The Expositor's Bible: The Book of the Twelve Prophets, Vol. 2: Commonly Called the MinorSmith, George Adam
Religion
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of the Twelve Prophets, Vol. 2: Commonly Called the Minor
Smith, George Adam
Bible. Minor Prophets -- Commentaries
The appointment of so responsible a position for Zerubbabel demanded
for him a special promise of grace. And therefore, as Joshua had his
promise in the Fourth Vision, we find Zerubbabel’s appended to the
Fifth. It is one of the great sayings of the Old Testament: there is
none more spiritual and more comforting. Zerubbabel shall complete the
Temple, and those who scoffed at its small beginnings in the day of
small things shall frankly rejoice when they see him set the top-stone
by plummet in its place. As the moral obstacles to the future were
removed in the Fourth Vision by the vindication of Joshua and by his
cleansing, so the political obstacles, all the hindrances described by
the Book of Ezra in the building of the Temple, shall disappear.
_Before Zerubbabel the great mountain shall become a plain._ And this,
because he shall not work by his own strength, but the Spirit of
Jehovah of Hosts shall do everything. Again we find that absence of
expectation in human means, and that full trust in God’s own direct
action, which characterise all the prophesying of Zechariah.
_Then the angel who talked with me returned and roused me like a man
roused out of his sleep. And he said to me, What seest thou? And I
said, I see, and lo! a candlestick all of gold, and its bowl upon the
top of it, and its seven lamps on it, and seven[848] pipes to the lamps
which are upon it. And two olive-trees stood over against it, one on
the right of the bowl,[849] and one on the left. And I began[850] and
said to the angel who talked with me,[851] What be these, my lord? And
the angel who talked with me answered and said, Knowest thou not what
these be? And I said, No, my lord! And he answered and said to me,[852]
These seven are the eyes of Jehovah, which sweep through the whole
earth. And I asked and said to him, What are these two olive-trees on
the right of the candlestick and on its left? And again I asked and
said to him, What are the two olive-branches which are beside the two
golden tubes that pour forth the oil[853] from them?[854] And he said
to me, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord! And he
said, These are the two sons of oil which stand before the Lord of all
the earth._
_This is Jehovah’s Word to Zerubbabel, and it says:[855] Not by might,
and not by force, but by My Spirit, saith Jehovah of Hosts. What art
thou, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel be thou level! And he[856]
shall bring forth the top-stone with shoutings, Grace, grace to
it![857] And the Word of Jehovah came to me, saying, The hands of
Zerubbabel have founded this house, and his hands shall complete it,
and thou shall know that Jehovah of Hosts hath sent me to you. For
whoever hath despised the day of small things, they shall rejoice when
they see the plummet[858] in the hand of Zerubbabel._
THE SIXTH VISION: THE WINGED VOLUME (Chap. v. 1-4).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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