. . . the contention that vv.
9–10 are postexilic additions to the text of Zephaniah must be rejected. First,
the above analysis demonstrates that vv. 5 and 6–8 are concerned not with
YHWH’s judgment against Jerusalem or Israel, but with YHWH’s actions against
the nations as part of an exhortative and disputational rhetorical strategy
that is designed to convince the seventh-century Jerusalemite/Judean audience
that YHWH will maintain the security of Jerusalem/Judah despite the punitive
measures that are taken against them. In short, there is no fundamental shift
in theme from judgment against Jerusalem to judgment against the nations. Even
for those who contend that v. 9 represents a shift from the portrayal in v. 8
of full judgment against the nations, the purification or purging of the
nations portrayed here is consistent with the purification or purging of
Jerusalem and Judah proposed in 1:2–18 and 2:1–3. Both Jerusalem/Judah and the
nations share in YHWH’s actions to prepare for the recognition of YHWH’s
sovereignty throughout all creation.
Second, the particle combination כִּי־אָז, “for then,” does not therefore mark the beginning of a new
redactional unit; indeed, this argument actually depends on the alleged
thematic shift in the passage. Instead, the particles merely indicate a
temporal transition that marks the contents of vv. 9–10 as a consequence of the
actions stated in the two earlier כִּי
clauses of v. 8b, that is, YHWH’s decision is to gather the nations and pour
out wrath against them (v. 8b) and YHWH’s wrath will consume all of the earth
(v. 8b). The expanded particle כִּי־אָז
points to vv. 9–10 as the climactic elements in the reasons given for the basic
exhortation of the passage in v. 8a, “wait for me.… ”
Third, v. 9 appears to depend on the tower of Babel tradition in Gen
11:1–9 in which the nations were scattered throughout the earth and their
languages confused as a result of their attempts to build a tower that would
enable them to reach heaven. Indeed, the verb פוץ,
“to scatter,” which appears in v. 10 as part of the phrase “daughter of my
dispersion (פּוּצַי),” also appears in the nations’ statement
as to why they wanted to build the tower in the first place: “and they said,
‘Come and let us build for ourselves a tower with its top in the heavens, and
we will make for ourselves a name, lest we be scattered (נָפוּץ) upon the face of the earth’ ” (Gen 11:4). It appears once
again in the statement of YHWH’s action against the nations: “and YHWH
scattered (וַיָּפֶץ
ה״) them from there upon the
face of all the earth, and they ceased to build the city” (Gen 11:8). The
dependence of Zeph 3:9–10 on this tradition can hardly be taken as an
indication of its late date. The tower of Babel narrative in Gen 11:1–9 is
generally recognized as a J-stratum narrative, which most scholars date to the
earliest stages of pentateuchal composition, that is, in the tenth-ninth
centuries BCE. Although the Pentateuch had likely not achieved its final form
by the mid-seventh century, the tower of Babel tradition would presumably have
been available for use by Zephaniah.
Fourth, v. 10 draws on Isaiah’s oracles concerning Egypt in Isaiah
18–19. This is clear from the use of the phrase, “from across the rivers of
Cush” (מֵעֵבֶר
לְנַהֲרֵי־ כוּשׁ),
which appears in Isa 18:1 as part of the specification of the destination of
ambassadors sent from Jerusalem: “Woe, land of whirring wings that is beyond
the rivers of Cush (אֲשֶׁר מֵעֵבֶר לְנַהֲרֵי־כוּשׁ).” It is also evident from the portrayal of YHWH’s
“supplicants” (עֲתָרַי, “my supplicants”) who bring YHWH’s
offering (יוֹבִילוּן
מִנְחָתִי,
“[who] present my grain offering”) and the portrayal in Isa 18:7 of gifts
presented by the Egyptians/Ethiopians to YHWH: “At that time gifts will be
brought (יוּבַל־שַׁי) to YHWH Sebaot by a people tall and
smooth … to Mount Zion, the place of the name of YHWH Sebaot.” Other
correspondences include the use of the term שָׂפָה,
literally “lip,” as a term for “language” in both v. 9 and Isa 19:18. Again,
the argument that Zeph 3:9–10 is postexilic depends in part on dating the
Isaian Egyptian oracles to a relatively late date in the exilic or postexilic
period. But I argue that the Egyptian oracles in Isa 18:1–7 and 19:1–17 must be
placed in relation to the efforts of King Hoshea of Israel to gain support from
Pharaoh So of Egypt for his revolt against Assyria in 724 (cf. 2 Kgs 17:4),
that the material in Isa 19:18–25 must be dated to the reign of King Manasseh
(786–742), and that 20:1–6, which closes out the material in 19:1–25, must date
to the reign of Josiah. If this is the case, the Egyptian/Ethiopian oracles in
Isaiah 18–19 were available in the mid-seventh century. Indeed, the assignment
of 20:1–6, which is linked literarily to Isaiah 19, to the time of Josiah,
indicates an effort to read these oracles in relation to Josiah’s reform.
Fifth, the portrayal of Egyptians or Ethiopians as supplicants to YHWH
in the mid-seventh century points once again to the perception that the defeat
of the Twenty-fifth Ethiopian Dynasty, the withdrawal of the Assyrians from
Egypt, and the rise of Saite Dynasty marked YHWH’s actions to bring down the
Assyrian Empire and to restore Judah. In this early period, Saite moves would
have marked Egypt as a potential ally of Judah against the Assyrians; after
all, they had attempted to function in this role during the Assyrian invasions
of the late eighth century. In such a scenario, the Egyptian moves into
Philistia in the mid-seventh century and the portrayal of their offering gifts
to YHWH, perhaps as overtures to relations with Jerusalem, would have been seen
as a fulfillment of Isaiah’s earlier oracles in Josiah’s early reign. (Marvin
A. Sweeney, Zephaniah: A Commentary [Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical
Commentary on the Bible; Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2003], 182-84)
