In a few days we will look at the fourteen chapters of the book of Zechariah. Most of the minor prophets in the Old Testament spoke prior to the Babylonian captivity. But the last three prophets, those at the very end of the Old Testament, spoke after the exile, when the people of Israel had returned to Judah and were rebuilding the temple and the city. Haggai and Zechariah began their prophecies about 520 BC, as the temple was being rebuilt. (Haggai and Zechariah are explicitly mentioned in Ezra 5:1-2.) Malachi, the last Old Testament prophet, probably spoke around 460 BC, when Ezra and then Nehemiah were active.
Zechariah 1:1 reads:
In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo:
This is probably December of 520 BC. Some Jews began returning from the exile in Babylon in 537 BC (Ezra 1:1-4) and began rebuilding the temple. In 520 BC, Haggai scolded the Jews for their procrastination in completing the temple; this is the message of the book of Haggai. After this, in chapters 1-8, Zechariah will tell of visions about the temple and its people, visions he received in 519 BC.
Beginning with the night visions at this time, eight visions possibly all in one night, Zechariah lays out the future of Jerusalem, beginning with the standards and expectations after the exile. Two chapters focus on a question of fasting, with a digression that avoids the triviality of that question and circles back to the real motive for worship. Those two chapters are then followed by six strange chapters describing role of Israel and Jerusalem in the messianic and apocalyptic age, as evil is finally defeated. (Indeed it is this book that probably has the greatest influence on the New Testament apocalyptic book of Revelation (says Baldwin.)
Zechariah was presumably familiar with earlier writings of Isaiah and Amos and at times echoes them.
Themes from the Feast of Tabernacles run throughout the book, from myrtle trees (sometimes used at that feast) in chapter 1, through living water, and a celebration of that feast at the end of time, in chapter 14.
Outline
The commentary by Joyce Baldwin gives a nice outline of Zechariah. It uses a chiastic structure. It has long been noted that the first 8 chapters of Zechariah have a chiastic structure but apparently a chiastic structure for the second half of the book was noted by P. Lamarche. (Baldwin has a nice section on chiasmi, pp.74-81, in her commentary. The chiastic structure of theoutline below is guided by Baldwin's outline on pp. 85 and 86 of her commentary. The titles and subtitles are mine.
Zechariah 1-6, Visions and Prophetic Statements from 520 BC.
1:1-6, Introduction
1:7-17, Rider on a red horse
1:18-21, Four horns punish Israel
2, Measuring the city
3, A new high priest4, A high priest and a prince
5:1-4, Flying scroll accuses the city
5:5-11, Wickedness removed from Israel
6, Four chariots and horses
Zechariah 7-8, The ninth vision, 518 BC.
7:1-3, A question about fasting
7:4-14, A sermon on justice
8:1-8, A series of questions and sayings
8:9-17, A sermon on the return to Jerusalem
8:18-19, The answer to the fasting question
Zechariah 9-11, Later Prophecy. 1
9:1-8, YHWH triumphs over northern nations
9:9-10, King on a lowly donkey
9:11-10:1, Jubilation and restoration in Jerusalem
10:2-3a, Rebuke of sham leaders
10:3b-11:3, Jubilation and restoration in Jerusalem
11:4-17, Good shepherd & bad shepherd
Zechariah 12-14, Later Prophecy, 2
12:1-9, Jerusalem, immovable and on fire
12:10-13:1, The pierced one
13:2-6, False prophets removed
13:7-9, Shepherd slaughtered, people scattered
14:1-15, Jerusalem surrounded
14:16-21, YHWH worshiped as king over all
Resources and References
For the book of Zechariah, I have relied on the following resources:
- a commentary by Joyce Baldwin in Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi: An Introduction & Commentary (The Tyndale Old Testament Commentary Series) 1981
- a commentary by Kenneth Barker in the seventh volume of the Expositor's Bible Commentary, Zondervan 1985.
- a commentary by Thomas E.McComiskey in The Minor Prophets: A Commentary on Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, edited by Thomas Edward McComiskey, 2018.
If I refer to Baldwin, Alden, or McComiskey in the notes, it is in reference to the commentaries above. There are other resources online.
I have been impressed with the commentaries by Joyce Baldwin. She was apparently the Carmen Imes of the twentieth century, As I worked through the commentary by Barker, I noticed that he often both quoted Baldwin and praised her insight into Zechariah. For that reason, I purchased the commentary by Baldwin and have relied on it extensively.
- Amongst the online commentaries provided by EasyEnglishBible, is an online commentary on Zechariah.
- The Gospel Coalition now has a set of online commentaries. Their commentary on Zechariah is here.
- The Bible Project videos are always excellent. I recommend their video on Zechariah.
Like most Old Testament writings, there is considerable wordplay. There is alliteration, punning, chiasmi, and so on. I do not know Hebrew and so I lean on the commentators to alert me to some of the wordplay.
My practice is to read through the text from the New International Version (NIV), copied into the blog and italicized in blue. At the head of each blue paragraph of text I place a short title; after the text I place my thoughts or comments in black. I begin this process with my own reactions and thoughts and then supplement these comments with gleanings from a commentary or two. (All the text in black, unless noted otherwise, is mine.) I place hyperlinks in pink, created so that one can click on a link and see the linked site open in another window... and go down a rabbit hole if one wishes!
Abbreviations
Anyone serious about study in the Old Testament must become aware of the ancient Near Eastern culture in which these works were written. If I discuss that culture in a blogpost, I will often fall back on the abbreviation ANE for "ancient Near East."
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