Zechariah14chapter 14

The chapter starts with the worst outcome stated plainly: the city taken, the houses looted, the women violated, half the city going into captivity. Zechariah does not skip to the good part.

Then the LORD goes out and fights, and His feet stand on the Mount of Olives — the ridge directly east of Jerusalem, across the Kidron valley, the hill you climb to look down on the temple. It splits east and west, making a valley to escape through.

An earthquake is remembered here "like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah." That quake was famous enough to date events by; Amos opens his book by it, and archaeologists have found eighth-century destruction layers at several sites often connected with it. Zechariah's audience knew the reference.

Living waters go out from Jerusalem, half to the eastern sea (the Dead Sea) and half to the western (the Mediterranean), in summer and winter alike. Judah's streams were seasonal — many ran only in the rainy months — so a river that flows in summer was itself a small miracle.

The nations that survive come up year after year to keep the Feast of Tabernacles, the harvest festival of booths, and those who do not come get no rain.

The book's last image is domestic. "HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD" — the exact words engraved on the gold plate on the high priest's turban — will be written on the bells of the horses, and every cooking pot in Jerusalem and Judah will be as holy as the bowls at the altar.