And to ask the priests of the house of the LORD of hosts and the prophets: The second part of the delegation’s task was to ask a question about fasting. The question was directed to the priests of the house of the LORD of hosts and the prophets. This phrase is long and cumbersome in English, and Good News Translation has simplified it by shifting “the Temple of the LORD Almighty” to the previous verse (as mentioned above), and expressing it as the destination of the delegation (as also in Bible en français courant). If other translators wish to do the same, it would be better to run the two verses together and number them 2-3, as Contemporary English Version does. For a comment on the house of the LORD, see Hag 1.2.

Should I mourn and fast in the fifth month, as I have done…?: The question was no doubt asked by one man as the representative of the group, and is expressed in the singular. Because the speaker was a representative, Good News Translation has expressed the question in the plural, “Should we continue to mourn … as we have done…” (as also do Moffatt, New Living Translation, Contemporary English Version, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente). This is useful as showing that the fast was still current practice. Translators may use the singular or plural according to the natural patterns of their own languages.

Mourn here does not have the sense of grieving over a dead relative or friend, but rather of showing sorrow for past misdeeds. The verbs mourn and fast, if translated literally, may sound like two separate actions. Good News Translation shows the relationship between them by saying “to mourn … by fasting” and other translators may find it helpful to do the same. In cultures where fasting as a religious exercise is unknown, it may be necessary to give more detail, and say something like “to go without food in order to show my [or, our] sorrow.”

Many readers will not know why the Jews fasted in the fifth month. It was because it was on the seventh day of the fifth month (2 Kgs 25.8) that the Babylonians had destroyed Solomon’s Temple. Good News Translation makes this clear with the words “to mourn because of the destruction of the Temple,” and other translators may wish to do the same. An alternative possibility is to put this information in a footnote, as do Bible de Jérusalem, Jerusalem Bible, New International Version, New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, Contemporary English Version, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, and Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente. Now that the Temple was being rebuilt, there seemed little point in continuing the fast, but the people raising the question needed to obtain official guidance before making any change in their practice. For the priests as the ones responsible for making decisions in such matters, compare Hag 2.11-13. In the present instance, the prophets were associated with the priests, and in fact the answer, though not given till 8.19, came through Zechariah, a man who was probably both a priest and a prophet.

For so many years: If the fast to commemorate the destruction of the Temple in 586 B.C. had been started in the following year, it had by this time been going on for nearly 70 years (compare verse 5).

Quoted with permission from Clark, David J. & Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Zechariah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2002. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .