I will go also - The invited, shall with as much zeal embrace the motion, as others made it.
In Jerusalem - Literally understood, you have the first fruits of them mentioned, Acts 2:10 - 12. Mystically, Jerusalem is the church of Christ. To pray - To perform all gospel - worship.
Ten men - That is, many men. All languages - No nation is any longer excluded. A Jew - To whom the gospel was first preached. We have heard - And now see, and are assured. That God - The true God, the only true God, whom to know is life eternal.
Hadrach - This is the name of a city in Celosyria, and here signifies the country also. It was not far from Damascus. The rest thereof - This burden shall lie long as well as heavy on Damascus. Towards the Lord - For as all men's appeals in cases of wrong are to heaven, so they who have been wronged by Syrian injustice, look to heaven for right.
Hamath - A principal town of Syria. Shall border - Shall be so near the storm, that they shall not quite escape. Very wise - Each of them are subtle, and think by craft to save themselves, but God derides their wisdom.
Cast her out - Of her inheritance, as the word properly means.
Her expectation - Her hope that Tyre would break Alexander's power, or hold out against it. Ashamed - Turned into shame and confusion. The king - The government shall be overthrown. Shall not be inhabited - For many years.
A bastard - Strangers, who have no right of inheritance.
Take away his blood - Though proud and warlike nations have delighted to shed blood, and, as it were, to eat the blood of their enemies, yet God will overthrow their power, and take the prey out of their mouth. Abominations - Their abominable sacrifices which they offered and feasted on. God will punish their idolatries, and by destroying the cities of those abominations, will remove them for ever. The remnant - That small select number who escape the sword, shall be the Lord's peculiar ones. As a governor - For the honour which shall be given them. As a Jebusite - The city is put for the people, and this one city and people for all the other: all the remaining Philistines shall be as Jebusites, servants to the people of God.
I will encamp - To defend it from all its enemies. Mine house - This temple, but as it is an emblem of the church. The army - Of the Persian and the Grecian army, whose march lay through Judea.
Thy king - The Messiah. He is just - The righteous one, who cometh to fulfil all righteousness. Having salvation - To bestow on all that believe in him.
I will cut off - When the Messiah comes and sets up his kingdom, he will need no external force. Neither chariot, bow nor sword, brought salvation to him, neither shall they be mentioned in the day of his conquest. The heathen - The Heathens through him shall be reconciled unto God, and one another, Eph 2:17. From the river - From Euphrates to the utmost end of Canaan, to the Mediterranean sea; a type of all the world, which was in due time to be the inheritance of Christ.
As for thee - Oh Jerusalem; these words are Christ's words to her. By the blood - By my blood, in which thy covenant as confirmed; 'tis God's covenant as made by him, 'tis Zion's covenant as made for her, 'tis Christ's also as made in him. Sent forth - I have delivered the Jews out of Babylon: compared to a pit in which no water was, wherein the Jews must have perished, had not God visited them.
Turn ye - The prophet exhorts the Jews to hasten to Christ, who is the salvation and high tower of the church. Prisoners of hope - Captives, yet not without hope. Even to - day - In this day of lowest distress. Double - Twice as much good as thou hast suffered evil.
When I have bent Judah - In the day's when Judah shall be in my hand as a strong bow, already bent. Ephraim - Ephraim, the remainder of the ten tribes (which returned with Judah) shall be for a supply of warriors; as the quiver filled is a supply of arrows to the bow - man. O Greece - Against the Grecians or Ionians, who had oppressed the Jews, and bought them for slaves, against whom the Jews took arms, under the conduct of the Maccabees, to whom Christ made good much of this promise.
Shall be seen - Shall manifestly appear for them. His arrow - His judgments, swift, irresistible, and sudden. As the lightning - Which breaks forth with violence, and runs from east to west in a moment. The Lord God - Their God, the God of Israel, shall give the alarm to them, and sound the call to bring them together. Of the south - In which the mightiest whirlwinds are raised; some think the prophet alludes to the tempest at the delivery of the law.
Devour - Destroy their enemies. With sling - stones - As David did Goliath. Shall drink - In their festivals, when they offer sacrifices of thanksgiving for their victories. Make a noise - Shout with shouts of triumph, as men do whose hearts are glad with success, and cheared with wine. Shall fill - With the blood of the sacrifices they offer.
As the flock - As a shepherd saves his flock. As the stones of a crown - Precious in my sight. As an ensign - Or trophy.
His goodness - Infinite goodness is the fountain of all the good done for this people. His beauty - How wonderful the beauty of Divine Providence in Israel's deliverance and salvation? Corn - Plentiful harvests shall make the young men chearful in sowing, reaping, and eating the fruits thereof. New wine - There shall be such plenty of wine, that all, young and old, shall be cheared with it.
The latter rain - This made plenty of all provision, and is proverbially used to signify a great blessing. Bright clouds - Bright through the lightnings which break from them. Them - The Jews.
Vanity - Their predictions were vain. They went - They went into captivity. Troubled - Oppressed and afflicted. No shepherd - No ecclesiastical or civil governors, that would faithfully do their duty.
The shepherds - Officers in the church and state. The goats - The officers among them, who were like he - goats, that push, and wound, and trample under foot the feebler cattle. Visited - In mercy. As his goodly horse - Hath given them strength and courage.
Out of him - From God. The corner - The prince or ruler, who is in a polity as a corner - stone in buildings. The nail - Which fastens the tents of war, or the timber together in a house. The battle bow - All warlike provision. Every oppressor - Or collector of tribute. It was from God that Nebuchadnezzar mightily prevailed, and opprest Israel; and it is from God also, that Judah grows up to such power, as to be able to cope with his adversaries, and to impose tribute on them.
Of Joseph - The remnant of the kingdom of Israel, the residue of the ten tribes. To place them - To settle them in their own land, and in their own cities.
Their children shall see - These blessings shall continue through your generations, to children that shall be born.
I will hiss - Though they are now scattered far off, I will call them as a shepherd, and they shall run with speed back to the flock. As they have increased - As they did of old time.
I will sow them - Their increase shall be like the increase of rich soil that hath much seed cast on it. The people - The Heathen. In far countries - Whithersoever they were driven. With their children - The children born to them shall live, and grow up with them. Turn again - To their city and country.
Place shall not be found - The land shall be too narrow for them.
And he passed through - The whole verse is an allusion to what God had done in the two famous deliverances of his people, bringing them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, and through Jordan, and destroying the Egyptians, and delivering them out of Assyrian bondage, and in order thereto, destroying that kingdom.
Walk up and down - Shall manage all their affairs. In his name - By power and wisdom given from above, to the glory of our God, and our Redeemer.
Open thy doors - That destruction of the Jewish church and nation, is here foretold in dark and figurative expressions, which our Lord, when the time was at hand, prophesied of very plainly. Lebanon - Lebanon, a great mountain boundary between Judea and its neighbours on the north, is here commanded to open its gates, its fortifications raised to secure the passages, which lead into Judea. That the fire - Fire kindled by the enemy in the houses and buildings in Judea, and in Lebanon itself. The cedars - Palaces built with cedars.
Fir - tree - Houses and towns built with firs. The cedar - Much less shall ye escape. Ye Oaks - Used in that country for building palaces, cities, towns, and fortresses. The forest - Jerusalem, compared to a forest, in regard of the many and tall houses in it. In short, all are called to cry, for the miseries that will come upon all. Come down - Is laid desolate.
Of the shepherds - The enemy having driven away their flocks and herds. Their glory - What was their honour. Of Jordan - The great forests on the banks of Jordan, where the young lions were wont to range.
My God - God the father speaks to Christ. Of the slaughter - Appointed to the slaughter. The Jews, during four hundred and fifty years, were a flock of slaughter to the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and afterwards the Romans.
Whose possessors - Governors. Not guilty - Think they do no ill. That sell them - For slaves. For l am rich - Profanely give God thanks, that they thrive by cruelty and oppression.
I will deliver - To rob, imprison, banish, or kill each other. Of his king - The Roman Caesar, whom the Jews had chosen to be so. The land - Their king and his armies shall destroy the land.
Bands - The beauty of grace and glory, the bands of love and peace.
Then - After that time of his patient feeding the flock, and cutting off the unfaithful shepherds. Cut off - By the sword or famine. The flesh - Either live to be besieged, 'till hunger makes the living eat the dead, or by seditions and bloody intestine quarrels, destroy each other.
Even beauty - Which was the beauty and glory of them, the covenant of God, with all the blessings of it. That I might break - Declare it null. Christ calls it his covenant, for he was the mediator of it.
Broken - The covenant was disannulled. That waited - Believed in him, and obeyed him. Knew - Saw, and owned God in all this.
And I said - Upon parting, Christ seems after the manner of men, to mind them of his claims for them, and desire them to reckon with him. If ye think good - He puts it to them, whether they thought he deserved ought at their hands? So they - The rulers of the Jews, the high priest, chief priests, and pharisees. Weighed - Which was the manner of paying money in those days. Thirty pieces - Which amounts to thirty - seven shillings and six - pence, the value of the life of a slave, Exod 21:32. This was fulfilled when they paid Judas Iscariot so much to betray Christ.
The Lord - God the Father. Cast it - As being so little, it would hardly purchase any thing but what was the cheapest among them. A goodly price - God upbraids the shepherds of his people, who prized the great Shepherd no higher. Cast them to the potter - Or rather, cast them into the house of the Lord for the potter; all which the Jewish rulers acted over.
Then - So soon as I saw what value they put upon me. I cut asunder - Christ did it really, the prophet did it in the type. Break - Declare it broken. The brother - hood - That friendship which had been among them. Judah - The two tribes, and the remnant of the ten tribes.
Take unto thee - O Zechariah, personate a shepherd quite different from him thou hast represented.
Who shall not visit - Who seeks not out those that are lost. The young one - Which are aptest to perish through weakness. Nor heal - But leaves it to die of its wounds. That stand still - Not able to go forward. Will eat - Feast on the fattest of the flock. Tear their claws - Tear off their skin unto the very nails; in brief, a sluggish, negligent, covetous, riotous, oppressive, and cruel government, is shadowed out by a foolish shepherd.