Zephaniah 1:4

"And I will stretch out my hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place, and the name of the Chemarin with the priests."

"I will stretch out my hand upon Judah ..." The popular misunderstanding of the Judgment Day among the Jews regarded it as a day of personal triumph for themselves over their Gentile enemies, an error Amos had sought to correct a century prior to Zephaniah (Zephaniah 5:18-20). It was therefore necessary for Zephaniah to warn Judah that they would not escape divine judgment while living in rebellion against the Lord. All the world is wicked; but, "The sin of God's people is worst of all, precisely because they are God's people. As Peter has it, 'Judgment must begin at the house of God' (1 Peter 4:17)."[12]

"Cut off the remnant of Baal ..." Reid thought that, "This implies that reform had begun,"[13] but such an implication is not in the passage at all. As a matter of fact, some translate it, "The vestige of Baal"; and as Taylor noted (see introduction) it does not require the deduction that only a vestige of Baal remained, having rather the meaning that, even the last vestiges of Baal will be rooted out. Furthermore, many ancient authorities render this place "the name of Baal," including the Septuagint,[14] thus making it parallel with the "name of the Chemarin" in the next clause. Thus, no valid argument for dating Zephaniah after Josiah's reform can be made from this.

"And the name of the Chemarin with the priests ..." "Chemarin is the usual Aramaic word for priest, which comes from a root whose meaning is 'to be black.'"[15] "It means 'black-robed' and is applied to idolatrous priests (2 Kings 23:5; Hosea 10:5)."[16]