The prophet does not specify the identity of the sacrifice. This has led explainers to seek out instances within the prophetic literature where sacrifice is used as an image for judgment on the day of the Lord, as a background to Zephaniah’s image here of the Lord’s preparing a sacrifice for that day. Such instances occur in Isaiah 34:6, Jeremiah 46:10, and Ezekiel 39:17–20. In every case, the object of God’s wrath comprises the material for sacrifice. Of these three, only Isaiah 34:6 can be viewed as written earlier than Zephaniah. That passage speaks of the Lord’s sword of judgment consuming the nations, the enemies of the Lord. Such foes are the Lord’s sacrifice on the day of his judgment (or day of vengeance, Isaiah 34:8). Thus, this image of a sacrifice on the day of the Lord, in Isaiah and the others, served as an image of judgment on God’s and Israel’s enemies. The sacrificial victims will not be animals, but those who have long despised the sacrifice that God provides. They will become the sacrifice their sin merits.¹ Zephaniah, though, takes this image and strikingly applies it not to Judah’s enemies but to Judah itself, as the object of God’s judgment on account of their many sins. Where there is sin there must also be death, because of the holiness of the Lord.