In the whole command of the crowning of the high priest, Israel’s future glory is likewise seen. Their great and high calling will be realized in that day when the man the Branch comes forth and turns away ungodliness from Jacob. Israel will be as His earthly people like the Priest upon His throne, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people. The kingdom has then come, and the will of God is being done in earth as it is done in heaven. And oh how blessedly for the believer’s heart to think God’s own thoughts and move in the purposes of God. Our own individual salvation eternally assured, we ought to cry continually “Even so, come Lord Jesus.” – Amen, Amen!
CHAPTER VII
The question put to the Prophet concerning the Fast. – The Rebuke given and their Failure shown.
The night visions had come to an end. In them, as we have seen, the whole future of Israel, their restoration to the land and regeneration, as well as the theocracy and the judgments connected with it, were revealed. Nearly two years had passed by since that memorable night of visions, and during these two years the people had, obedient to the heavenly visions and encouraged by them, built the house of the Lord. Soon the temple was to be completed and worship once more to be restored. A question rose then in the minds of some of the people about the keeping of certain fast days by which they commemorated events of judgments upon their nation and city. The principal day of fasting was the day set apart for remembering the destruction and burning of the city of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. This day was kept by the Jews on the tenth day of the fifth month. Messengers are sent with this question to the prophet, and this occasion is used by the Lord to give a new message to the nation through the prophet.
The seventh chapter is divided into three sections. 1. The occasion for the prophecy (verses 1-4). 3. The rebuke (verses 4-8). 3. Looking over the past (verses 8-14). But the seventh chapter does not answer the question put to the prophet. If a reader of the word stops reading with the seventh chapter, and does not continue to read the eighth, he will be much perplexed. The seventh and eighth chapters of Zechariah go together; in fact they should form only one chapter. The eighth chapter contains two sections. 1. Promises of blessings again and teachings concerning their walk (verses 1-17). 2. The solemn fast days will be no more; instead of them there will be feast days. Whole nations will seek the Lord and be joined to Israel. Thus the end of chapter eight answers the question of the people concerning the fast days. At the first glance we notice that these two chapters, though starting from a desire of the people in the prophet’s day, are yet awaiting their final and greatest fulfillment. Israel still fasts and is still the forsaken. Still there is mourning and weeping over the departed glory, and once a year is the solemn fast kept which reminds the seed of Abraham of the sad fate of Jerusalem and the Temple, twice destroyed on the same day.
But let us glance at these sections in these chapters, and make a short comment on them.
Chapter VII: 1–4. The question– It comes from the people of Bethel. The two men who represent the people have Assyrian names – Sherezer, meaning prince of the treasury, and Regemmelech, the official of the King. Perhaps they were born in exile and received their names there, and may have held the position indicated by their names. Their concern for a human institution not at all commanded in the word of the Lord, as it was the case with the fast day in question, shows the lack of spirituality in them. They should have been more concerned about true obedience than with an insignificant ceremony. It has always been so with the people. When the Lord came He said to the leaders, “Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel” (Matthew xxii: 24). And they are still concerned with ceremonials and know not the true obedience. But the same conditions, alas! exist too in Christendom. The question itself about weeping on that day for so many years shows that they were tired of it. It was a burden to them. If they had the true faith and in it obedience, they would not have come with that question at all, but with joy and gladness would they have looked to the future, and known that the promised restoration as seen by the prophet was surely to come.
II. The reproof. Verses 4-7.– The word of the Lord comes now to the prophet. The message is for all the people and for the priests. The two fasts are mentioned. The one in the fifth month as already stated was the one in remembrance of the destruction of the city. The fast of the seventh month was kept on the anniversary of the murder of Gedaliah at Mizpah (Jeremiah xli). But why did they keep these fast days? Why do they keep these days indeed still? The Lord asks, “Is it unto me, unto me?” No, it was not for the honor and glory of God, but their own selfish interests were at the bottom of it. Indeed God had never asked them to fast. These institutions were man-made, and highly displeasing to Jehovah. And is it not so now, not alone with the Jews but with Christendom? Oh, the manmade institutions and outward observances which only dishonor God and are for the selfish interests of the people! The eating and drinking, the fast being over, was not unto the Lord, but unto themselves. It was obedience the Lord required. Had they listened to the words spoken by the prophets they would not have been in captivity, there would have been no need for a solemn fast. Unbelief was at the bottom of it all, and so it is still with the nation in dispersion.
III. The closing verses of the seventh chapter look over past history. In the first place the Lord says what he desires to see done by them: True judgment executed, mercy and truth shown by every man to his brother, oppress not the widow and the fatherless, the stranger nor the poor, let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart. These precepts were spoken to them by the prophets before the captivity. “Wash ye, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow” (Isaiah i.) But they did the very opposite, and continued in an outward service without obedience of the heart.
This disobedience became their ruin and brought on the disaster. The description of their waywardness fits that people in their entire history. They refused to attend and offered a rebellious shoulder. They made their ears too heavy to hear, their heart they made an adamant that they might not hear the law and the words which Jehovah of hosts sent by His Spirit. These conditions prevailed in a still intenser form when our Lord Jesus Christ appeared among them. At last God Himself put judicial blindness upon them and still their heart is like adamant, but that heart of stone will be removed at last by the Spirit of God and a heart of flesh given in its place. (Ezek. xxxvi).
And now follows the manifestation of the wrath of Jehovah of hosts. He had cried and they did not hear, and now they called but He did not hear. The prayers of orthodox Judaism especially on their fast days are beyond description and pleading for mercy. Still there is no answer to the many prayers. “Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear; your hands are full of blood.” (Is. i: 14, 15.) Alas! it is worship with the lips. The believing remnant alone in the future will be heard in their pleadings, and the Lord will send at last the salvation out of Zion, and the Deliverer will come who turns away ungodliness from Jacob. The fourteenth verse puts the dispersion and the judgment before us in a nutshell. They are whirled among all the nations whom they know not. The land itself becomes desolate behind them. As soon as the people leave whose land it is, the land flowing with milk and honey becomes a wilderness, and when they return it will be again the land of blessing.
What a testimony the land and the people is! Both speak of God’s righteous judgment, and the truth of His word. A whole nation scattered among all the nations and still kept intact. Their land trodden down by the Gentiles, waste and desolate. The land mourneth, indeed. Prosperity will come to that land again, but not by human efforts and human wisdom. The attempts of unbelieving Israel now in transforming the wilderness may prove successful, and colonies after colonies will be established. The time of Jacob’s trouble, however, will sweep it all away.
The question concerning the fast is answered in the next chapter. The great and wonderful future of the land, the people, and of Jerusalem, prosperity and blessing is clearly shown in it. No more mourning, but joy; no more shame, but honor; no desolation, but restoration and His people saved from the East and West, nations at last being converted through Israel’s blessing and testimony. We will look at these promises and let them pass before us in our next chapter.
CHAPTER VIII
The Gracious Answer to their Question. – Promises of Blessing, Restoration, Prosperity and Salvation. – No more Fast Days. – Nations to be added to Jerusalem.
The eighth chapter contains the most blessed promises concerning the future of Jerusalem and the people Israel. Now the question concerning the fasts is answered in a way the petitioners never expected. The promises which are given in this chapter were only partially fulfilled in Zechariah’s day in the returned and believing remnant, the actual fulfillment is still future. In the first night vision we heard the words, Cry yet saying, Thus says the Lord of hosts, My cities through prosperity shall yet be spread abroad, and the Lord shall yet comfort Zion and shall yet choose Jerusalem. The eighth chapter gives the details of the promised prosperity. The perfect picture of Jerusalem’s glorious future is unrolled before our eyes. Though still future, with the eyes of faith we can look at it and rejoice in the vision when at last the covenant keeping God of Abraham has established Jerusalem and made her a praise in the earth. It is a grand and glorious prophecy which is before us, and while we now consider it as believers and members of His heavenly people, we may well think of the time when He, who is our Lord and Israel’s King, shall come and we with Him, and when in Him all these blessings will be carried out. Not long ago we saw teachings on this chapter consisting of entirely spiritual applications for believers’ comfort, prosperity and increase, etc. The New Testament contains all the comfort and blessing for believers, and we need not rob Israel of promises belonging to them and connected with their future.
We divide the chapter into eight sections, which we will now briefly review:
1. The Restoration Announced. Verses 1-3. The jealousy of the Lord for Jerusalem is again stated, like in the first chapter, I am jealous for Jerusalem (14th verse). Here, however, is the word fury added. The Hebrew verb signifies, I have been and am still jealous of her with great fury. The fury denotes the wrath which fell upon the ungodly nations, the horns of the second night visions, which are now passed out of existence, broken to pieces. Now to Jerusalem, no longer trodden down by the Gentiles, the enemies being scattered, the Lord Himself has returned and His glory is seen there again. It had departed, but now the sign of his presence and favor is again given. The city becomes a new city, called The City of Truth. How different this name is from the others which Jerusalem bore and which so fittingly described her fallen condition and abomination. She was called the city which had grievously sinned, like an unclean woman (Lament. i: 8, 17), a harlot and a murderer (Isaiah i: 21) spiritually called Sodom and Egypt (Rev. xi), but now a new name is given her, The City of Truth. He who is the Truth has turned the lie and ungodliness from Jacob, and truth is the characteristic of the city. The mountain of the Lord of hosts becomes the holy mountain.
2. Jerusalem will have Rest and be Largely Inhabited. Verses 4 and 5. What a picture in comparison with the former desolation! Jerusalem was forsaken and a desolation, a city of heaps. It is even so now, few cities of the earth present such an awful misery as modern Jerusalem does. It will all be changed, and just as great as the misery and desolation was the blessing and the increase will be. Old men in the streets, bowed down by old age, and alongside of them boys and girls who run about in childish play. No more fear, they shall dwell safely and none shall make them afraid. The increase in descendants is even now very great among the Jews and the city is rapidly becoming a Jewish city again, and thus everything is preparing for the final conflict. Only after Jerusalem’s warfare is ended will there be peace.
3. They are Brought back from the Captivity. Verses 7, 8. When they heard of a restoration they thought this very marvelous. Had they not been scattered into the four winds? Could they ever be brought together again? Therefore the Lord says, Because it is marvelous in the eyes of the remnant of this nation in those days, shall it be marvelous in My eyes also? saith the Lord of hosts. At this present time Jews and Gentiles doubt the promises of restoration, it is marvelous in their eyes. But He who scattered Israel will gather them again. He knows also where the so called Lost Tribes are, the house of Israel, and we need not try to help God to find them. When the time comes He will bring them all back. In the second chapter we noticed that the North Country is mentioned, and we called attention to the fact that the North Country, Russia, is inhabited by nearly one-half of the entire Jewish race. In that land the persecutions are the greatest and also the desire for a return to the land. The restoration in unbelief is one especially from the Jews in the North Country. Here in the eighth chapter the East and the West countries are mentioned, the far East, India, China, etc., and the West, our own country and the isles of the sea. The rich Jews may now be satisfied in the countries, away from the homeland, where they prospered, but at last they will return and the Lord will send fishers to fish them and hunters to hunt them out. (Jer. xvi: 16.) The Gentiles will bring them back to their own land (Isaiah lxvi: 20). All will then be His people and He will be their God.
4. The Land is Blessed. – Fruitfulness and Plenty. – The Remnant to Possess all these Things. Verses 9-12. What a contrast there is now seen! For before these days there was no hire for man, nor any hire for beast.. Little fruit was had from the ground, there was nothing for man and beast.. Neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in on account of the affliction.. There was no rest, no peace, but uncertainty and affliction. Those that went out from the land had no peace, and they that came into the land found no peace. The curse said, No rest for the sole of their feet, and how literally it has been fulfilled. Again the people seek a resting place in the land without their God and their Saviour, all in the confidence of the flesh. They will succeed in their restoration plans only to find themselves at last in greater difficulties and facing worse afflictions than ever before. Then every one will be against his neighbor (verse 10). Money spent by the millions in building channels for irrigation, planting of trees and vines, building railroads, etc. (just what modern Zionism proposes and has undertaken to do), may succeed in transforming the land in spots into a fruitful garden, but the time of Jacob’s trouble will sweep that all away. The Lord will be gracious to the very land in the day of His manifestation. There will be a seed of peace, the vine will give her fruit, the ground her increase, the heavens their dew. They shall build houses and inhabit them, they shall plant vineyards and eat the fruit of them (Isaiah lxv: 21). For ye shall go out with joy and be led forth with peace, the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the firtree, and instead of the briar shall come up the myrtle tree, and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off (Isaiah lv: 12-13). The remnant of the people left after the great tribulation will inherit this all.
5. The Curse Changed into Blessing. Verses 13-15. They had been a curse among the nations, but now at last the nations of the earth blest in the seed of Abraham. As He had punished them so He blesses them now. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, says your God, speak ye to the heart of Jerusalem and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned, for she has received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins (Isaiah xl: 1, 2). Literal were the curses threatened concerning Israel and Israel’s land, literally they were all fulfilled. And are there not many more promises of blessing for the people and for the land spoken by the same true and faithful God who uttered the threatenings and carried them out to the very last? And will not the Lord fulfill these promises of blessing literally to the minutest details? Assuredly He will. It is remarkable that this simple truth is not seen and understood in Christendom of to-day. According to the popular idea God has punished the Jews and will continue to do so, and the church has taken Israel’s place and inherited all the blessings. It is this false notion which is responsible in a great measure for the dreadful confusion existing in Christendom. The thing against which Paul warned is practiced in Christendom, Boast not against the branches.. Be not highminded, but fear. For if God spared not the natural branches (Jews) take heed lest He also spare not thee (Gentiles). God is able to graft them (Israel) in again. (Romans xi.)
6. Israel will be a Holy People. Verses 16 and 17. These are the words ye are to do, speak ye every man the truth to his neighbor, execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates; let none of you imagine evil in your hearts against his neighbor and love no false oath, for all these are things which I hate, saith the Lord. Untruth, false oath, speaking one against the other are characteristic sins of Israel. But the character of the nation is now to be entirely changed. They are now indeed to be a holy people, with hearts circumcised, loving God with all their hearts and their neighbors as themselves. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments and do them. (Ezekiel xxxvi: 26, 27.)
7. No more Fast Days, but Feast Days. Verses 18 and 19. The fast of the fourth month and the fast of the fifth and the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth, shall be to the house of Judah joy and gladness and cheerful feasts; therefore love the truth and the peace. This is now the answer to their question. The fasts of the fifth and seventh month were the fasts commemorating the burning of the temple and the taking of the city by Nebuchadnezzar, and the other the anniversary of the murder of Gedeliah and his friends. The fast of the tenth month was kept in remembrance of the siege of Jerusalem which was commenced in that month and the fast of the fourth month was kept on account of the taking of Jerusalem. These fasts commemorated therefore all national calamities. A greater calamity happened of course later when at the same time Jerusalem was destroyed by the Roman armies, the temple and the city burned to the ground and not a stone left upon another. The Jews are still keeping national fasts on account of these calamities. Not alone in Jerusalem are there Jews and Jewesses going to the small piece of ancient stone masonry, which is said to be all left of the magnificent temple in Jerusalem, to mourn there especially on the ninth day of Ab, but the mourning among the orthodox Jews on that day is world-wide. In the synagogues of Russia and New York, San Francisco and in South Africa, everywhere where there are orthodox Jews the Lamentations of the prophet Jeremiah are chanted in a mournful tone. But the time is coming when all will be changed. With Jerusalem rebuilt and peacefully inhabited, a temple full of God’s glory, and over it all the heavenly glory and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man, there will be no more need of fasting and mourning, but all will be changed in gladness and joy. The Songs of praise which are found at the close of the book of Psalms will then undoubtedly be sung by restored Israel.
8. The Conversion of the World and Conquest for the Lord will follow Through Converted and Restored Israel. Verses 20-23. These verses have often been spiritualized. How much harm there is done by taking such words and promises out of their connections and fitting them to a time and people for which they were never meant. Can God give His blessing to such teaching of His Word? We believe not. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, It shall yet be that nations will come, the inhabitants of many cities. And the inhabitants of one city shall go to another saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord and to seek the Lord of hosts: I will go also. And many peoples and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to pray before the Lord. This the world has not yet seen. Individuals have turned to the Lord, and His own are gathered out of all nations and languages, but such a picture as it is seen here has not yet been seen. The conversion of peoples and strong nations is still future. It will not come by modern missionary efforts, consisting not alone of preaching, but as it is done to-day, by educational work in heathen countries, as well as other humanitarian institutions, such as hospital work, orphanages, etc. Nations can never be converted by these efforts, nor has God given His Church promises that nations and the world is to be converted by the preaching of the Gospel of grace. Individuals, of course, are converted and will be converted by the Word faithfully preached. A people is thus taken out for His name. And to this agree the words of the prophets, as it is written, After this I will return and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down (Israel’s time commencing again, in restoration and regeneration) and I will build again the ruins thereof and I will set it up; that the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the nations upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things. (Acts xv: 14-17.) It is sad to think that Christendom ignores such a revelation of the divine purpose and order and goes on in entirely different lines. We are living now in the time of the outcalling of a people, the Church, the body of the Lord Jesus Christ is formed. When that body is completed, which does not mean the conversion of the world, the Lord will come for His outcalled saints and then with His saints in glory. This will be followed, according to the words of the prophets, as we have so clearly seen in these studies by the building again of the tabernacle of David and all that is connected with it, and then the residue of men, the nations, will seek the Lord. It is also to be noticed that these nations will seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and worship there before Him. This means that Jerusalem will become the great center of not alone world government but also of worship. The last chapter in this book of Zechariah shows nations coming up to Jerusalem on the feast of tabernacles.
The last verse of the eighth chapter is the grandest of all. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, in those days it shall be that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew saying, we will go with you for we have heard that God is with you. This shows clearly what so often is doubted, namely, that the Jew converted and filled with the Spirit will be the instrument for the conversion of the nations. At this present time when a poor Jew shows himself, even in a so-called Christian (?) land like ours, he will occasionally be followed by ten men or more who will mock him and call him names and perhaps assault him (by no means a rare occurrence). But it will all be changed in the day of Israel’s glory. It will then be known that Israel is the blessed people, and ten men out of all languages will beseech the Jew to take him along to the most blessed spot in the earth, to Jerusalem.
Thus ends one of the most striking prophecies concerning the future of the Seed of Abraham and Abraham’s land. How strange that so few Christian people care to study these sublime revelations, which tell us how true and faithful our God is and which make it so clear and plain that the Bible is divine, the Word of God. May He teach us, who love these truths, who love Him and His appearing, who is not only Our Hope but Israel’s Hope as well, may He teach us more and more to know His thoughts and purposes and to find our delight in them.