Chapter One

1–6. Heading and introductory prophetic exhortation. 7. Heading of the second revelation through visions and symbolic action. 8–17. First vision: horseman among myrtles and horses of various colors. 18–21. Second vision — four horns and four workmen (Synodal Zech 1:18-21) 2:1–4 Masoretic text).

Zechariah 1:1. In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to Zechariah, son of Berechiah, son of Iddo, the prophet: In the heading, according to the original text, the LXX, Vulgate, Targum, only the year and month of the prophet’s receiving the revelation are indicated; the Syriac adds: “on the first (day) of the month.” — “In the second year of Darius” refers to the Persian king Darius I Hystaspes, who reigned from 521 BC to 485 BC.

Zechariah 1:8. And I saw at night: behold, a man on a reddish horse standing among myrtles, which are in a depression, and behind him horses reddish, speckled, and white, Zechariah 4:1. The revelation through visions occurred at night, but these were not dreams but ecstatic contemplations in a waking state; this state of prophetic insight was like an awakening from the ordinary state of a person, which the prophet himself compares to a state of sleep (Zechariah 4:1). One can suppose that intense reflection on the destiny of the chosen people brought Zechariah to such a state, as it did Moses in the wilderness and other prophets. — The prophet sees a man mounted “on a reddish horse,... among myrtles, which are in a depression.” Interpreters attempt to clarify the significance of myrtle trees in the sense of an image of the Hebrew Church, humble and inconspicuous to the eye, but blooming and fragrant even in difficult times such as the time of Babylonian captivity (Targum Jonathan has: among myrtle trees, which are in Babylon; Keil 527, Rochemont 178, Glagolev 170). But it is more likely to recognize here a corruption of the Masoretic text, for the LXX read here (and in Zech 1:10-11): ανα μεσον των ορεων των κατασκιων, that is, instead of hahad-hassim-heharim (mountains); the reading of the LXX, along with many scholars, can be recognized as more correct, based on the fact that it will then correspond completely with the eighth vision of chariots coming forth from a ravine between two mountains (Zech 6:1; Marti 402). — Behind the horseman are “horses reddish, speckled (Venetian: chestnut) and white”; from the following (Zech 1:11) one can conclude that these horses had riders; although one can see the executors of God’s will in the horses themselves. The colors of the horses, without question, have symbolic significance, as an indication of those calamities with which the Lord will strike the peoples living in security and prosperity and therefore having no fear of God (Zech 1:15). — The man on the reddish horse is not the leader of the horses found behind him; in Zech 1:10 he does not count himself among those whom the Lord sent to go about the earth; but from Zech 1:11 it is evident that this man is the Angel of the Lord, to whom the horses (or their riders) report on the completion of the mission entrusted to them (see Glagolev, p. 169, note 1). In the first vision, acting in the form of horses of various colors, are without question the Angelic forces (Theodoret 71), inferior to the Angel of the Lord and carrying out the will of the Lord. Among the other heavenly forces mentioned in the book of the prophet Zechariah, the Angel of the Lord holds the highest, predominant position, as is evident already from the first vision. According to the remark of Professor Glagolev, in the fourth vision (Chapter III) “the Angel of the Lord appears decidedly as a divine person, having power, like God, to forgive sins” (p. 171). The author of a special monograph on the Old Testament Angel of the Lord, Roling, at the beginning of his study, pointing to the significance which the Old Testament teaching on the Angel of the Lord possesses, cites the expression of Stollberg, according to which “and the Old Testament Church — is the Church of the incarnate God” (Lic. Aug. Roling, Ueber den Iehovaongel des Alten Testaments, Tubingen, 1866. S. 3). The book of the prophet Zechariah fully confirms this thought of Stollberg: the Angel of the Lord here appears as a Divine Person, who at the end of time became incarnate as the Son of God. According to the interpretation of the first vision of the prophet Zechariah in the blessed Jerome, “the man mounted on the reddish horse is the Lord Savior, Who, taking upon himself the providence of our flesh, is heard in the book of the prophet Isaiah: Why are your garments red” (Isa 63:2; p. 12). Zechariah 1:11. And they answered the Angel of the Lord standing among the myrtles and said: We have gone about the earth, and behold, all the earth is inhabited and at rest. The report of the heavenly forces, personified in the form of horses, is reassuring and comforting in its general content, but not for the given circumstances. The peace and prosperity of the pagan peoples excluded the possibility of peace and prosperity for the chosen people.

Zechariah 1:12. And the Angel of the Lord answered and said: O Lord of hosts! How long will you withhold your mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, against which you have been angry these seventy years? Therefore, the Angel of the Lord turns to the Lord of hosts with intercession for the return of mercy to Jerusalem and to his people, which has been under God’s wrath for seventy years already. From Zech 1:15, and equally from the visions of the second and eighth, it becomes clear that the intercession of the Angel of the Lord for the chosen people, evidently, presented in its content something reminiscent of Rev 6:10; how long, O Holy and True Lord, do you not judge and avenge, and so forth.

Zechariah 1:16. Therefore thus says the Lord: I am returning to Jerusalem with mercy; my house shall be built in it, says the Lord of hosts, and a measuring line shall be stretched out over Jerusalem. Zechariah 1:17. And again proclaim and say: thus says the Lord of hosts: my cities shall again overflow with good, and the Lord shall comfort Zion and shall again choose Jerusalem. The content of the good, comforting words uttered by the Lord (Zech 1:13) directly concerning Jerusalem and other cities, which the Lord calls his own (Zech 1:17), is this: the calamities of the chosen people are coming to an end; in Jerusalem the temple will be built (consequently, the Lord, dwelling in the temple, will again be close to his people), and the city itself will be rebuilt. The calamities of captivity will be forgotten, for the favor of God will manifest itself in the fullness of blessings with which the cities of worshippers of the true God will abound.

Zechariah 1:18. And I lifted my eyes and looked: and behold, four horns. The second vision stands in close connection with the preceding one: it represents a continuation and clarification of the thoughts expressed in the first vision regarding pagan peoples. — The prophet sees four horns. A horn, in biblical usage, is a symbol of power and might, — the expression is used for both the chosen people and for pagans, enemies of the people of God and of God himself.

Zechariah 1:19. And I said to the Angel who was speaking with me: What are these? And he answered me: These are the horns that scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem. The blessed Jerome places this vision of Zechariah in connection with the vision of the four monarchies in Daniel (Dan 2:31-44) and understands by the horns in the second vision of Zechariah four definite kingdoms: Babylonian, Medo-Persian, Macedonian, and Roman.

Zechariah 1:20. Then the Lord showed me four craftsmen. By craftsmen or workers, the blessed Jerome says, “we understand Angels obedient to the might of the Lord, so that they build up what the pagans have destroyed” (p. 18).

Zechariah 1:21. And I said: What are they going to do? He said to me thus: These horns scattered Judah, so that no one could raise their head; but these have come to terrify them, to strike down the horns of the peoples who raised their horn against the land of Judah, to scatter it. In the first vision it is made clear that the peaceful and prosperous state of the pagan kingdoms does not correspond to the intentions of the Lord to return his favor and prosperity to the chosen people; in the second — it is expressly stated that the pagans face punishment for their cruelty toward Judah and Israel.