OUT OF THE CHAOS: A study in the book of Zechariah
Chapter 12: Victory: Who pierced whom?
To see this on YouTube:
Last night again the football team I support here in Sydney went down to defeat. They led the contest from the opening score, sometimes in double digits, until only minutes were left in the final quarter and eventually heartbreak among the supporters of the red and the white was all that remained after three hours of cheering. The game took place in Melbourne and rain came down at times making play more child-like, more recess-like. Often channel 7’s coverage stood far back, cameras focused on the entire ground at once and the players on both sides actually looked more like toy soldiers in a kids’ game of war, since I couldn’t make out any particular player from any other. Then quick as a flash, the director would make a decision, a certain camera and camera angle were employed, and the television zoomed in on a single play and even a single player who stole the proverbial show. That zoom-device was employed again and again, with good consequence, making me note and care and feel the energy of the contest.
Movie buffs know that technique from Rosebud in Citizen Kane to Mel Gibson’s Passion and the tear on the cheek of the Almighty that drops onto planet earth and causes floods and earthquakes at the death of Messiah. Even the 6 million in Schindler’s List become countable as we follow the little girl in the red coat. Zooming helps us see the one, and thus we see the entire company.
That’s what Zechariah does in our chapter today and going forward, the next two chapters as well. From the singular focus on the bad shepherds in chapters 10 and 11 to the suffering donkey-rider of chapter 9, at times he is using a wide-angle lens and at other times, the zoom feature. Jerusalem, the city of God, is mentioned 52 times in this prophet’s writings in 14 chapters, and 22 of those references occur in chapters 12 to 14. Geography, the Lord of all the earth, is too big at this point. God wants us to zoom in on Judah and more particularly zooming on Jerusalem.
Similarly, he is Lord of hosts and rules the skies, but in this chapter, we see him zoom in on a single battle and a single battler who will ensure victory to the people of God.
And we know God is Lord of time, ruling from the beginning to the end, and in chapter 12 we see the Eternal One “in that day.” That phrase is used 16 times in the final three chapters. What day is that? The zoom feature helps us understand the end of days, the final moments of global resistance and global hostility to God’s people, and to God himself, will come to an end. It’s the consummation of all things.
Let’s jump in. Today’s chapter shows us two of the final four promises of God towards the Jewish people. I love God’s promises and hope you do as well. I give you my word. That’s my promise. My faithfulness is in view. My character is in view. In the same way, when God gives us his word, it is his character on which we count, to be faithful to his plans and purposes.
Promise #1: God will defend Jerusalem (.2-.9)
Verse 1 is another one of those prelude identifiers. Another oracle or burden. That which follows is God’s announcement.
Then we see which God is speaking and on what he wants you to recognize him. He is Creator.
“declares the LORD who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him.”
That’s Creation-talk. He is the one who has been around much longer than the Babylonians and the Persians. The Assyrians were not in our view when God made the heavens and the earth. He’s the Ancient of Days and can be trusted. His creation shouts sovereignty, that is, that God is Lord of all the earth. IF and when the nations gather, it won’t surprise him in time or space. He knows the hearts of all people and he arranges all things for his purposes. God as creator is how he wants to be known, and as a result, all nations, and certainly Judah has no excuse in not following him.
Verse 2: Behold. Hiney. Don’t miss this. When Jerusalem gets in trouble and all the nations gather against her, it’s not they which arrange this; it’s God himself. Remember, when the Jewish people walk away from God, turn our backs on him and live for ourselves, God has no recourse but to judge us and use that judgment to bring us back. And that bringing us back, that redemption, is designed to assist in his proclamation of his love to all the earth. Behold. Don’t miss this. God’s intention will be accomplished. And here the purpose is shown in two symbols: cup and heavy stone. Both are troublesome, and God says he is the cause of that trouble.
A comment and a bothersome note here. When the Satmar rebbe said “the Holocaust was not merely a punishment within the framework of Divine retribution for Zionist heresy. It was also the result of the actions of the Zionists on the historical level.“ (https://etzion.org.il/en/philosophy/issues-jewish-thought/issues-mussar-and-faith/satmar-rebbes-understanding-reason). This was quite disturbing. Arthur Katz, who died 16 years ago last week, did not blame Zionism nor Zionists for the Holocaust. On his website, “Art maintains that God reveals Himself in His judgments and offers a suggestion for an interpretation of Jewish catastrophe as a witness to Jews prior to and including a final time of calamity destined for that people.”
Both the Satmar rebbe and Katz agree that the Holocaust was God’s judgment on the Jewish people, but with different causes. Zechariah would agree that judgment must come on God’s people for God’s sake AND for Jewish people’s sake and for the world’s sake.
As Peter the apostle teaches in his epistle: “17 For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? 18 AND IF IT IS WITH DIFFICULTY THAT THE RIGHTEOUS IS SAVED, WHAT WILL BECOME OF THE GODLESS MAN AND THE SINNER? Therefore, those also who suffer according to the will of God shall entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right.” (4.17-19)
Back to Zechariah. Judah will be a cup. Cups can mean many things in the Scripture, and a cup as judgment is a usual theme in Bible. (Psalm 75.8, Isa. 51.17, .21-.23, Jer. 25.15-28, Ezek. 23.31-33, Hab. 2.16, Rev. 14.10, 16.19, 18.6) Didn’t Yeshua say to the boys who wanted his mantle, “Are you able to drink the cup I’m about the drink?” (Mat. 20.22)
And in the drinking of this cup, Zechariah says it will cause a reeling to the peoples. A shaking. A quivering. Troubles, on the nations who attack our Jewish people. We have seen that again and again in history, haven’t we? Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Persia… and even in our days. Drink of the cup of the Jewish people, bring judgment to her, and you will feel the burn. You will be troubled yourself.
By the way the word for ‘cup’ is not Kos as is usual, rather it’s
סַף־רַ֛עַל
Saf means ‘bowl’ or ‘basin’ (cf. Ex. 12.22) and is associated with the threshold of a door. So, some commentators combine the two imagery and say that the judgment at a threshold and the stone which follows is that someone who is drunk (from the cup) trips on entry or that they bang their head by not bowing to the size gap.
God says Jerusalem will be a heavy stone. Result? The nations will be severely injured. It’s a typical repeated verb in Hebrew.
שָׂר֣וֹט יִשָּׂרֵ֑טוּ
Mess with the Jewish people and you will get yours. Plain and simple. Severely.
And in verse 4, it’s all over the battlefield and the marauders. Their horses go into panic mode, and the riders on the horses will be insane.
There is assonance and that poetry highlights the comprehensive nature of the ruin.
כָל־סוּס֙ בַּתִּמָּה֔וֹן וְרֹכְב֖וֹ בַּשִּׁגָּע֑וֹן
Bewilderment and madness --like a punishing couplet in Shakespeare. And then even blindness. A third punishment is added, again in assonance. Blindness.
בַּֽעִוָּרֽוֹן׃
God is watching over Judah and protecting her. Watch over is to protect from too much difficulty. Some, yes, but too much? Not at all! The final answer is God’s answer. Yes, Jerusalem will be attacked and yes, we will suffer troubles, and deservedly so, but in the end, God will be victorious on our behalf, for his name’s sake. Verse 5, who will get glory? The Lord of armies, the Lord of hosts.
Verse 6, again, ‘in that day’ we are fashioned into a fire pot and a flaming torch. Both are fiery agents of ruin. That is, each can wipe out entire fields or entire households. God’s promises of defending Jerusalem are sealed in Zechariah’s opening of this chapter. All the nations (verse 9) that come against Jerusalem will be destroyed.
Michael Stead says, “The pattern of the past becomes the paradigm for the future.” (Page 188) and he alludes to Jewish pain and suffering yet victory in the time of the Exodus and Red Sea crossing (Ex. 14.23-24), Elisha and the victory over the Arameans (2 King 6.14-20), and even Samson and the Philistines (Judge 15.1-8)
2. Promise #2: God will pour out a spirit of repentance for a pierced one (.10-14)
This ‘conquest through defeat’ motif is rife in the Scripture and as a student of the Bible you should re-read Isaiah chapter 51, perhaps later today. It’s as if Zechariah was rewriting that chapter in his own time and in his own words.
But now the particular in Zechariah’s view. The battles of the earlier part of the chapter result in victory. The victory, however, is one with a significant loss. The one who is pierced. Now, obviously in war, there are casualties of war, and in this report, we see a significant person is pierced. And there is sadness in those who marched with this one, but the zoom on the camera is picking up something different. The pierced one is not just any old soldier. And the piercing is not done by outsiders. What? That’s a shock!
Let’s talk about the pronouns in this verse 10.
Smith writes, “John 19:37 and Rev 1:7 read “upon him whom they pierced.” However, Yahweh may be the speaker and may be saying that the people had pierced him metaphorically by their rebellion and ingratitude, or they pierced him when they attacked his representative (perhaps some unidentified martyr). The NEB keeps both pronouns and reads “. . . on me, on him whom they have pierced.” D. R. Jones understands the passage to mean that the people of Jerusalem will look upon Yahweh (in prayer) touching those whom they (the nations) have slain (Jones 161). J. D. W. Watts follows Jones and translates v 10, “when they look to me (in prayer) regarding (those) whom they (the nations) have pierced (i.e., soldiers of Judah), they shall mourn for him (a collective)” (Watts 357).”
Michael Brown cites b. Sukkah 55a and 52a by saying the ancients, even in Talmud, read this as a singular and not a plural subject. Talmud refers this to Messiah ben Joseph, the suffering messiah of the ancients. (Brown, p. 148-9)
Brown helps further when he says, “it’s clear the mourners are turning to God.” And he goes on to show that the First Person pronoun has to apply to God himself. All throughout the chapter, God is the agent and the focus. Now the 2nd textual problem. The ‘they’ of verse 10. Who are they? Brown argues well that they who mourn are the same ‘they’ who pierced the One. So, the Jewish people are not in view as crying over the loss of a military guy with whom they are in good relationship. They are mourning because of their own rejection of Messiah. And that makes good theology in Revelation and John’s Gospel account as well where he cites this passage. (Rev. 1.7, John 19.37)
Be assured, friends, that the promise of God’s deliverance, as we have seen previously in Scripture, does not come without a cost. Only the cost is not that Jewish people will suffer and be pierced. No, the solution is found in Messiah himself, who is pierced for our transgressions. As Isaiah recorded centuries before Zechariah, “He was despised and forsaken of men, A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; And like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
Is. 53:4 Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
And our sorrows He carried.
Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten of God and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities.
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray,
Each of us has turned to his own way.
But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. (Isa. 53.3-6)
One more clue about this one is found in Zechariah’s verse 11 today. The reference is to The Plains of Megiddo and would immediately call attention to the hearer about the battle before Judah fell of King Josiah and how he was wounded and died in battle. This is recorded in 2 Chronicles 35.22-25. All of Israel was heartbroken at that time. Josiah was a good king. National mourning took place on a grand scale. Think about what happened on and in the aftermath of 9/11 and just naming the phrase “Twin Towers”, or think Port Arthur, or Granville train, and you will see what I mean. Older Americans think Kennedy being shot in Dallas and the words “grassy knoll” or “Texas Depository” and you get the idea.
But in this case, the mourners are actually the wounders! We are the ones who pierced him. We are mourning not only because of the loss of our hero, but we are guilty. We killed our only hope. The clans, one by one, admit their error, and repent. Clans of Aaron and others. Priests, prophets, kings… all the wrong and bad shepherds cry out and repent.
Don’t miss it. The camera pans out and we see all of Israel guilty for piercing the Beloved. And then the camera zooms in on this clan and this house. That house and that clan. Individuals who admit their sin and cry out for mercy.
And what does God promise? Verse 10. I will pour out grace and more grace. That’s why we look and repent. That’s how we look and repent. God is gracious and longs for us to know and love him.
The camera of God is zooming in on you. Just now. He wants us to repent and believe in the Good News of the Messiah, the one whom we had pierced, that by his death and resurrection, we too can have eternal life. He wants you to repent. He wants to give you eternal life.
Do you want that?
He’s still available and longing for you to know him. Why not receive him now?
Resource on video
To see a fun video overview of the book of Zechariah see this from Bible Project:
https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/zechariah/
Bibliography:
Brown, Michael L, Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, Volume Three, Baker Books, Grand Rapids, 2003.
Ryken, Leland (and others), Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, 1998.
Smith, Ralph, Micah to Malachi: Word Biblical Commentary (Volume 32), Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, 1984.
Stead, Michael, Zechariah: The Lord Returns, Aquila Press, Sydney, 2015.
Webb, Barry, The Message of Zechariah: Your Kingdom Come, Intervarsity Press, Nottingham, 2003.
Wiersbe, Warren, Be Heroic: Demonstrating Bravery by your Walk, David C. Cook Press, Colorado Springs, 1997.
ACTUAL TEXT
The burden of the word of the LORD concerning Israel.
Thus declares the LORD who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him, 2 “Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. 3 “It will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely 1injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it. 4 “In that day,” declares the LORD, “I will strike every horse with bewilderment and his rider with madness. But I will watch over the house of Judah, while I strike every horse of the peoples with blindness. 5 “Then the clans of Judah will say in their hearts, ‘A strong support for us are the inhabitants of Jerusalem through the LORD of hosts, their God.’
In that day I will make the clans of Judah like a fire pot among pieces of wood and a flaming torch among sheaves, so they will consume on the right hand and on the left all the surrounding peoples, while the inhabitants of Jerusalem again dwell on their own sites in Jerusalem. 7 “The LORD also will save the tents of Judah first, so that the glory of the house of David and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem will not be magnified above Judah. 8 “In that day the LORD will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the one who 1bis feeble among them in that day will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the LORD before them. 9 “And in that day I will 1aset about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.
I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn. 11 “In that day there will be great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the plain of Megiddo. 12 “The land will mourn, every family by itself; the family of the house of David by itself and their wives by themselves; the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their wives by themselves; 13 the family of the house of Levi by itself and their wives by themselves; the family of the Shimeites by itself and their wives by themselves; 14 all the families that remain, every family by itself and their wives by themselves.
