Commentary on Zechariah 1 part 20/24

that we may walk becomingly as in the day, the beneficent Lord seeks to destroy all the nations that come in a seditious and warlike manner against the city of the great King, Jerusalem — and this is Jerusalem.

He seeks to destroy all the nations that have become estranged from the truth and from godliness, not so that men should no longer exist — for that is impossible — but that they should no longer be evil and wicked.

For if he wished utterly to destroy humanity, he would not seek to do this, being able suddenly to bring the whole into non-existence.

For if from non-being into being he led and called the things that are, much more was he able to overturn them from existence; but this is not willed by him.

It is said, at any rate, concerning him by the all-wise Solomon:

He created all things unto being, and the generative principles of the world are saving;

there is no poison of destruction in them. For just as the Lord and our Savior, having come to seek our lost race, saved it, so, seeking to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem, he saves them, having done away with the causes of the harm that had befallen them from unlawful deeds and strange notions, so that, peace prevailing, the nations should no longer come against the divine Jerusalem, having cast off the seditious manner and the war-loving mind.

The word 'come against' signifies that those who advance are enemies and aliens, as the proverbial oracle says to him who lives peaceably:

Whenever you lie down, you shall sleep sweetly, and you shall not fear the assaults of the ungodly that come against you. And that the destruction of the nations sought by the Savior, the provider of all, is accomplished, has been added: that in the aforeshown day he who promises good things pours out upon the house of David and those who dwell in Jerusalem a spirit of grace and compassion, inasmuch as he is the Father of compassions and the giver of the Holy Spirit.

he is shown by the God-inspired Scriptures.

For concerning this gift Paul writes:

'The love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.' And Solomon, in the Wisdom that bears his name, says:

'Who has traced out the things in heaven, unless you gave wisdom and sent your Holy Spirit from on high? And thus the paths of those on earth were set straight, and men were taught the things that please you.' And the Giver of the Spirit himself says in Isaiah to a certain one:

'I have put my Spirit upon you'; and again concerning such a one he says to others:

'I have put my Spirit upon him.' And, making manifest the lavish gift, the one who bestows it says:

'I will pour out a spirit of grace and compassion,' as one may also learn from other sayings:

'I will pour out from my Spirit upon all flesh'—this signifies the rich giving, as also does the saying:

'The love of God has been poured out in our hearts.' From the apostolic utterance it is established that the Spirit of grace is holy, since it is written thus:

'Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without compassion on the testimony of two or three witnesses;

of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be deemed worthy who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and counted the blood of the covenant a common thing, and outraged the Spirit of grace by which he was sanctified.' In harmony with the Spirit of grace being holy is also that which is conveyed in another passage of the Apostle thus:

'There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit'; and further:

'For to one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge, to another faith in the same Spirit'—and the various gifts enumerated in what follows.

The Spirit of grace is also a Spirit of compassion, being supplied by the Father of compassions.

It has been said with regard to this text, in other commentaries, that the God of all is the Father of compassions of the God the Word and the Giver of the Holy Spirit.

Having learned from what is written who it is that lavishly gives the Spirit of grace and compassion, we shall accordingly come to know who the house of David is and who are those dwelling in Jerusalem.

Both can indicate the Church, which is both Jerusalem and the house of David, as was clarified just now.

: 'And they shall look upon me because of the things they mocked, and they shall mourn over him with mourning as over a beloved one, and they shall grieve with grief as over a firstborn.'

Having fallen into great calamity, the Jews who killed the Lord were seized intensely by mourning and grief, weeping as over a beloved dead man and grieving as over a firstborn son, since wrath came upon them to the uttermost, so that their homeland was razed and they themselves, enslaved, became wanderers over all the earth.

That they were subjected to these things by the decree of God's providence, because of the pollution they committed in delivering up the Savior of all to the cross, one may learn from the very passage set before us.

For the one who suffered at their hands says:

'They shall look upon me because of the things they mocked.' Did they not indeed dance impiously and unholily, when, as Jesus hung upon the stake, they mockingly said:

'Aha, you who destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days,

he saved others, himself he cannot save. If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross'? While these wretches were reviling with these things and yet others, the evangelist writes that the prophecy which reads thus was fulfilled:

'They shall look on him whom they pierced'—which is the same, differing only in wording from:

'They shall look upon me because of the things they mocked.' For those who have precisely mastered the Hebrew tongue say that the aforementioned utterance of Zechariah was taken over into the evangelic passage—either the evangelist himself transferring it, for he was a Hebrew, or having received it from another who had translated the Hebrew phrase into Greek, whether Aquila or Theodotion or some other translator.

some inquire where among the prophets that saying was spoken:

'They shall look on him whom they pierced'—since it is nowhere to be found among the publicly circulated books of the Old Testament.

He plausibly believes that the mourning as over a beloved one and the grief as over a firstborn belong to those who killed the Lord, since grievous things came upon them for having slain Jesus, who is the firstborn and beloved Son.

It has often been observed that 'beloved' signifies two things: the one worthy of being loved, and the Only-begotten Son.

Both apply to Jesus Christ, who is the Son of love—that is, of God—concerning whom it is written:

'God is love'; but also 'only-begotten,' for from the Father he alone is the only-begotten Son, and also from the holy Virgin Mary.

: 'In that day the mourning shall be magnified in Jerusalem, like the mourning of a pomegranate-grove hewn down in the plain; and the land shall mourn family by family: the family by itself and their women by themselves, the family of the house of David and their women by themselves, the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their women by themselves, the family of the house of Levi by itself and their women by themselves, the family of Simeon by itself and their women by themselves, all the families that remain, family by itself and their women by themselves.'

The trees named allegorically in Scripture, being endowed with free will, at one time bear good fruit by deliberate choice, and at another time bear what is poisonous and harmful.

Indeed, then, the people of Israel, planted by God as a fruitful vine, wholly true, having turned aside became a vine of bitterness, so as thereafter to become worthy of being cut down, since it brought forth a cluster of gall and a grape of bitterness, according to what is written:

'Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire.' Just as, then, the vine that bore good fruit changed to bearing the worst fruit, so too the plants of the pomegranate, having become evil from good, underwent mourning as they were cut down, as the present phrase makes clear.

At any rate, concerning cultivated plants bearing edible fruit, it is said in the Song of Songs by the Bridegroom Christ:

'I went down to see among the fruit of the torrent-valley, to see whether the vine had blossomed, whether the pomegranates had blossomed.' For having gone down into the trial of this life—called a torrent-valley by way of anagogical interpretation—he saw the vine and the pomegranates having the beginning of fruit-bearing, which is signified by the blossom.

After the blossom, when the perfect fruit had been displayed, the bride of the Word—the Church, arrayed as bride for him—conceived a longing to be filled with the drink which the Bridegroom provides.

'You shall give me to drink of spiced wine, of the juice of my pomegranates.' The juice of pomegranates not only heals thirst but, being administered as a remedy, also betters the one who partakes of it.

The fruit of this plant, lying beneath its rind, has a great composition, harmoniously arranged and densely packed in accord and proportion, so that the Bridegroom says to his consort:

'Your cheek is like the rind of a pomegranate, O bride'—there being displayed in you the redness that comes from modesty, and the fruit beneath the rind that possesses much order and composition.

The trees thus interpreted, having turned to their own sloth, are cut down, with the axe laid to their root, similarly to the vines that do not bear praiseworthy and beneficial fruit, as the Savior said:

'Every branch that does not remain in me is cut down and cast into the fire.' And nowhere else will the mourning of the pomegranate-grove be magnified than in the plain where it is hewn down.

When this ruinous thing has come about, the tribes of the land shall mourn with lamentation and wailing over the change of the pomegranate plants into wickedness.

Yet the mourning is to be understood in an equivocal sense, since the trees undergo it when their own roots are cut off, while the tribes of the land mourn in a different way, bringing their hands with striking against the breast.

For it would be devoid of fellow-feeling, and a sign of not perceiving the terror that grips them, for those living together to lie together for the succession of children while the threat hangs over them, at a time that is the season for prayer.

And even apart from any impending wrath, the Christ-bearing Apostle restrains the unions of husbands with wives at the times of prayers, writing to those in wedlock that then especially they should hold themselves back from marital intercourse when it is necessary to pray and to entreat God, saying:

'Deprive one another for a season'—that is, of the customary bed—'that you may devote yourselves to prayer.' If, then, this is done for the sake of purity even at an hour when nothing fearful is impending, how much more should purity be pursued when danger is impending.

For this was also a matter of concern in the teaching prior to the Savior's sojourn among us.

For instance, when the nations were pressing in warlike fashion against Israel to plunder and take captive, the divine word exhorts those subject to the enemies' onslaught to devote themselves to fasting and self-control, saying:

'Sanctify a fast, proclaim a solemn service'; and after other things:

'Let the bridegroom go forth from his chamber and the bride from her bridal room.'

'Between the base of the altar the priests shall weep and shall say:

Spare, O Lord, your people, and do not give your inheritance over to reproach, that the nations should rule over them, lest the nations say:

Where is their God?' And observe how discordant and unfitting it would be for those dwelling together to tarry in the same chamber and bridal room when grievous things are expected, while the priests lament between the base of the altar.

In agreement with this prophecy, it is also declared in the ancient history:

for when the ark had been built by Noah at the command of him who cares for all, on account of the fearful downpour, so that Noah and his household might be kept safe from all harm, when the rush of the rain was already impending, the Lord says to the righteous man:

'Come in, you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives'—so that inside the ark the men might be by themselves and the women apart, marital intercourse not being consummated during the destruction of the human race, all being swept away except only the four married couples who entered into the ark, the men and their spouses no longer remaining in separation when, once the earth had dried after the flood had abated, they came forth from the ark, a command having been given by God for Noah and his wife with him, and their sons and their wives, to come out:

for once the threat against mankind had been removed, the marriage unions were restored, so that the succession of mankind through child-bearing might be increased.

Similarly to the things thus contemplated concerning Noah and to those from the prophet Joel, so now too, with a terror hanging over them, the word, urging them to mourning, wishes the men by themselves and likewise the women to mourn, in order that they may perceive the impending calamity.

And observe indeed the precision of the injunction, which not only distinguishes the different tribes from one another, but also the men of the same tribe from the women, and conversely:

'the family by itself and their women by themselves.'

By 'the family of the house of David' he means those who are such because they act in a kingly and competent manner by the practical power.

And since men differ from women not only according to the literal history—in that the latter give birth and the former beget—but also according to the anagogical sense, let the souls that sow lessons in other souls by way of teaching be justly called men, while those who receive the lessons from others, and do not beget from themselves, are allegorically designated as women.

Likewise also in the case of Nathan and Levi and Simeon and the other remaining tribes, let the distinction of the men and women be maintained with respect to both the literal sense and the deeper meaning.

having a manner of life and knowledge, they are also the servants of God.

For Nathan is a prophet, while Levi is a priest;

for from him too, even according to the literal history, those who serve God in priestly fashion are descended.

Being other than both of these, Simeon—interpreted as 'hearing' or 'a thing heard'—indicates those who are heard by God as he assents to their supplications, especially because they too give heed to the divine commandments.

Just as, then, those indicated by name are apart—the men, the women remaining by themselves—so too the other remaining tribes likewise pass their time in mourning.

It was made precise that the mourning must take place in no other city than Jerusalem, a detail from which especially the command looks toward a deeper, anagogical meaning.

For the people were still in captivity at the time when the prophet spoke these things.

Consider whether it is with such an aim in view — the consummation of the world now drawing near as never before — according to what was written by John:

'It is the last hour.' And when the human race has multiplied, the Apostle writes:

'For the rest, that those also who have wives may be as though they had none' — apart from the men who achieve celibacy and the women who remain widows for Christ's sake and those who have taken up the resolve of virginity and so live, that they may devote themselves to prayer genuinely and without distraction.

10: 'In that day every place shall be laid open in the house of David and to those who dwell in Jerusalem, both for removal and for sprinkling.'

On that day, already so often spoken of with clarity, in addition to what exists elsewhere, this too shall come to pass:

Every place in the house of David in Jerusalem shall be laid open, a removal taking place unto divine sprinkling.

The place that is laid open to the house of David is the God-inspired Scripture, especially that which precedes the sojourn of the Saviour;

that which is laid open to Jerusalem — and this is the city above, the mother of the righteous, the heavenly city of the living God.

By 'place' in these words one must understand not that which circumscribes and bounds a body, but that which is divided into propositions and problems.

Upon the opening of the places so designated there will follow a removal from the letter to the spirit, and from the shadow to the truth, and, in a word, from the temporal to the eternal, from things visible and lowly to things lofty and invisible.

And what follows the removal but the vessels of aspersion that bring perfect purification? This sprinkling is accomplished by the divine blood of the Saviour, concerning which Peter, the foremost of the apostles, writes, addressing those to whom he sends his epistle as follows:

'Grace and peace be multiplied to you, unto obedience and the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.' And the divine blood sprinkles the conscience of those who serve the living God, redeeming those who are being perfected from the vain manner of life handed down from their fathers, as is set forth in the same epistle of the wise mystagogue, thus:

'Knowing that you were redeemed not with corruptible things, with silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.' Those thus sprinkled, in order to obtain a pure heart, entreat again and again, unceasingly, Him who is able to grant purity, as one of them says:

'You shall wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow.' Urging on to this purity, which is worship pure and undefiled, the sacred word says:

'Wash yourselves, become clean' — so it exhorts.

10: 'And it shall come to pass in that day, says the Lord, that I will utterly destroy the names of the idols from the land, and there shall no longer be any remembrance of them;'

'and the false prophets and the unclean spirit I will remove from the land.'

When the aforementioned removal unto sprinkling and truth takes place, then the fabrications of the heterodox, figuratively called idols, shall be destroyed from the land, since men are no longer deceived, the figurative idolatry having been refuted by the truth that has been revealed, and every false prophecy having been abolished together with the unclean spirit that energizes it — a spirit that resides in a man before faith in Christ.

It is also possible that this is said concerning the sensible images and the demons associated with them, that they shall be utterly destroyed from the land.

That the statues are indicated by this appellation, one may learn from the psalmist who says:

'The idols of the nations are silver and gold; they have feet and do not walk,' and so on.

And that the demons lurking in their shrines share the same name with them, the prophet Isaiah teaches, beginning from this point:

'Wail, you graven images in Jerusalem and in Samaria;'

'for as I did to Samaria and her graven images, so will I do also to Jerusalem and her idols.' Now idols, both graven and molten, that wail are not the fabrications of craftsmen, which are not by nature capable of wailing;

for wailing is an inarticulate sound emitted by a living creature out of some affliction of the soul.

This meaning has been demonstrated at greater length in the commentaries on Isaiah, with a testimony from the Wisdom of Solomon, which runs thus:

'For equally hateful to God are the ungodly man and his ungodliness;'

'for the deed shall be punished together with him who wrought it.' These things were said by the wise man concerning a workman and a piece of wood carved by him into the form of a living creature; and just as that which has no soul is not by nature able to wail, as was said just now, so neither is it able to be punished.

Therefore let these words be understood concerning the demons that are nailed fast to the lifeless statues.

When the idols are being destroyed from the land, there are removed from it the false diviners and, in a word, all who profess false foreknowledge, justly called false prophets by the divine instruction — the unclean spirit also suffering this same fate together with them.

For how does the spirit of the diviners and augurs not possess the uncleanness that comes from impiety? This saying might also be understood concerning the leaders of the heresies, who are full of demons and deceiving spirits.

For concerning them the inspired Paul writes thus:

'Some shall depart from the sound faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, in the hypocrisy of liars, having their own conscience seared.' One need not be troubled if the unclean spirit is spoken of in the singular in the prophet, but the deceiving spirits in the plural in the apostolic writing.

For the individual things, taken together generically, are called one spirit.

And it is well said too that the names of the idols are destroyed, so that there is no longer any remembrance of them — of their boasting and their foolishness — since they exist only in name and not in power.

10: 'And it shall come to pass, if a man prophesy still, that his father and his mother who begot him shall say to him:'

'You shall not live, because you have spoken lies in the name of the Lord;'

'and his father and his mother who begot him shall bind him hand and foot when he prophesies.'

— that is, they decree death against him, declaring:

'He shall not live any longer, because you have spoken lies in the name of the Lord, being no prophet but a false prophet.'

When his father and his mother thus convict the false prophet, they rush upon him and bind him hand and foot, refuting his sophistries and deceitful words.

Since the phrase 'those who begot him when he prophesies' is ambiguous, it must be distinguished into both possible meanings.

The human beings who begot him as a man and who preserve something of a parent's disposition toward him, because he speaks lies in the name of the Lord, bind him hand and foot, condemning him.

But the other meaning may be rendered thus:

his father and his mother bind him hand and foot — they who begot him in his prophesying, who brought him forth as a false prophet, having begotten him by a nurture and birth that come from imitation and teaching, they themselves evidently being made of the same quality according to a false-prophetic condition.

Not in vain nor by chance is such a one called a 'man,' but because, walking according to the flesh in strife and jealousy, he falsely bears the name of man, similarly to those of whom it is said:

'But you shall die like men.' And concerning those unworthy of the divine Spirit the Lord says:

'My Spirit shall not remain in these men, because they are flesh.'

10: 'And it shall come to pass in that day, that the prophets shall be ashamed, each one of his vision when he prophesies, and they shall put on a garment of hair instead of the lies they told.'

'I am no prophet, for a man begot me from my youth.'

'What are these wounds between your hands?' And he shall say:

'Those with which I was wounded in the house of my beloved.'

Those who promise foreknowledge incur shame when their prior pronouncement falls to the ground.

Since, then, the refutation of the false prophet has come about not only from strangers but also from those who begot him, for this reason he is put to shame, his prophecy having been refuted, so that he then reviles himself and laments, having put on a garment of hair.

He confesses, at any rate, that he is a man from his youth — 'youth' here indicating not age but a young and superficial character.

For the base man, having neither hoary prudence nor honored old age nor an unstained life, passes his days in ignorance, according to the proverbially spoken oracle:

'Folly is kindled in the heart of a youth, but the rod and instruction are far from him.' He who has passed beyond this most wretched condition brings his supplication to God:

'Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my ignorances.' He who has been convicted of speaking lies in his prophesying, put to shame over his vain vision — which was rather divination and not prophecy — confesses that he is no prophet, nor was he advanced to this from among the prophets.

And since, clothed in a garment of hair, he denies being a prophet under compulsion and not according to truth, it is said to him:

'What then are these wounds between your two hands?' To which he says:

'Those with which I was wounded in the house of my beloved, since not even those who begot me could bear my being a prophet, so as even to inflict wounds upon me.'

It is possible to say that the 'house of the beloved' of the one who prophesies falsely is the multitude beloved by him, which has condemned his divinations, so as to subject him to grievous sufferings.

And these things too are to be referred to those who hold divergent opinions within Christianity.

The false repentance of the false prophet who has put on a garment of hair is also brought forward in Isaiah against those who fast and pray in vain, a rebuke being made against the hypocrites:

'For though you bend your neck like a ring and spread sackcloth and ashes beneath you, not even so shall you call your fast acceptable.' Yet I do not say this as though no one is profited by a laborious course of life and a hard regimen, which then becomes profitable when it is carried out together with repentance.

The Ninevites, at any rate, having repented after much wickedness at the preaching of the prophet Jonah, escaped the great overthrow that had been threatened against their city.

The psalmist agrees also, saying in one place:

'When they troubled me' — namely my enemies, both visible and invisible — 'I clothed myself with sackcloth and humbled my soul with fasting'; and in another Psalm:

'I made sackcloth my garment, and I became a byword to them.' From the mournful condition that arises for the sake of possessing good things, the one who has attained them, changing over into gladness, says:

'You turned my mourning into joy for me; you tore off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness.'

'Sword, awake against my shepherd and against the man who is his fellow citizen, says the Lord Almighty;'

'strike the shepherd, and let the sheep be scattered, and I will bring my hand upon the shepherds.'

From this prophecy the evangelist Matthew took up the saying quoted in the Gospel according to him, when, after Jesus had been arrested and the disciples had been made to stumble and were fleeing, he said:

'That it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophet:'

'I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered' — calling the striking and the wounding the death of the true shepherd on behalf of the rational flock, who laid down his own soul for the sheep, given as a ransom for many. Concerning the plot thus laid, with the hands of the excellent herdsman wounded and his feet pierced, one may hear him saying to the Father:

'The one whom you struck, they themselves pursued, and to the pain of my wounds they themselves added.' For those who slew the Lord, striking him whom God had delivered up on their behalf, added to the pain of his wounds, increasing the plot as they pursued him.

Enduring the abomination dared by the wicked, he who gave over his own shepherd to be handed up on behalf of the sheep, commands a sword to awake against his own shepherd and against his fellow citizen — and this is the people of the Hebrews.

Nevertheless, the sword that was brought upon them slew the fellow citizen, yet it did not harm the flock-leader, who took upon himself death for the sparing of the flock.

For how should he not have remained untouched by all harm, who says to God:

'Deliver my soul from the sword'? This utterance is found in the twenty-first Psalm, brought forth entirely in the person of the Savior.

When the soul of him who sent up the prayer had been delivered from the sword, his fellow citizen fell under the sword of chastisement, according to what is said in Amos the prophet:

'All the sinners of the people shall die by the sword.' The same punishment is hinted at in what is spoken by God in Zephaniah the prophet: