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NOTES for Zec 11:1-17

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1 Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars.
2 Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is fallen; because the mighty are spoiled: howl, O ye oaks of Bashan; for the forest of the vintage is come down.
3 There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: a voice of the roaring of young lions; for the pride of Jordan is spoiled.
4 Thus saith the LORD my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter;
5 Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty: and they that sell them say, Blessed be the LORD; for I am rich: and their own shepherds pity them not.
6 For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the LORD: but, lo, I will deliver the men every one into his neighbour's hand, and into the hand of his king: and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.
7 And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock. And I took unto me two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bands; and I fed the flock.
8 Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.
9 Then said I, I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another.
10 And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it assunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people.
11 And it was broken in that day: and so the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was the word of the LORD.
12 And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.
13 And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.
14 Then I cut asunder mine other staff, even Bands, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15 And the LORD said unto me, Take unto thee yet the instruments of a foolish shepherd.
16 For, lo, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, which shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces.
17 Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.
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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.

Other notes

 
For Zec 11:1-17
1 Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars.
2 Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is fallen; because the mighty are spoiled: howl, O ye oaks of Bashan; for the forest of the vintage is come down.
3 There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: a voice of the roaring of young lions; for the pride of Jordan is spoiled.
4 Thus saith the LORD my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter;
5 Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty: and they that sell them say, Blessed be the LORD; for I am rich: and their own shepherds pity them not.
6 For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the LORD: but, lo, I will deliver the men every one into his neighbour's hand, and into the hand of his king: and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.
7 And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock. And I took unto me two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bands; and I fed the flock.
8 Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.
9 Then said I, I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another.
10 And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it assunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people.
11 And it was broken in that day: and so the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was the word of the LORD.
12 And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.
13 And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.
14 Then I cut asunder mine other staff, even Bands, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15 And the LORD said unto me, Take unto thee yet the instruments of a foolish shepherd.
16 For, lo, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, which shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces.
17 Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.
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This part of the prophecy can plunge us into pessimism, for we are permitted, and only to a very small degree, to glimpse...  Read more

This part of the prophecy can plunge us into pessimism, for we are permitted, and only to a very small degree, to glimpse how impenetrable the darkness can become if the Lord’s Covenant with humanity collapses. Should we understand the words of the prophecy as an exact prediction of a situation that will arise fatally and inevitably? Or should we see in Zechariah’s words a warning addressed to people: you constantly retreat from the Covenant with the Lord, reject its terms, and invariably return to the same familiar sins; look, then, at what the world will become if the Covenant that constrains you so much is dissolved; taste what life will be like after you have finally rejected the Lord.

A flock that rejects the good Shepherd will inevitably fall into the hands of a worthless shepherd who will destroy it and then perish himself. This has happened many times before, yet centuries pass and bitter experience teaches no one.

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For Zec 11:13
13 And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.
Hide
Thirty pieces of silver became the symbol of the betrayal, the most terrible betrayal in the history of humanity - the betrayal of the Messiah by Judas, who was His follower. And the prophetic sermon, as it sometimes happens, became a prediction in every sense of the word, the prediction of what happened in the days...  Read more

Thirty pieces of silver became the symbol of the betrayal, the most terrible betrayal in the history of humanity - the betrayal of the Messiah by Judas, who was His follower. And the prophetic sermon, as it sometimes happens, became a prediction in every sense of the word, the prediction of what happened in the days of the earthly ministry of the Savior. Of course, the mission of the prophet is not to predict the future. The prophet is not a predicator, he is the witness of God, the one who can carry up to his contemporaries (if, of course, these last ones will want to listen to him) what God thinks of them, their deeds and actions.

But there are situations in the history, that the cultural historian would have probably called archetype, the situations where the form is not less symbolic, that the meaning itself. And one of such situations is the payment for the betrayal. Well then the situations can almost repeat themselves sometimes, as we say, one to one.

Zechariah just points out one of these situations, one of these moments, when the form and the meaning merge almost inseparably: the silver cast contemptuously, falling in the treasury of Temple as compensation, as payment to God "for anxiety". The union-covenant is broken, God takes His payment, as a penalty is taking, by saying: if you appreciate My works in any way, pay.

He is paid, paid the price, due to an artisan not so expensive: not completely without interest, but with an unworthy interest not only for God, but also for man, whose labor of is indeed valued high. And then it is enough to lead this logic to a good term, in order to receive the price of betrayal. Because, get rid of God - means turning away from Him, get rid of the Messiah - means killing Him. Those who appreciate God at the price of a potter, will not also appreciate the Messiah higher.

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