprived of all its significance, even if this really were the case. But the objection is also incorrect, since the Judaeans have been already addressed in Zep 3:8 in the expression חַכּוּ לִי.