Intertextuality Pair

Zephaniah 2:11 → Genesis 10:5

Echo

Later text

Zephaniah 2:11BSB

The LORD will be terrifying to them when He starves all the gods of the earth. Then the nations of every shore will bow in worship to Him, each in its own place.

Earlier text

Genesis 10:5BSB

From these, the maritime peoples separated into their territories, according to their languages, by clans within their nations.

Significance

Zephaniah 2:11 declares that "the nations of every shore will bow in worship to Him, each in its own place," echoing the phrase from Genesis 10:5 where the descendants of Japheth are described as "the maritime peoples" (אִיֵּי הַגּוֹיִם, iyyei haggoyim, "islands/coastlands of the nations") who spread into their territories. Genesis 10:5 describes the scattering of nations into their respective territories after the flood; Zephaniah envisions these same far-flung coastland peoples turning from their false gods to worship Yahweh. The allusion transforms the Table of Nations from a record of dispersion into a prophecy of universal worship—the very peoples who separated into distant coastlands will each worship the LORD "in its own place." Zephaniah 2:11 itself supplies the mechanism for this reversal: the LORD "will starve all the gods of the earth," so that the scattered nations of the Table of Nations become, at last, gathered worshipers of the one true God.

Found via
Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type
Echo
Connection Method(s)
Longitudinal Theme — the canon-wide nations theme: the maritime peoples scattered "into their territories" in the Table of Nations (Genesis 10:5) become "the nations of every shore" bowing in worship "each in its own place" (Zephaniah 2:11), dispersion transformed into ingathering worship of the one true God.

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