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Wednesday, July 23rd, 2025
the Week of Proper 11 / Ordinary 16
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Read the Bible

Contemporary English Version

Zechariah 1:5

Where are your ancestors now? Not even prophets live forever.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Death;   The Topic Concordance - Disobedience;   Hearing;   Rendering;   Servants;  

Dictionaries:

- Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Ancestors;   Apocalyptic literature;   Zechariah, book of;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Zechariah, the Book of;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Zechariah, Book of;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Apocalyptic Literature;   Zechariah, Book of;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Zechariah, Prophecy of;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Joshua (3);   Zechariah, Book of;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
Where are your ancestors now? And do the prophets live forever?
Hebrew Names Version
Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
King James Version (1611)
Your fathers, where are they? and the Prophets, doe they liue for euer?
King James Version
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
English Standard Version
Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
New American Standard Bible
"Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
New Century Version
Your ancestors are dead, and those prophets didn't live forever.
Amplified Bible
"Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Geneva Bible (1587)
your fathers, where are they? and doe the Prophets liue for euer?
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Legacy Standard Bible
"Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Berean Standard Bible
Where are your forefathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Complete Jewish Bible
"Your ancestors, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Darby Translation
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
Easy-to-Read Version
"Your ancestors are gone, and those prophets did not live forever.
George Lamsa Translation
Your fathers, where are they? And my prophets, do they live for ever?
Good News Translation
Your ancestors and those prophets are no longer alive.
Lexham English Bible
"Your ancestors, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Literal Translation
Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
American Standard Version
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
Bible in Basic English
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they go on living for ever?
JPS Old Testament (1917)
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
Bishop's Bible (1568)
What is nowe become of your forefathers? & do the prophetes liue for euer?
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Where are your fathers, and the prophets? Will they live for ever?
English Revised Version
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
World English Bible
Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Where ben youre fadris and profetis? whether thei schulen lyue with outen ende?
Update Bible Version
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live forever?
Webster's Bible Translation
Your fathers, where [are] they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?
New English Translation
"As for your ancestors, where are they? And did the prophets live forever?
New King James Version
"Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
New Living Translation
"Where are your ancestors now? They and the prophets are long dead.
New Life Bible
"Where are your fathers now? And the men who spoke for Me, do they live forever?
New Revised Standard
Your ancestors, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Your fathers, where are they? and, the prophets, to times age-abiding, do they live?
Douay-Rheims Bible
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, shall they live always?
Revised Standard Version
Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live for ever?
Young's Literal Translation
Your fathers -- where [are] they? And the prophets -- to the age do they live?
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
What is now become of youre forefathers and the prophetes? are they yet still alyue?
THE MESSAGE
"And where are your ancestors now? Dead and buried. And the prophets who preached to them? Also dead and buried. But the Message that my servants the prophets spoke, that isn't dead and buried. That Message did its work on your ancestors, did it not? It woke them up and they came back, saying, ‘He did what he said he would do, sure enough. We didn't get by with a thing.'"

Contextual Overview

1 I am the prophet Zechariah, the son of Berechiah and the grandson of Iddo. In the eighth month of the second year that Darius was king of Persia, the Lord told me to say: 2Israel, I, the Lord All-Powerful, was very angry with your ancestors. But if you people will return to me, I will turn and help you. 4 Don't be stubborn like your ancestors. They were warned by the earlier prophets to give up their evil and turn back to me, but they paid no attention. 5 Where are your ancestors now? Not even prophets live forever. 6 But my warnings and my words spoken by the prophets caught up with your ancestors. So they turned back to me and said, " Lord All-Powerful, you have punished us for our sins, just as you had planned."

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Job 14:10-12, Psalms 90:10, Ecclesiastes 1:4, Ecclesiastes 9:1-3, Ecclesiastes 12:5, Ecclesiastes 12:7, Acts 13:36, Hebrews 7:23, Hebrews 7:24, Hebrews 9:27, 2 Peter 3:2-4

Reciprocal: Genesis 48:21 - Behold Deuteronomy 18:22 - if the thing Joshua 24:33 - died 1 Samuel 9:6 - all that he saith 1 Kings 16:34 - General 2 Kings 13:14 - he died Ezra 9:7 - Since the days Psalms 49:9 - That he Jeremiah 9:14 - which Jeremiah 25:5 - Turn Jeremiah 36:28 - General Lamentations 3:42 - thou Lamentations 5:7 - and are John 6:49 - and are John 8:52 - Abraham

Cross-References

Genesis 1:8
and named it "Sky." Evening came and then morning—that was the second day.
Genesis 1:13
Evening came and then morning—that was the third day.
Genesis 1:19
Evening came and then morning—that was the fourth day.
Genesis 1:23
Evening came and then morning—that was the fifth day.
Genesis 1:31
God looked at what he had done. All of it was very good! Evening came and then morning—that was the sixth day.
Genesis 8:22
As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat; winter and summer, day and night.
Psalms 19:2
Each day informs the following day; each night announces to the next.
Psalms 74:16
You rule the day and the night, and you put the moon and the sun in place.
Psalms 104:20
and you made the darkness, so the animals in the forest could come out at night.
Isaiah 45:7
I create light and darkness, happiness and sorrow. I, the Lord , do all of this.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Your fathers, where [are] they?.... They are not in the land of the living; they perished by the sword of the Chaldeans, or died in captivity:

and the prophets, do they live for ever? meaning either the false prophets, as Hananiah and Shemaiah, Jeremiah 28:17 or the true prophets of the Lord; and the words may be considered as a prevention of an objection the people might make, taken from their prophets dying in common with their fathers; and so the Targum paraphrases them, "and if you should say, the prophets, do they live for ever?" which is followed by Jarchi, and embraced by many interpreters: the answer is, it is true they died; but then their words live, and have had their full accomplishment.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Your fathers, where are they? - The abrupt solemnity of the question seems to imply an unexpected close of life which cut short their hopes, plans, promises to self. “When they said, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them” 1 Thessalonians 5:3. Yet not they only but the prophets too, who ministered God’s Word to them, these also being human beings, passed away, some of them before their time as people, by the martyr’s death. Many of them saw not their own words fulfilled. But God’s word which they spake, being from God, passed not away.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Zechariah 1:5. Your fathers, where are they?Israel has been destroyed and ruined in the bloody wars with the Assyrians; and Judah, in those with the Chaldeans.

The prophets, do they live for ever? — They also, who spoke unto your fathers, are dead; but their predictions remain; and the events, which have taken place according to those predictions, prove that God sent them.


 
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