As mentioned above, it will probably be helpful to begin a new paragraph with this verse. Verses 6 and 7 go together in content, verse 6 having the form of a first person statement by the LORD, and verse 7 being an expansion of the theme in the third person.

I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph: These statements are parallel with each other and should be taken together. The speaker is the LORD. The house of Judah refers to the descendants of the people of the southern kingdom (Judah) and the house of Joseph refers to the descendants of the people of the northern kingdom (Israel). In exile these northern people accepted the culture of the nation that captured them more than the southerners, but it remained a hope of the prophets that the LORD would restore to the Promised Land people of both the south and the north. The word translated strengthen is a form of the same root translated “mighty men” in verse 5. Good News Translation will be a helpful model for many translators.

I will bring them back because I have compassion on them: The word translated bring them back is a strange form in Hebrew, which seems to be a combination of two verbs, one meaning “to bring back” and the other “to cause to dwell.” The ancient Greek version understood it to be the second of these, but the ancient Syriac, Aramaic and Latin versions understood it to be the first, and in this they are followed by most modern translators. This is interpreted as a promise that the exiles will be brought back to the Promised Land. Bring them back may also be rendered as “bring them all back home” (Good News Translation; similarly Contemporary English Version). To have compassion means to show sympathy and a desire to help.

They shall be as though I had not rejected them: The term translated rejected is not a common term, and occurs most often in the Psalms (Psa 43.2 [Revised Standard Version “cast off”]; 44.9 [Revised Standard Version “cast off”]; 60.1; 88.14 [Revised Standard Version “cast off”]). It is rendered “cast them off” by Jerusalem Bible/New Jerusalem Bible and New English Bible/ Revised English Bible and “disowned them” by New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh.

For I am the LORD their God and I will answer them: If a literal translation of their God gives the meaning that the people of Judah own God, translators may express this phrase as “the God they serve [or, worship].” The verb answer assumes that the people have prayed for help. The situation here is the opposite of that in 7.13, where the LORD refused to listen to the people’s prayers. In languages where the goal or object of the prayers must be indicated, we may say “I will answer their prayers asking me to help them,” or “When they ask me to help them, I will answer them,” or even “When they pray to me saying, ‘Please help us,’ I will do it.”

Quoted with permission from Clark, David J. & Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Zechariah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2002. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .