Do not bring any more meaningless ¹  offerings; I consider your incense detestable! ²  You observe new moon festivals, Sabbaths, and convocations, but I cannot tolerate sin-stained celebrations! ³ 

You are tired out from listening to so much advice. ¹  Let them take their stand – the ones who see omens in the sky, who gaze at the stars, who make monthly predictions – let them rescue you from the disaster that is about to overtake you! ² 

You are like a wild female donkey brought up in the wilderness. In her lust she sniffs the wind to get the scent of a male. ¹  No one can hold her back when she is in heat. None of the males need wear themselves out chasing after her. At mating time she is easy to find. ² 

King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came against Jerusalem with his whole army and laid siege to it. The siege began in the tenth month of the ninth year that Zedekiah ruled over Judah. ¹ 

In the thirtieth year, ¹  on the fifth day of the fourth month, while I was among the exiles ²  at the Kebar River, ³  the heavens opened ⁴  and I saw a divine vision. ⁵ 

In the seventh year, in the fifth month, on the tenth of the month, ¹  some of the elders ²  of Israel came to seek ³  the Lord, and they sat down in front of me.

In the twelfth year of our exile, in the tenth month, on the fifth of the month, ¹  a refugee came to me from Jerusalem ²  saying, “The city has been defeated!” ³ 

They will designate men to scout continually ¹  through the land, burying those who remain on the surface of the ground, ²  in order to cleanse it. They will search for seven full months.

“‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: In the first month, on the first day of the month, you must take an unblemished young bull and purify the sanctuary.

“‘In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, you will celebrate the Passover, and for seven days bread made without yeast will be eaten.

In the seventh month, on the fifteenth day of the month, at the feast, ¹  he will make the same provisions for the sin offering, burnt offering, and grain offering, and for the olive oil, for the seven days.

On the twenty-fourth day of the first month ¹  I was beside the great river, the Tigris. ² 

You say, “When will the new moon festival ¹  be over, ²  so we can sell grain? When will the Sabbath end, ³  so we can open up the grain bins? ⁴  We’re eager ⁵  to sell less for a higher price, ⁶  and to cheat the buyer with rigged scales! ⁷ 

In the eighth month of Darius’ ¹  second year, ²  the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah, ³  son of Berechiah son of Iddo, as follows:

In King Darius’ fourth year, on the fourth day of Kislev, the ninth month, ¹  the word of the Lord came to Zechariah.

Jeroboam inaugurated a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, ¹  like the festival celebrated in Judah. ²  On the altar in Bethel he offered sacrifices to the calves he had made. ³  In Bethel he also appointed priests for the high places he had made.

Letters were sent by the runners to all the king’s provinces stating that ¹  they should destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews, from youth to elderly, both women and children, ²  on a particular day, namely the thirteenth day ³  of the twelfth month (that is, the month of Adar), and to loot and plunder their possessions.

The king’s scribes were quickly ¹  summoned – in the third month (that is, the month of Sivan), on the twenty-third day. ²  They wrote out ³  everything that Mordecai instructed to the Jews and to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces all the way from India to Ethiopia ⁴  – a hundred and twenty-seven provinces in all – to each province in its own script and to each people in their own language, and to the Jews according to their own script and their own language.

In Noah’s six hundred and first year, ¹  in the first day of the first month, the waters had dried up from the earth, and Noah removed the covering from the ark and saw that ²  the surface of the ground was dry.

When ¹  the Lord brings you to the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Hivites, and Jebusites, which he swore to your fathers to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, ²  then you will keep ³  this ceremony ⁴  in this month.