Zephaniah

3 definitions found

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  Zephaniah
       n 1: a Hebrew minor poet of the late 7th century BC [syn: {Sophonias}]
       2: an Old Testament book telling the prophecies of Zephaniah
          which are concerned mainly with the approaching judgement
          by God upon the sinners of Judah [syn: {Sophonias}, {Book
          of Zephaniah}]



From Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary [easton]:

  Zephaniah
     Jehovah has concealed, or Jehovah of darkness. (1.) The son of
     Cushi, and great-grandson of Hezekiah, and the ninth in the
     order of the minor prophets. He prophesied in the days of
     Josiah, king of Judah (B.C. 641-610), and was contemporary with
     Jeremiah, with whom he had much in common. The book of his
     prophecies consists of:
     
       (a) An introduction (1:1-6), announcing the judgment of the
     world, and the judgment upon Israel, because of their
     transgressions.
     
       (b) The description of the judgment (1:7-18).
     
       (c) An exhortation to seek God while there is still time
     (2:1-3).
     
       (d) The announcement of judgment on the heathen (2:4-15).
     
       (e) The hopeless misery of Jerusalem (3:1-7).
     
       (f) The promise of salvation (3:8-20).
     
       (2.) The son of Maaseiah, the "second priest" in the reign of
     Zedekiah, often mentioned in Jeremiah as having been sent from
     the king to inquire (Jer. 21:1) regarding the coming woes which
     he had denounced, and to entreat the prophet's intercession that
     the judgment threatened might be averted (Jer. 29:25, 26, 29;
     37:3; 52:24). He, along with some other captive Jews, was put to
     death by the king of Babylon "at Riblah in the land of Hamath"
     (2 Kings 25:21).
     
       (3.) A Kohathite ancestor of the prophet Samuel (1 Chr. 6:36).
     
       (4.) The father of Josiah, the priest who dwelt in Jerusalem
     when Darius issued the decree that the temple should be rebuilt
     (Zech. 6:10).
     

From Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary (late 1800's) [hitchcock]:

  Zephaniah, the Lord is my secret