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Zechariah 14:1
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The Destroyers of Jerusalem Destroyed
1Behold, a day of the LORD is coming when your plunder will be divided in your presence.2For I will gather all the nations for battle against Jerusalem, and the city will be captured, the houses looted, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be removed from the city.
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Dave Hunt
Derek Prince
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Commentary
- Adam Clarke
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Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh - This appears to be a prediction of that war in which Jerusalem was finally destroyed, and the Jews scattered all over the face of the earth; and of the effects produced by it.
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
All nations will be gathered together by the Lord against Jerusalem, and will take the city and plunder it, and lead away the half of its inhabitants into captivity (Zac 14:1, Zac 14:2). The Lord will then take charge of His people; He will appear upon the Mount of Olives, and by splitting this mountain, prepare a safe way for the rescue of those that remain, and come with all His saints (Zac 14:3-5) to complete His kingdom. From Jerusalem a stream of salvation and blessing will pour over the whole land (Zac 14:6-11); the enemies who have come against Jerusalem will be miraculously smitten, and destroy one another (Zac 14:12-15). The remnant of the nations, however, will turn to the Lord, and come yearly to Jerusalem, to keep the feast of Tabernacles (Zac 14:16-19); and Jerusalem will become thoroughly holy (Zac 14:20, Zac 14:21). From this brief description of the contents, it is perfectly obvious that our chapter contains simply a further expansion of the summary announcement of the judgment upon Israel, and its refinement (Zac 13:7-9). Zac 14:1, Zac 14:2 show how the flock is dispersed, and for the most part perishes; Zac 14:2-5, how the Lord brings back His hand over the small ones; vv. 6-21, how the rescued remnant of the nation is endowed with salvation, and the kingdom of God completed by the reception of the believers out of the heathen nations. There is no essential difference in the fact that the nation of Israel is the object of the prophecy in Zac 13:7-9, and Jerusalem in ch. 14. Jerusalem, as the capital of the kingdom, is the seat of Israel, the nation of God; what happens to it, happens to the people and kingdom of God. Zac 14:1-2 The judgment and the deliverance. - Zac 14:1. "Behold, a day cometh for Jehovah, and thy spoil is divided in the midst of thee. Zac 14:2. And I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to war, and the city will be taken, and the houses plundered, and the women ravished, and half the city will go out into captivity; but the remnant of the nation will not be cut off out of the city." A day comes to the Lord, not inasmuch as He brings it to pass, but rather because the day belongs to Him, since He will manifest His glory upon it (cf. Isa 2:12). This day will at first bring calamity or destruction upon Israel; but this calamity will furnish occasion to the Lord to display His divine might and glory, by destroying the enemies of Israel and saving His people. In the second hemistich of Zac 14:1, Jerusalem is addressed. "Thy spoil" is the booty taken by the enemy in Jerusalem. The prophet commences directly with the main fact, in a most vivid description, and only gives the explanation afterwards in Zac 14:2. The Vav consec. attached to ואספתּי is also a Vav explicativum. The Lord gathers all nations together to war against Jerusalem, and gives up the city into their power, that they may conquer it, and let loose all their barbarity upon it, plundering the houses and ravishing the women (cf. Isa 13:16, where the same thing is affirmed of Babylon). Just as in the Chaldaean conquest the people had been obliged to wander into captivity, so will it be now, though not all the people, but only the half of the city. The remaining portion will not be cut off out of the city, i.e., be transported thence, as was the case at that time, when even the remnant of the nation was carried into exile (Kg2 25:22). It is obvious at once from this, that the words do not refer to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, as Theodoret, Jerome, and others have supposed. Zac 14:3-5 This time the Lord will come to the help of His people. Zac 14:3. "And Jehovah will go forth and fight against those nations, as in His day of battle, on the day of slaughter. Zac 14:4. And His feet will stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives, which lies to the east before Jerusalem; and the Mount of Olives will split in the centre from east to west into a very great valley, and half of the mountain will remove to the north, and its (other) half to the south. Zac 14:5. And ye will flee into the valley of my mountains, and the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel, and ye will flee as ye fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. And Jehovah my God will come, all the saints with Thee." Against those nations which have conquered Jerusalem the Lord will fight כּיום וגו, as the day, i.e., as on the day, of His fighting, to which there is added, for the purpose of strengthening the expression, "on the day of the slaughter." The meaning is not "according to the day when He fought in the day of the war," as Jerome and many others suppose, who refer the words to the conflict between Jehovah and the Egyptians at the Red Sea (Exo 14:14); for there is nothing to support this special allusion. According to the historical accounts in the Old Testament, Jehovah went out more than once to fight for His people (cf. Jos 10:14, Jos 10:42; Jos 23:3; Jdg 4:15; Sa1 7:10; Ch2 20:15). The simile is therefore to be taken in a more general sense, as signifying "as He is accustomed to fight in the day of battle and slaughter," and to be understood as referring to all the wars of the Lord on behalf of His people. In Zac 14:4 and Zac 14:5 we have first of all a description of what the Lord will do to save the remnant of His people. He appears upon the Mount of Olives, and as His feet touch the mountain it splits in half, so that a large valley is formed. The splitting of the mountain is the effect of the earthquake under the footsteps of Jehovah, before whom the earth trembles when He touches it (cf. Exo 19:18; Jdg 5:5; Psa 68:8; Nah 1:5, etc.). The more precise definition of the situation of the Mount of Olives, viz., "before Jerusalem eastwards," is not introduced with a geographical purpose - namely, to distinguish it from other mountains upon which olives trees grow - but is connected with the means employed by the Lord for the salvation of His people, for whom He opens a way of escape by splitting the mountain in two. The mountain is splitמחציו מזרחה וימּה, from the half (i.e., the midst) of it to the east and to the west, i.e., so that a chasm ensues, which runs from the centre of the mountain both eastwards and westwards; so that the mountain is split latitudinally, one half (as is added to make it still more clear) removing to the south, the other to the north, and a great valley opening between them. Into this valley the half of the nation that is still in Jerusalem will flee. גּיא הרי is the accusative of direction (Luther and others render it incorrectly, "before the valley of my mountains"). This valley is not the valley of the Tyropaeon, or the valley between Moriah and Zion (Jerome, Drus., Hofm.), but the valley which has been formed by the splitting of the Mount of Olives; and Jehovah calls the two mountains which have been formed through His power out of the Mount of Olives hârai, "my mountains." Nor is it connected with the valley of Jehoshaphat; for the opinion that the newly-formed valley is merely an extension of the valley of Jehoshaphat has no foundation in the text, and is not in harmony with the direction taken by the new valley - namely, from east to west. The explanatory clause which follows, "for the (newly-formed) valley of the mountains will reach אל אצל," shows that the flight of the people into the valley is not to be understood as signifying that the valley will merely furnish the fugitives with a level road for escape, but that they will find a secure place of shelter in the valley. 'El 'Atsal has been taken by different commentators, after Symm. and Jerome, in an appellative sense, "to very near," which Koehler interprets as signifying that the valley will reach to the place where the fugitives are. This would be to Jerusalem, for that was where the fugitives were then. But if Zechariah had meant to say this, he could not have spoken more obscurely. 'Atsal, the form in pause for 'âtsēl, as we may see by comparing Ch1 8:38 and Ch1 9:44 with Ch1 8:39 and Ch1 9:43 (cf. Olsh. Gramm. 91, d), is only met with elsewhere in the form אצל, not merely as a preposition, but also in the name בּית־האצל, and is here a proper name, as most of the ancient translators perceived, - namely, a contracted form of בּית־האצל, since בּית is frequently omitted from names of places constructed with it (see Ges. Thes. p. 193). This place is to be sought for, according to Mic 1:11, in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and according to the passage before us to the east of the Mount of Olives, as Cyril states, though from mere hearsay, κώμη δὲ αὕτη πρὸς ἐσχατιαῖς, ὡς λόγος τοῦ ὄρους κειμένη. The fact that Jerome does not mention the place is no proof that it did not exist. A small place not far from Jerusalem, on the other side of the Mount of Olives, might have vanished from the earth long before this father lived. The comparison of the flight to the flight from the earthquake in the time of king Uzziah, to which reference is made in Amo 1:1, is intended to express not merely the swiftness and universality of the flight, but also the cause of the flight, - namely, that they do not merely fly from the enemy, but also for fear of the earthquake which will attend the coming of the Lord. In the last clause of Zac 14:5 the object of the coming of the Lord is indicated. He has not only gone forth to fight against the enemy in Jerusalem, and deliver His people; but He comes with His holy angels, to perfect His kingdom by means of the judgment, and to glorify Jerusalem. This coming is not materially different from His going out to war (Zac 14:3); it is not another or a second coming, but simply a visible manifestation. For this coming believers wait, because it brings them redemption (Luk 21:28). This joyful waiting is expressed in the address "my God." The holy ones are the angels (cf. Deu 33:2-3; Dan 7:9-10; Mat 25:31), not believers, or believers as well as the angels. In what follows, Zechariah depicts first of all the completion secured by the coming of the Lord (Zac 14:6-11), and then the judgment upon the enemy (Zac 14:12-15), with its fruits and consequences (Zac 14:16-21).
John Gill Bible Commentary
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh,.... Or the day when the Lord will come, both in his spiritual and personal reign; for this is not to be understood of his first coming in the flesh, at which time none of the things after mentioned happened; nor of his coming to take vengeance on the Jews; but rather of his coming to convert them: and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee; not the substance of the nations, divided by the Israelites in the midst of Jerusalem, as the Targum and Jarchi interpret it; but the spoil of Jerusalem, when taken by the enemy, as is after said, which should be divided by them with great joy and triumph, in the midst of it: this refers not to the spoil of Jerusalem by Antiochus or the Romans, but to the slaying of the witnesses, and the triumph of their enemies over them, Rev 11:7 or else to the spoil and prey the Turks will come to Jerusalem for, when it shall begin the possession of the Jews; and who perhaps at first will have some success; see Eze 38:12.
Matthew Henry Bible Commentary
God's providences concerning his church are here represented as strangely changing and strangely mixed. I. As strangely changing. Sometimes the tide runs high and strong against them, but presently it turns, and comes to be in favour of them; and God has, for wise and holy ends, set the one over against the other. 1. God here appears against Jerusalem; judgment begins at the house of God. When the day of the Lord comes (Zac 14:1) Jerusalem must pass through the fire to be refined. God himself gathers all nations against Jerusalem to battle (Zac 14:2); he gives them a charge, as he did Sennacherib, to take the spoil and to take the prey (Isa 10:6), for the people of Jerusalem have now become the people of his wrath. And who can stand before him or before nations gathered by him? Where he gives commission he will give success. The city shall be taken by the Romans, who have nations at command; the houses shall be rifled, and all the riches of them taken away, by the enemy; and, to gratify an insatiable lust of uncleanness as well as avarice, the women shall be ravished, as if victory were a license to the worst of villanies, jusque datum sceleri - and crimes were sanctioned by law. One-half of the city shall then be carried into captivity, to be sold or enslaved, and shall not be able to help itself, such is the destruction that shall be made in the great and terrible day of the Lord. 2. He presently changes his way, and appears for Jerusalem; for, though judgment begin at the house of God, yet, as it shall not end there, so it shall not make a full end there, Jer 4:27; Jer 30:11. (1.) A remnant shall be spared, the same with that third part spoken of, Zac 13:8. One-half shall go into captivity, whence they may hereafter be fetched back, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off, as one would have feared, from the city. Many of the Jews shall receive the gospel, and so shall prevent their being cut off from the city of God, his church upon earth. In it shall be a tenth, Isa 6:13; See Eze 5:3. (2.) Their cause shall be pleaded against their enemies (Zac 14:3): Then, when God has made use of these nations as a scourge to his people, he shall go forth and fight against them by his judgments, as when he fought against the enemies of his church formerly in the day of battle, with the Egyptians, Canaanites, and others. Note, The instruments of God's wrath will themselves be made the objects of it; for it will come to their turn to drink of the cup of trembling; and whom God fights against he will be sure to overcome and be too hard for. And every former day of battle, which God has made to his people a day of triumph, as it is an engagement to God to appear for his people, because he is the same, so it is an encouragement to them to trust in him. It is observable that the Roman empire never flourished, after the destruction of Jerusalem as it had done before, but in many instances God fought against it. (3.) Though Jerusalem and the temple be destroyed, yet God will have a church in the world, into which Gentiles shall be admitted, and with whom the believing Jews shall be incorporated, Zac 14:4, Zac 14:5. These verses are dark and hard to be understood; but divers good expositors take this to be the meaning of them. [1.] God will carefully inspect Jerusalem, even then when the enemies of it are laying it waste: His feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, whence he may take a full view of the city and temple, Mar 13:3. When the refiner puts his gold into the furnace he stands by it, and has his eye upon it, to see that it receive no damage; so when Jerusalem, God's gold, is to be refined, he will have the oversight of it. He will stand by upon the mount of Olives; this was literally fulfilled when our Lord Jesus was often upon this mountain, especially when thence he ascended up into heaven, Act 1:12. It was the last place on which his feet stood on this earth, the place from which he took rise. [2.] The partition-wall between Jews and Gentiles shall be taken away. The mountains about Jerusalem, and particularly this, signified it to be an enclosure, and that it stood in the way of those who would approach to it. Between the Gentiles and Jerusalem this mountain of Bether, of division, stood, Sol 2:17. But by the destruction of Jerusalem this mountain shall be made to cleave in the midst, and so the Jewish pale shall be taken down, and the church laid in common with the Gentiles, who were made one with the Jews by the breaking down of this middle wall of partition, Eph 2:14. Who art thou, O great mountain? And a great mountain the ceremonial law was in the way of the Jews' conversion, which, one would think, could never have been got over; yet before Christ and his gospel it was made plain. This mountain departs, this hill removes, but the covenant of peace cannot be broken; for peace is still preached to him that is afar off and to those that are nigh. [3.] A new and living way shall be opened to the new Jerusalem, both to see it and to come into it. The mountain being divided, one-half towards the north and the other half towards the south, there shall be a very great valley, that is, a broad way of communication opened between Jerusalem and the Gentile world, by which the Gentiles shall have free admission into the gospel-Jerusalem, and the word of the Lord, that goes forth from Jerusalem, shall have a free course into the Gentile world. Thus the way of the Lord is prepared, for every mountain and hill shall be brought low, and plain and pleasant valleys shall come in the room of them, Isa 40:4. [4.] Those of the Jews that believe shall come in, and join themselves to the Gentiles, and incorporate with them in the gospel-church: You shall flee to the valley of the mountains, that valley that is opened between the divided halves of the mount of Olives; they shall hasten into the church with the Gentiles, as formerly the Gentiles with them, Zac 8:23. The valley of the mountains is the gospel-church, to which there were added of the Jews daily such as should be saved, who fled to that valley as to their refuge. This valley of the mountains is said to reach unto Azal, or to the separate place, that is, to all those whom God has set apart for himself. When God makes his mountains a way (Isa 49:11), by making them a valley, the way shall be opened to all the way-faring men (Isa 35:8), and, though fools, they shall not err therein. Or, to those that are now separated from God this valley shall reach; for the Gentiles, who are afar off, shall be made nigh, with the Jews, who are a people near unto him, and both have an access, a mutual access to each other and a joint access to God as a Father by one Spirit, Eph 2:18. [5.] They shall flee to the valley of the mountains, to the gospel-church, under dreadful apprehensions of their danger from the curse of the law. They shall flee from the wrath to come, from the avenger of blood, who is in pursuit of them, to the church as to a city of refuge, or as doves to their windows, as they fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah, Amo 1:1. Therefore the gospel reveals the wrath of God from heaven (Rom 1:18) that we might be awakened to escape for our lives, to flee as from an earthquake, for we feel the earth ready to sink under us, and we can find no firm footing in it, and therefore must flee to Christ, in whom alone we can stand fast and be easy. (4.) God shall appear in his glory for the accomplishing of all this: The Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee, which may refer to his coming to destroy Jerusalem, or to destroy the enemies of Jerusalem, or his coming to set up his kingdom in the world, which is called the coming of the Son of man (Mat 24:37), or to his last coming, at the end of time; however, it teaches us, [1.] That the Lord will come; it has been the faith of all the saints, Behold, the Lord comes to fulfil every word that he has spoken in its season. [2.] When he comes all his saints come with him; they attend his motions and are ready to serve his interests. Christ will come at the end of time with ten thousands of his saints, as when he came to give the law upon Mount Sinai. [3.] Every particular believer, being related to God as his God, may triumph in the expectation of his coming and speak of it with pleasure, The Lord my God shall come, shall come to the comfort of all that are his; for, "Blessed Lord, all the saints shall be with thee, and it shall be their everlasting happiness to dwell in thy presence; and therefore come, Lord Jesus." And some think that this may be read as a prayer, Yet, O Lord my God! come, and bring all the saints with thee. II. God's providences appear here strangely mixed (Zac 14:6, Zac 14:7): In that day of the Lord the light shall not be clear nor dark, not day nor night; but at evening time it shall be light. Some refer this to all the time from hence to the coming of the Messiah; the Jewish church had neither perfect peace nor constant trouble, but a cloudy day, neither rain nor sunshine. But it may be taken more generally, as designed to represent the method God usually takes in the administration of the kingdom both of providence and grace. Here is, 1. An idea of the usual course and tenour of God's dispensations; the day of his grace and the day of his providence are neither clear nor dark, not day nor night. It is so with the church of God in this world; where the Sun of righteousness has risen it cannot be dark night, and yet short of heaven it will not be clear day. It is so with particular saints; they are not darkness, but light in the Lord, and yet, while there is so much error and corruption remaining in them, it is not perfect day. So it is as to the providences of God that relate to his church; in general the affairs of the church are neither good nor bad in any extremity, but there is a mixture of both; we are singing both of mercy and judgment, and are uncertain which will prevail, whether it be an evening or a morning twilight. We are between hope and fear, not knowing what to make of things. 2. An intimation of comfort with reference hereunto: It shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord. This intimates, (1.) The beauty and harmony of such mixed events; there is one and the same design and tendency in all; all the wheels make but one wheel, all the revolutions but one day. (2.) The brevity of them; it is, as it were, but for one day, for a little moment; the cloud that darkens the light will soon blow over. (3.) The eye God has upon all these events, and the hand he has in them all; they are known to the Lord; he takes notice of them, and orders and disposes of all for the best, according to the counsel of his will. 3. An issue very joyful secured at last: At evening-time it shall be light: it shall be clear light, and no longer dark; we are sure of it in the other world, and we hope for it in this world - at evening-time, when our hopes are quite spent with waiting all day to no purpose, nay, when we fear it will be quite dark, when things are at the worst and the case of the church is most deplorable. As to the church's enemies the sun goes down at noon, so to the church it rises at night; unto the upright springs light out of darkness (Psa 112:4); deliverance comes when the tale of bricks is doubled, and when God's people have done looking for it, and so it comes with a pleasing surprise.
Tyndale Open Study Notes
14:1-21 Zechariah closes with visions of judgment, salvation, and God’s universal kingdom. In the future, Israel would be besieged, teetering on the verge of total destruction, when the Lord himself would intervene and rescue his people (14:3-4) and punish their enemies with a terrible plague (14:12). Israel would be restored as God’s people, and Jerusalem would be exalted as the center of civilization (14:16-17). God’s rule would be established over all the earth (14:9), and the created order would be transformed (14:6-10). Fittingly, God’s holiness would be the pervasive characteristic of his rule over all the earth (14:20-21). Zechariah’s message stimulates the people of God to hope in the Sovereign King of Israel, who will bring justice and restoration. 14:1 The day of the Lord will bring judgment and deliverance and will reverse the fortunes of many (see Amos 5:18; cp. Matt 19:28-30; Luke 13:23-30).
Zechariah 14:1
The Destroyers of Jerusalem Destroyed
1Behold, a day of the LORD is coming when your plunder will be divided in your presence.2For I will gather all the nations for battle against Jerusalem, and the city will be captured, the houses looted, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be removed from the city.
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Judgment Day
By Dave Hunt4.2K1:15:19Judgment DayGEN 15:13EXO 12:14JOL 3:2ZEC 14:1MAT 6:33In this sermon, the pastor discusses the topic of Judgment Day, referring to passages from the books of Joel and Zechariah in the Bible. He emphasizes that God will gather all nations, including the United States, for judgment. The pastor warns that we live in serious times and that God is angry, ready to bring judgment upon the world. He also mentions the importance of presenting the truth to the Jewish people and recognizing the significance of Israel in biblical prophecy.
The Place of Israel in God's Purposes - Part 2
By Derek Prince1.1K28:21ZEC 14:1
This sermon by Derek Prince Ministries delves into the prophecies concerning Israel, focusing on the miraculous preservation of the Jewish identity, the gathering of nations against Jerusalem, the supernatural revelation of the Messiah to the Jewish people, and the return of the Messiah in glory. It emphasizes the fulfillment of biblical prophecies regarding Israel's restoration and the significance of God's covenant with the land of Israel.
The Interval Between the Coming of the Lord for His Saints and With His Saints
By Arno Clemens Gaebelein0ISA 10:22ZEC 14:1LUK 21:36JHN 14:1ROM 9:281TH 4:131JN 5:4REV 2:10REV 13:6Arno Clemens Gaebelein preaches about the distinct interval between the coming of the Lord Jesus to take His saints up to Himself and His coming with His saints. The first stage of the Lord's coming, His coming for us, was first announced to the disciples in a moment of sorrow and love, emphasizing the importance of being gathered unto Him before His manifestation with us. The Thessalonian saints' sorrow over the fear of missing the first blessedness of meeting the Lord at His coming led to a new revelation about the Lord's return to receive His saints, providing comfort and removing their fear. The Word of the Lord assures believers of their exemption from the great tribulation and the last judgment, promising to keep them from the hour of temptation that will come upon all the world.
- Adam Clarke
- Keil-Delitzsch
- John Gill
- Matthew Henry
- Tyndale
Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh - This appears to be a prediction of that war in which Jerusalem was finally destroyed, and the Jews scattered all over the face of the earth; and of the effects produced by it.
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
All nations will be gathered together by the Lord against Jerusalem, and will take the city and plunder it, and lead away the half of its inhabitants into captivity (Zac 14:1, Zac 14:2). The Lord will then take charge of His people; He will appear upon the Mount of Olives, and by splitting this mountain, prepare a safe way for the rescue of those that remain, and come with all His saints (Zac 14:3-5) to complete His kingdom. From Jerusalem a stream of salvation and blessing will pour over the whole land (Zac 14:6-11); the enemies who have come against Jerusalem will be miraculously smitten, and destroy one another (Zac 14:12-15). The remnant of the nations, however, will turn to the Lord, and come yearly to Jerusalem, to keep the feast of Tabernacles (Zac 14:16-19); and Jerusalem will become thoroughly holy (Zac 14:20, Zac 14:21). From this brief description of the contents, it is perfectly obvious that our chapter contains simply a further expansion of the summary announcement of the judgment upon Israel, and its refinement (Zac 13:7-9). Zac 14:1, Zac 14:2 show how the flock is dispersed, and for the most part perishes; Zac 14:2-5, how the Lord brings back His hand over the small ones; vv. 6-21, how the rescued remnant of the nation is endowed with salvation, and the kingdom of God completed by the reception of the believers out of the heathen nations. There is no essential difference in the fact that the nation of Israel is the object of the prophecy in Zac 13:7-9, and Jerusalem in ch. 14. Jerusalem, as the capital of the kingdom, is the seat of Israel, the nation of God; what happens to it, happens to the people and kingdom of God. Zac 14:1-2 The judgment and the deliverance. - Zac 14:1. "Behold, a day cometh for Jehovah, and thy spoil is divided in the midst of thee. Zac 14:2. And I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to war, and the city will be taken, and the houses plundered, and the women ravished, and half the city will go out into captivity; but the remnant of the nation will not be cut off out of the city." A day comes to the Lord, not inasmuch as He brings it to pass, but rather because the day belongs to Him, since He will manifest His glory upon it (cf. Isa 2:12). This day will at first bring calamity or destruction upon Israel; but this calamity will furnish occasion to the Lord to display His divine might and glory, by destroying the enemies of Israel and saving His people. In the second hemistich of Zac 14:1, Jerusalem is addressed. "Thy spoil" is the booty taken by the enemy in Jerusalem. The prophet commences directly with the main fact, in a most vivid description, and only gives the explanation afterwards in Zac 14:2. The Vav consec. attached to ואספתּי is also a Vav explicativum. The Lord gathers all nations together to war against Jerusalem, and gives up the city into their power, that they may conquer it, and let loose all their barbarity upon it, plundering the houses and ravishing the women (cf. Isa 13:16, where the same thing is affirmed of Babylon). Just as in the Chaldaean conquest the people had been obliged to wander into captivity, so will it be now, though not all the people, but only the half of the city. The remaining portion will not be cut off out of the city, i.e., be transported thence, as was the case at that time, when even the remnant of the nation was carried into exile (Kg2 25:22). It is obvious at once from this, that the words do not refer to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, as Theodoret, Jerome, and others have supposed. Zac 14:3-5 This time the Lord will come to the help of His people. Zac 14:3. "And Jehovah will go forth and fight against those nations, as in His day of battle, on the day of slaughter. Zac 14:4. And His feet will stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives, which lies to the east before Jerusalem; and the Mount of Olives will split in the centre from east to west into a very great valley, and half of the mountain will remove to the north, and its (other) half to the south. Zac 14:5. And ye will flee into the valley of my mountains, and the valley of the mountains will reach to Azel, and ye will flee as ye fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. And Jehovah my God will come, all the saints with Thee." Against those nations which have conquered Jerusalem the Lord will fight כּיום וגו, as the day, i.e., as on the day, of His fighting, to which there is added, for the purpose of strengthening the expression, "on the day of the slaughter." The meaning is not "according to the day when He fought in the day of the war," as Jerome and many others suppose, who refer the words to the conflict between Jehovah and the Egyptians at the Red Sea (Exo 14:14); for there is nothing to support this special allusion. According to the historical accounts in the Old Testament, Jehovah went out more than once to fight for His people (cf. Jos 10:14, Jos 10:42; Jos 23:3; Jdg 4:15; Sa1 7:10; Ch2 20:15). The simile is therefore to be taken in a more general sense, as signifying "as He is accustomed to fight in the day of battle and slaughter," and to be understood as referring to all the wars of the Lord on behalf of His people. In Zac 14:4 and Zac 14:5 we have first of all a description of what the Lord will do to save the remnant of His people. He appears upon the Mount of Olives, and as His feet touch the mountain it splits in half, so that a large valley is formed. The splitting of the mountain is the effect of the earthquake under the footsteps of Jehovah, before whom the earth trembles when He touches it (cf. Exo 19:18; Jdg 5:5; Psa 68:8; Nah 1:5, etc.). The more precise definition of the situation of the Mount of Olives, viz., "before Jerusalem eastwards," is not introduced with a geographical purpose - namely, to distinguish it from other mountains upon which olives trees grow - but is connected with the means employed by the Lord for the salvation of His people, for whom He opens a way of escape by splitting the mountain in two. The mountain is splitמחציו מזרחה וימּה, from the half (i.e., the midst) of it to the east and to the west, i.e., so that a chasm ensues, which runs from the centre of the mountain both eastwards and westwards; so that the mountain is split latitudinally, one half (as is added to make it still more clear) removing to the south, the other to the north, and a great valley opening between them. Into this valley the half of the nation that is still in Jerusalem will flee. גּיא הרי is the accusative of direction (Luther and others render it incorrectly, "before the valley of my mountains"). This valley is not the valley of the Tyropaeon, or the valley between Moriah and Zion (Jerome, Drus., Hofm.), but the valley which has been formed by the splitting of the Mount of Olives; and Jehovah calls the two mountains which have been formed through His power out of the Mount of Olives hârai, "my mountains." Nor is it connected with the valley of Jehoshaphat; for the opinion that the newly-formed valley is merely an extension of the valley of Jehoshaphat has no foundation in the text, and is not in harmony with the direction taken by the new valley - namely, from east to west. The explanatory clause which follows, "for the (newly-formed) valley of the mountains will reach אל אצל," shows that the flight of the people into the valley is not to be understood as signifying that the valley will merely furnish the fugitives with a level road for escape, but that they will find a secure place of shelter in the valley. 'El 'Atsal has been taken by different commentators, after Symm. and Jerome, in an appellative sense, "to very near," which Koehler interprets as signifying that the valley will reach to the place where the fugitives are. This would be to Jerusalem, for that was where the fugitives were then. But if Zechariah had meant to say this, he could not have spoken more obscurely. 'Atsal, the form in pause for 'âtsēl, as we may see by comparing Ch1 8:38 and Ch1 9:44 with Ch1 8:39 and Ch1 9:43 (cf. Olsh. Gramm. 91, d), is only met with elsewhere in the form אצל, not merely as a preposition, but also in the name בּית־האצל, and is here a proper name, as most of the ancient translators perceived, - namely, a contracted form of בּית־האצל, since בּית is frequently omitted from names of places constructed with it (see Ges. Thes. p. 193). This place is to be sought for, according to Mic 1:11, in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and according to the passage before us to the east of the Mount of Olives, as Cyril states, though from mere hearsay, κώμη δὲ αὕτη πρὸς ἐσχατιαῖς, ὡς λόγος τοῦ ὄρους κειμένη. The fact that Jerome does not mention the place is no proof that it did not exist. A small place not far from Jerusalem, on the other side of the Mount of Olives, might have vanished from the earth long before this father lived. The comparison of the flight to the flight from the earthquake in the time of king Uzziah, to which reference is made in Amo 1:1, is intended to express not merely the swiftness and universality of the flight, but also the cause of the flight, - namely, that they do not merely fly from the enemy, but also for fear of the earthquake which will attend the coming of the Lord. In the last clause of Zac 14:5 the object of the coming of the Lord is indicated. He has not only gone forth to fight against the enemy in Jerusalem, and deliver His people; but He comes with His holy angels, to perfect His kingdom by means of the judgment, and to glorify Jerusalem. This coming is not materially different from His going out to war (Zac 14:3); it is not another or a second coming, but simply a visible manifestation. For this coming believers wait, because it brings them redemption (Luk 21:28). This joyful waiting is expressed in the address "my God." The holy ones are the angels (cf. Deu 33:2-3; Dan 7:9-10; Mat 25:31), not believers, or believers as well as the angels. In what follows, Zechariah depicts first of all the completion secured by the coming of the Lord (Zac 14:6-11), and then the judgment upon the enemy (Zac 14:12-15), with its fruits and consequences (Zac 14:16-21).
John Gill Bible Commentary
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh,.... Or the day when the Lord will come, both in his spiritual and personal reign; for this is not to be understood of his first coming in the flesh, at which time none of the things after mentioned happened; nor of his coming to take vengeance on the Jews; but rather of his coming to convert them: and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee; not the substance of the nations, divided by the Israelites in the midst of Jerusalem, as the Targum and Jarchi interpret it; but the spoil of Jerusalem, when taken by the enemy, as is after said, which should be divided by them with great joy and triumph, in the midst of it: this refers not to the spoil of Jerusalem by Antiochus or the Romans, but to the slaying of the witnesses, and the triumph of their enemies over them, Rev 11:7 or else to the spoil and prey the Turks will come to Jerusalem for, when it shall begin the possession of the Jews; and who perhaps at first will have some success; see Eze 38:12.
Matthew Henry Bible Commentary
God's providences concerning his church are here represented as strangely changing and strangely mixed. I. As strangely changing. Sometimes the tide runs high and strong against them, but presently it turns, and comes to be in favour of them; and God has, for wise and holy ends, set the one over against the other. 1. God here appears against Jerusalem; judgment begins at the house of God. When the day of the Lord comes (Zac 14:1) Jerusalem must pass through the fire to be refined. God himself gathers all nations against Jerusalem to battle (Zac 14:2); he gives them a charge, as he did Sennacherib, to take the spoil and to take the prey (Isa 10:6), for the people of Jerusalem have now become the people of his wrath. And who can stand before him or before nations gathered by him? Where he gives commission he will give success. The city shall be taken by the Romans, who have nations at command; the houses shall be rifled, and all the riches of them taken away, by the enemy; and, to gratify an insatiable lust of uncleanness as well as avarice, the women shall be ravished, as if victory were a license to the worst of villanies, jusque datum sceleri - and crimes were sanctioned by law. One-half of the city shall then be carried into captivity, to be sold or enslaved, and shall not be able to help itself, such is the destruction that shall be made in the great and terrible day of the Lord. 2. He presently changes his way, and appears for Jerusalem; for, though judgment begin at the house of God, yet, as it shall not end there, so it shall not make a full end there, Jer 4:27; Jer 30:11. (1.) A remnant shall be spared, the same with that third part spoken of, Zac 13:8. One-half shall go into captivity, whence they may hereafter be fetched back, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off, as one would have feared, from the city. Many of the Jews shall receive the gospel, and so shall prevent their being cut off from the city of God, his church upon earth. In it shall be a tenth, Isa 6:13; See Eze 5:3. (2.) Their cause shall be pleaded against their enemies (Zac 14:3): Then, when God has made use of these nations as a scourge to his people, he shall go forth and fight against them by his judgments, as when he fought against the enemies of his church formerly in the day of battle, with the Egyptians, Canaanites, and others. Note, The instruments of God's wrath will themselves be made the objects of it; for it will come to their turn to drink of the cup of trembling; and whom God fights against he will be sure to overcome and be too hard for. And every former day of battle, which God has made to his people a day of triumph, as it is an engagement to God to appear for his people, because he is the same, so it is an encouragement to them to trust in him. It is observable that the Roman empire never flourished, after the destruction of Jerusalem as it had done before, but in many instances God fought against it. (3.) Though Jerusalem and the temple be destroyed, yet God will have a church in the world, into which Gentiles shall be admitted, and with whom the believing Jews shall be incorporated, Zac 14:4, Zac 14:5. These verses are dark and hard to be understood; but divers good expositors take this to be the meaning of them. [1.] God will carefully inspect Jerusalem, even then when the enemies of it are laying it waste: His feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, whence he may take a full view of the city and temple, Mar 13:3. When the refiner puts his gold into the furnace he stands by it, and has his eye upon it, to see that it receive no damage; so when Jerusalem, God's gold, is to be refined, he will have the oversight of it. He will stand by upon the mount of Olives; this was literally fulfilled when our Lord Jesus was often upon this mountain, especially when thence he ascended up into heaven, Act 1:12. It was the last place on which his feet stood on this earth, the place from which he took rise. [2.] The partition-wall between Jews and Gentiles shall be taken away. The mountains about Jerusalem, and particularly this, signified it to be an enclosure, and that it stood in the way of those who would approach to it. Between the Gentiles and Jerusalem this mountain of Bether, of division, stood, Sol 2:17. But by the destruction of Jerusalem this mountain shall be made to cleave in the midst, and so the Jewish pale shall be taken down, and the church laid in common with the Gentiles, who were made one with the Jews by the breaking down of this middle wall of partition, Eph 2:14. Who art thou, O great mountain? And a great mountain the ceremonial law was in the way of the Jews' conversion, which, one would think, could never have been got over; yet before Christ and his gospel it was made plain. This mountain departs, this hill removes, but the covenant of peace cannot be broken; for peace is still preached to him that is afar off and to those that are nigh. [3.] A new and living way shall be opened to the new Jerusalem, both to see it and to come into it. The mountain being divided, one-half towards the north and the other half towards the south, there shall be a very great valley, that is, a broad way of communication opened between Jerusalem and the Gentile world, by which the Gentiles shall have free admission into the gospel-Jerusalem, and the word of the Lord, that goes forth from Jerusalem, shall have a free course into the Gentile world. Thus the way of the Lord is prepared, for every mountain and hill shall be brought low, and plain and pleasant valleys shall come in the room of them, Isa 40:4. [4.] Those of the Jews that believe shall come in, and join themselves to the Gentiles, and incorporate with them in the gospel-church: You shall flee to the valley of the mountains, that valley that is opened between the divided halves of the mount of Olives; they shall hasten into the church with the Gentiles, as formerly the Gentiles with them, Zac 8:23. The valley of the mountains is the gospel-church, to which there were added of the Jews daily such as should be saved, who fled to that valley as to their refuge. This valley of the mountains is said to reach unto Azal, or to the separate place, that is, to all those whom God has set apart for himself. When God makes his mountains a way (Isa 49:11), by making them a valley, the way shall be opened to all the way-faring men (Isa 35:8), and, though fools, they shall not err therein. Or, to those that are now separated from God this valley shall reach; for the Gentiles, who are afar off, shall be made nigh, with the Jews, who are a people near unto him, and both have an access, a mutual access to each other and a joint access to God as a Father by one Spirit, Eph 2:18. [5.] They shall flee to the valley of the mountains, to the gospel-church, under dreadful apprehensions of their danger from the curse of the law. They shall flee from the wrath to come, from the avenger of blood, who is in pursuit of them, to the church as to a city of refuge, or as doves to their windows, as they fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah, Amo 1:1. Therefore the gospel reveals the wrath of God from heaven (Rom 1:18) that we might be awakened to escape for our lives, to flee as from an earthquake, for we feel the earth ready to sink under us, and we can find no firm footing in it, and therefore must flee to Christ, in whom alone we can stand fast and be easy. (4.) God shall appear in his glory for the accomplishing of all this: The Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee, which may refer to his coming to destroy Jerusalem, or to destroy the enemies of Jerusalem, or his coming to set up his kingdom in the world, which is called the coming of the Son of man (Mat 24:37), or to his last coming, at the end of time; however, it teaches us, [1.] That the Lord will come; it has been the faith of all the saints, Behold, the Lord comes to fulfil every word that he has spoken in its season. [2.] When he comes all his saints come with him; they attend his motions and are ready to serve his interests. Christ will come at the end of time with ten thousands of his saints, as when he came to give the law upon Mount Sinai. [3.] Every particular believer, being related to God as his God, may triumph in the expectation of his coming and speak of it with pleasure, The Lord my God shall come, shall come to the comfort of all that are his; for, "Blessed Lord, all the saints shall be with thee, and it shall be their everlasting happiness to dwell in thy presence; and therefore come, Lord Jesus." And some think that this may be read as a prayer, Yet, O Lord my God! come, and bring all the saints with thee. II. God's providences appear here strangely mixed (Zac 14:6, Zac 14:7): In that day of the Lord the light shall not be clear nor dark, not day nor night; but at evening time it shall be light. Some refer this to all the time from hence to the coming of the Messiah; the Jewish church had neither perfect peace nor constant trouble, but a cloudy day, neither rain nor sunshine. But it may be taken more generally, as designed to represent the method God usually takes in the administration of the kingdom both of providence and grace. Here is, 1. An idea of the usual course and tenour of God's dispensations; the day of his grace and the day of his providence are neither clear nor dark, not day nor night. It is so with the church of God in this world; where the Sun of righteousness has risen it cannot be dark night, and yet short of heaven it will not be clear day. It is so with particular saints; they are not darkness, but light in the Lord, and yet, while there is so much error and corruption remaining in them, it is not perfect day. So it is as to the providences of God that relate to his church; in general the affairs of the church are neither good nor bad in any extremity, but there is a mixture of both; we are singing both of mercy and judgment, and are uncertain which will prevail, whether it be an evening or a morning twilight. We are between hope and fear, not knowing what to make of things. 2. An intimation of comfort with reference hereunto: It shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord. This intimates, (1.) The beauty and harmony of such mixed events; there is one and the same design and tendency in all; all the wheels make but one wheel, all the revolutions but one day. (2.) The brevity of them; it is, as it were, but for one day, for a little moment; the cloud that darkens the light will soon blow over. (3.) The eye God has upon all these events, and the hand he has in them all; they are known to the Lord; he takes notice of them, and orders and disposes of all for the best, according to the counsel of his will. 3. An issue very joyful secured at last: At evening-time it shall be light: it shall be clear light, and no longer dark; we are sure of it in the other world, and we hope for it in this world - at evening-time, when our hopes are quite spent with waiting all day to no purpose, nay, when we fear it will be quite dark, when things are at the worst and the case of the church is most deplorable. As to the church's enemies the sun goes down at noon, so to the church it rises at night; unto the upright springs light out of darkness (Psa 112:4); deliverance comes when the tale of bricks is doubled, and when God's people have done looking for it, and so it comes with a pleasing surprise.
Tyndale Open Study Notes
14:1-21 Zechariah closes with visions of judgment, salvation, and God’s universal kingdom. In the future, Israel would be besieged, teetering on the verge of total destruction, when the Lord himself would intervene and rescue his people (14:3-4) and punish their enemies with a terrible plague (14:12). Israel would be restored as God’s people, and Jerusalem would be exalted as the center of civilization (14:16-17). God’s rule would be established over all the earth (14:9), and the created order would be transformed (14:6-10). Fittingly, God’s holiness would be the pervasive characteristic of his rule over all the earth (14:20-21). Zechariah’s message stimulates the people of God to hope in the Sovereign King of Israel, who will bring justice and restoration. 14:1 The day of the Lord will bring judgment and deliverance and will reverse the fortunes of many (see Amos 5:18; cp. Matt 19:28-30; Luke 13:23-30).