NOTES for Zec 14:1-21

The final prophecies of Deutero-Zechariah, collected in the 14th chapter, like his previous words, in essence, contain only a description of what the prophet sees in the future. Most of the previous prophets, including the first Zechariah, whose prophecies make up the first eight chapters of the book, are addressed directly to the people listening to them. Penetrating the mysteries of God's design, the prophets on behalf of the Lord direct a call to repentance to the people and bring a word of consolation and hope. None of this is present in the prophecies of Deutero-Zechariah — they are as if addressed to future generations. Deutero-Zechariah seems to call for nothing, he reports on future events as inevitable, as what has already been accomplished by the will of the Almighty. In this is the striking difference of Deutero-Zechariah from all other prophets.

And yet a connection between the words of the prophet and the historical context of his life does exist. Perhaps unknown editors and scribes did not consider it necessary to include indications of this connection in the text of the book, but it can still be seen. The fact is that indifference, apathy toward faith had become the main feature of the spiritual life of the era during the time of the prophet. Indications of this can be found in all the late prophets, and also in extra-biblical sources. And therefore the prophet does not count on a visible response from his listeners, he prophesies only because the Spirit, speaking in his heart, calls him to it. “Whether they hear or whether they refuse” — so the Lord commanded the prophet Ezekiel. The same can be applied to the prophecy of Deutero-Zechariah; he addresses those who still want to and can hear him.

Moreover, of exceptional significance for understanding the prophecies of Deutero-Zechariah is his understanding of salvation. Most prophets of the first and second generations saw and emphasized in the history contemporary to them that which anticipated the future. God's intervention in the history of the chosen people was for them the beginning, the first and incomplete manifestation of the coming Day of Visitation. In the events contemporary to them, the prophets saw only gleams of God's design and sought to comprehend this design. For Deutero-Zechariah, however, the coming advent of Christ has no parallel; the centuries preceding the Incarnation find their fullness and meaningfulness only in the events of the Kingdom of the Messiah. The coming, rejection, and enthronement of the Messiah become for him the only center toward which history is directed and without which it is aimless. He does not prophesy in order to change the course of history, which the prophets preceding him were called to do. The goal of Deutero-Zechariah is to point to future events so that people might have time to prepare for them, so that people might orient themselves by them in their lives.

That is why Deutero-Zechariah is truly the last prophet, after whom it will remain only for John the Baptist to proclaim that the foretold Kingdom has come. And from the times of Deutero-Zechariah begins that intense expectation which lies at the foundation of the spiritual life of many contemporaries of the Lord Jesus, from Simeon the God-Receiver and Zechariah (the father of John the Baptist) to Nicodemus and the apostles.

Contrary to popular notions of the earthly greatness of Israel under the rule of the Messiah, the first prophecy of the 14th chapter says that at this time the country will be laid waste by foreign invaders. It is not given to the prophet to know that these will be the Romans (the inhabitants of a distant city in the west, which at that time was barely three centuries old), therefore he uses the images of captivity and the earthquake under Uzziah familiar to everyone in Israel. It is important for him to inform his listeners and readers that in the coming era of disasters and enslavement the Lord Himself will come to His people. Four centuries before the day when Simon Peter will say to Jesus, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God,” Deutero-Zechariah proclaims the coming of the Messiah: “His feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of Olives.” But, like Joel, he sees in the Day of Visitation something incomprehensible and frightening, from which the foundations of the world will be shaken. “There shall be no light, the luminaries shall withdraw” — these words can only partially be understood as a continuation of the testimony of Abraham, Moses, and Amos about the darkness enveloping the presence of the Invisible One. Deutero-Zechariah himself does not explain them, he only sparsely describes what was revealed to his inner gaze: “It shall be a day... neither day, nor night; only at evening time shall there be light.” This is the very same mysterious eclipse to which the evangelist Luke testifies: “It was now about the sixth hour of the day, and darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour” (Lk 23:44). But the prophet also sees that this darkness, in which the sun will dim, will become for the world a source of living water — that very stream exuding life from under the threshold of the House of God, about which Ezekiel spoke.

Deutero-Zechariah concludes his word by indicating that on that day the enthronement of God Himself over all the earth will take place, and His name will become the only one in the universe. Distorted and false human notions about the Creator of the world will disappear, and humanity will come to know the true God. And therefore throughout the whole world, starting from Jerusalem, the victory of God's righteousness will be accomplished, and every evil will be struck down. The last prophecy, concluding the whole book, speaks of the triumph of the worship of God throughout the whole world. All nations, the prophet asserts, will worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, because without this they will have no source of life (which here is symbolized by rain, ensuring the fertility of the earth). All, even nations so hostile to the faith as the Egyptians, will participate in this worship, and Jerusalem itself and everything that happened in it will become a great shrine. And this triumph, this feast of faith, will be conditioned only by the coming of the Messiah and nothing else. The main thought of these last lines of the book is briefly expressed by the apostle Paul: “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:9-11).