Zephaniah 2:6

And the sea coast shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds, and folds for flocks. AND THE SEA COAST SHALL BE DWELLINGS AND COTTAGES FOR SHEPHERDS, [ nªwot (H5116) kªrot (H3741)] - rather, dwellings (with) cisterns (i:e., water tanks dug in the earth) for shepherds. Instead of a thick population and tillage, the region shall become a pasturage for nomad shepherds' flocks. The Hebrew for dug cisterns, Ceroth [from kaaraat, to dig], seems a play on sounds, alluding to their name Cherethites (Zephaniah 2:5): their land shall become what their national name implies, a land of cisterns. Maurer translates, 'Feasts for shepherds' (flocks)' - i.e., the Philistine sea coast, bereft of its inha...

The Prophet confirms what he has before said respecting the future vengeance of God, which was now nigh at hand to the Moabites and other neighboring nations, who had been continually harassing the miserable Jews. Hence, he says, that that whole region would become the habitation of sheep. It is a well known event, that when any country is without inhabitants shepherds occupy it; for there is no sowing nor reaping there, but grass alone grows. Where, therefore, there is no cultivation, where no number of men are found, there shepherds find a place for their flocks, there they build sheep cots. It is, therefore, the same as though the Prophet had said, that the country would be desolate, as we find it expressed in the next verse. (96) He immediately adds, but for a different reason, that _the coast of the sea would be a habitation to the house of Judah_. And there is here a striking diver...

4-15 Those are really in a woful condition who have the word of the Lord against them, for no word of his shall fall to the ground. God will restore his people to their rights, though long kept from them. It has been the common lot of God's people, in all ages, to be reproached and reviled. God shall be worshipped, not only by all Israel, and the strangers who join them, but by the heathen. Remote nations must be reckoned with for the wrongs done to God's people. The sufferings of the insolent and haughty in prosperity, are unpitied and unlamented. But all the desolations of flourishing nations will make way for the overturning Satan's kingdom. Let us improve our advantages, and expect the performance of every promise, praying that our Father's name may be hallowed every where, over all the earth....

Verse 6. _AND THE SEA-COASTS SHALL BE DWELLINGS_] _Newcome_ considers כרת _keroth_ as a proper name, not _cottages_ or _folds_. The _Septuagint_ have κρητη, _Crete_, and so has the _Syriac_. Abp. _Secker_ notes, _Alibi non extat_ כרת, et forte notat patriam των כרתים. "The word כרת is not found elsewhere, and probably it is the name of the country of the Cherethim....

THE SEACOAST SHALL BE DWELLINGS AND COTTAGES - o, literally, cuttings or diggings. This is the central meaning of the word; the place of the Cherethites (the cutters off) shall be “cheroth” of shepherds, places which they dug up that their flocks might be enclosed therein. The tracts once full of fighting men, the scourge of Judah, should be so desolate of its former people, as to become a sheep-walk. Men of peace should take the place of its warriors. So the shepherds of the Gospel with their flocks have entered into possession of war-like nations, turning them to the Gospel. They are shepherds, the chief of whom is that Good Shepherd, who laid down His Life for the sheep. And these are the sheep of whom He speaks, “Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear My Voice; and there shall be one fold and One Shepherd”...

EXPOSITION. VERSE 2:1-3:8 Part II. EXHORTATION TO REPENTANCE AND TO PERSEVERANCE. ZEPHANIAH 2:1 § 1. The prophet urges all to examine their ways before the day of the Lord come; and he prays the righteous to seek the Lord more earnestly, in order that they may be safe in the judgment. ZEPHANIAH 2:1 GATHER YOURSELVES TOGETHER. So the versions; and this rendering is probably correct. The prophet calls upon his nation to assemble themselves together in order to take mutual counsel or to make general confession and supplication to God. Another rendering, based on some alteration

AND THE SEA COAST SHALL BE DWELLINGS [AND] COTTAGES FOR SHEPHERDS,.... That tract of land which lay on the coast of the Mediterranean sea, inhabited by the Philistines, should now become so desolate, that instead of towns and cities full of merchants and sea faring persons, and houses full of inhabitants, and warehouses full of goods, there should now only be seen a few huts and cottages for shepherds to dwell in, to shelter them from the heat by day, and where they watched their flocks by night, and took their proper repose and rest. The last word is by some rendered "ditches" i, which were dug by them to receive rainwater for their use: or rather may signify "cottages dug by shepherds" k; in subterraneous places, whither they retired in the heat of the day, to shelter themselves from the scorching sun; and some of them were so large as to receive their flocks also; such was the cave of...

CHAPTER S 2-3:8 The Call to Repentance in View of the Judgment _ 1. The call to repentance (Zephaniah 2:1) _ 2. The judgment of the Philistines (Zephaniah 2:4) 3. The judgment of Moab and Ammon (Zephaniah 2:8) 4. The judgment of the other nations (Zephaniah 2:11) 5. The woe and warning to Jerusalem and His people (Zephaniah 3:1) Zephaniah 2:1. As we found it in Joel, so it is here. In view of the co

ZEPHANIAH 2. DOOM ON PHILISTIA [MOAB AND AMMON], ETHIOPIA, AND ASSYRIA. Zephaniah 2:1. Having spent its rage on Judah, the storm of Divine judgment sweeps south by the Philistian sea-board, uprooting cities and their inhabitants, driving them off like chaff, and leaving the once fertile plain a pasturage for shepherds and folds for flocks. ZEPHANIAH 2:1. The meaning of the first words is highly uncertain. An attractive suggestion yields, Get you shame, yea, be abashed, O nation unabashed, the reference being to the Philistines, rather than Judah, as many scholars maintain. Zephaniah 2:2. The text here is both corrupt and overladen. The original should perhaps be reduced to read, Ere ye be

DWELLINGS. pastures. COTTAGES. pens....