From chapter 11 onwards, new and wholly unexpected tones suddenly appear in Second Zechariah's words about the Messiah's coming...
From chapter 11 onwards, new and wholly unexpected tones suddenly appear in Second Zechariah's words about the Messiah's coming. He has just sung a hymn to cleansing from pagan temptations; he has just spoken of the people's new shepherds, who will be a sign of redemption accomplished. But God allows him to see something incomprehensible, and the prophet conveys it as accurately as he can. He sees that some mysterious catastrophe among the chosen people is connected with the Messiah's coming, that the arrival of the Kingdom of the gentle Messiah-King will not be triumphant. The Lord speaks of the people as sheep doomed to slaughter, left without justice or protection. God's word calls the people ‘truly poor’, with nothing to hope for. The reason is that people's souls turn away from God, and therefore God turns away from them.
Many prophets spoke of this tragic justice; even before the captivity they announced that a people who have no need of God and do not wish to seek Him are doomed. God cannot force His way into their lives, and He reveals Himself to those who thirst for righteousness and mercy without knowing the one God: ‘I revealed Myself to those who did not ask for Me,’ the Lord says bitterly to Second Isaiah (Isa 65:1ff.). Seeking God is the only thing a person needs in order to live, but it is something very practical. A person seeks God in humility of heart, in the desire to do His will, and in deeds of righteousness and mercy: ‘O man, you have been told what is good and what the Lord requires of you: to act justly, to love deeds of mercy and to walk humbly before your God,’ said the prophet Micah as early as the end of the eighth century BC (Mic 6:8). Yet if we invoke God only in words while arranging our lives as we see fit, we thereby reject Him in practice. And this rejection of God becomes the world's greatest tragedy, because not only are people left defenceless, but the Almighty Himself suffers. ‘My people! What have I done to you, and how have I burdened you? Answer Me’: the almost human, almost familiar anguish of unrequited love sounds in these words spoken to the same Micah (Mic 6:3).
Second Zechariah, too, was allowed to experience this profound tragedy of world history, the tragedy of the Creator's love betrayed by us. He sees that the covenant can no longer continue because people seek benefits from God but do not wish to know God Himself. The faith of Abraham and Moses, David and the prophets, turns into violence against God, into attempts to use Him for petty human interests. The Lord is infinitely higher, and His love scorches like fire; therefore the dissolution of the covenant will become a sign of God's truth for the poor who await the Lord.
God's people make their free choice and lose the Lord's presence. With inexpressible pain the Lord says through the prophet: ‘If it pleases you, give Me My wages; if not, do not.’ Payment for the Exodus and the law, for miracles and signs, healings and protection from oppressors. Payment for the Name revealed to Moses, for the presence of glory seen by Isaiah… These words sound blasphemous and out of place, and reading them is truly frightening. But this is not a literary device or poetic exaggeration: in God's Spirit the prophet sees into the future and reports only one monstrous detail from it. It is the thirty pieces of silver paid for the Blood of the Righteous One and used to buy the potter's land. We have no right to speculate about what was revealed to Second Zechariah; what matters is that this detail immediately shifts the centre of gravity of his prophecy. He does not see God's Anointed One enthroned on a throne: His Kingdom is revealed on the Cross.
For the prophet, this is not a historical accident arising from circumstances. To him, the betrayal and the thirty pieces of silver express all humanity's relationship with its Creator. But he also sees that the specific cause of the tragedy is Israel's unfaithful shepherds, whose guilt he describes in the closing verses of this extraordinary chapter.
11 A prediction of the final destruction of the Jews, Zec 11:1-6.
The Messiah will rule them, Zec 11:7-8.
But at length, provoked by their contempt of him, give them up, Zec 11:9-17.
11:1 Open thy doors - That destruction of the Jewish church and nation, is here foretold in dark and figurative expressions, which our Lord, when the time was at hand, prophesied of very plainly.Lebanon - Lebanon, a great mountain boundary between Judea and its neighbours on the north, is here commanded to open its gates, its fortifications raised to secure the passages, which lead into Judea.That the fire - Fire kindled by the enemy in the houses and buildings in Judea, and in Lebanon itself. The cedars - Palaces built with cedars.
11:2 Fir - tree - Houses and towns built with firs. The cedar - Much less shall ye escape. Ye Oaks - Used in that country for building palaces, cities, towns, and fortresses. The forest - Jerusalem, compared to a forest, in regard of the many and tall houses in it.In short, all are called to cry, for the miseries that will come upon all. Come down - Is laid desolate.
11:3 Of the shepherds - The enemy having driven away their flocks and herds. Their glory - What was their honour. Of Jordan - The great forests on the banks of Jordan, where the young lions were wont to range.
11:4 My God - God the father speaks to Christ.Of the slaughter - Appointed to the slaughter. The Jews, during four hundred and fifty years, were a flock of slaughter to the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and afterwards the Romans.
11:5 Whose possessors - Governors. Not guilty - Think they do no ill.That sell them - For slaves. For l am rich - Profanely give God thanks, that they thrive by cruelty and oppression.
11:6 I will deliver - To rob, imprison, banish, or kill each other.Of his king - The Roman Caesar, whom the Jews had chosen to be so.The land - Their king and his armies shall destroy the land.
11:7 Bands - The beauty of grace and glory, the bands of love and peace.
11:9 Then - After that time of his patient feeding the flock, and cutting off the unfaithful shepherds. Cut off - By the sword or famine.The flesh - Either live to be besieged, 'till hunger makes the living eat the dead, or by seditions and bloody intestine quarrels, destroy each other.
11:10 Even beauty - Which was the beauty and glory of them, the covenant of God, with all the blessings of it.That I might break - Declare it null. Christ calls it his covenant, for he was the mediator of it.
11:11 Broken - The covenant was disannulled. That waited - Believed in him, and obeyed him. Knew - Saw, and owned God in all this.
11:12 And I said - Upon parting, Christ seems after the manner of men, to mind them of his claims for them, and desire them to reckon with him.If ye think good - He puts it to them, whether they thought he deserved ought at their hands? So they - The rulers of the Jews, the high priest, chief priests, and pharisees. Weighed - Which was the manner of paying money in those days. Thirty pieces - Which amounts to thirty - seven shillings and six - pence, the value of the life of a slave, Exo 21:32.This was fulfilled when they paid Judas Iscariot so much to betray Christ.
11:13 The Lord - God the Father. Cast it - As being so little, it would hardly purchase any thing but what was the cheapest among them.A goodly price - God upbraids the shepherds of his people, who prized the great Shepherd no higher. Cast them to the potter - Or rather, cast them into the house of the Lord for the potter; all which the Jewish rulers acted over.
11:14 Then - So soon as I saw what value they put upon me.I cut asunder - Christ did it really, the prophet did it in the type.Break - Declare it broken. The brother - hood - That friendship which had been among them. Judah - The two tribes, and the remnant of the ten tribes.
11:15 Take unto thee - O Zechariah, personate a shepherd quite different from him thou hast represented.
11:16 Who shall not visit - Who seeks not out those that are lost.The young one - Which are aptest to perish through weakness.Nor heal - But leaves it to die of its wounds. That stand still - Not able to go forward. Will eat - Feast on the fattest of the flock.Tear their claws - Tear off their skin unto the very nails; in brief, a sluggish, negligent, covetous, riotous, oppressive, and cruel government, is shadowed out by a foolish shepherd.
11:17 The idol shepherd - To them that are but the images of shepherds. That leaveth - Casts off the care of the flock.The sword - Of the enemy, shall break his strength and be - fool his counsels. Dried up - They that have gifts which qualify them to do good, if they do it not, they will be taken away. They that should have been workmen, but were slothful, and would do nothing, will justly have their arm dried up. And they that should have been watchmen, but were drowsy, will justly have their eye blinded.