Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zechariah 11:7 - 11:7

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Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zechariah 11:7 - 11:7


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From Zec 11:7 onwards the feeding of the flock is described. Zec 11:7. “And I fed the slaughtering flock, therewith the wretched ones of the sheep, and took to myself two staves: the one I called Favour, the other I called Bands; and so I fed the flock. Zec 11:8. And I destroyed three of the shepherds in one month.” The difficult expression לָכֵן, of which very different renderings have been given (lit., with the so-being), is evidently used here in the same sense as in Isa 26:14; Isa 61:7; Jer 2:33, etc., so as to introduce what occurred eo ipso along with the other event which took place. When the shepherd fed the slaughtering flock, he thereby, or at the same time, fed the wretched ones of the sheep. עֲנִיֵּי הַצֹּאן, not the most wretched of the sheep, but the wretched ones among the sheep, like צְעִירֵי הַצִּאן in Jer 49:20; Jer 50:45, the small, weak sheep. עֲנִיֵּי הַצֹּאן therefore form one portion of the צֹאן הַהֲרֵגָה, as Hofmann and Kliefoth have correctly explained; whereas, if they were identical, the whole of the appended clause would be very tautological, since the thought that the flock was in a miserable state was already expressed clearly enough in the predicate הֲרֵגָה, and the explanation of it in Zec 11:5. This view is confirmed by Zec 11:11, where עֲנִיֵּי הַצֹּאן is generally admitted to be simply one portion of the flock. To feed the flock, the prophet takes two shepherds' staves, to which he gives names, intended to point to the blessings which the flock receives through his pastoral activity. The fact that he takes two staves does not arise from the circumstance that the flock consists of two portions, and cannot be understood as signifying that he feeds one portion of the flock with the one staff, and the other portion with the other. According to Zec 11:7, he feeds the whole flock with the first staff; and the destruction to which, according to Zec 11:9, it is to be given up when he relinquishes his office, is only made fully apparent when the two staves are broken. The prophet takes two staves for the simple purpose of setting forth the double kind of salvation which is bestowed upon the nation through the care of the good shepherd. The first staff he calls נֹעַם, i.e., loveliness, and also favour (cf. Psa 90:17, נֹעַם יְהֹוָה). It is in the latter sense that the word is used here; for the shepherd's staff shows what Jehovah will thereby bestow upon His people. The second staff he calls חוֹבְלִים, which is in any case a kal participle of חָבַל fo elpic. Of the two certain meanings which this verb has in the kal, viz., to bind (hence chebhel, a cord or rope) and to ill-treat (cf. Job 34:31), the second, upon which the rendering staff-woe is founded, does not suit the explanation which is given in Zec 11:14 of the breaking of this staff. The first is the only suitable one, viz., the binding ones, equivalent to the bandage or connection. Through the staff nō‛am (Favour), the favour of God, which protects it from being injured by the heathen nations, is granted to the flock (Zec 11:10); and through the staff chōbhelı̄m the wretched sheep receive the blessing of fraternal unity or binding (Zec 11:14). The repetition of the words וָאֶרְעֶה אֶת־הַצֹּאן (end of Zec 11:7) expresses the idea that the feeding is effected with both staves. The first thing which the shepherd appointed by God does for the flock is, according to Zec 11:8, to destroy three shepherds. הִכְחִיד, the hiphil of כָּחַד, signifies ἀφανίζειν, to annihilate, to destroy (as in Exo 23:23).

אֶת־שְׁלשֶׁת הָרֹעִים may be rendered, the three shepherds (τοὺς τρεῖς ποιμένας, lxx), or three of the shepherds, so that the article only refers to the genitive, as in Exo 26:3, Exo 26:9; Jos 17:11; 1Sa 20:20; Isa 30:26, and as is also frequently the case when two nouns are connected together in the construct state (see Ges. §111, Anm.). We agree with Koehler in regarding the latter as the only admissible rendering here, because in what precedes shepherds only have been spoken of, and not any definite number of them. The shepherds, of whom three are destroyed, are those who strangled the flock according to Zec 11:5, and who are therefore destroyed in order to liberate the flock from their tyranny. But who are these three shepherds? It was a very widespread and ancient opinion, and one which we meet with in Theodoret, Cyril, and Jerome, that the three classes of Jewish rulers are intended, - namely, princes (or kings), priests, and prophets. But apart from the fact that in the times after the captivity, to which our prophecy refers, prophesying and the prophetic office were extinct, and that in the vision in Zec 4:14 Zechariah only mentions two classes in the covenant nation who were represented by the prince Zerubbabel and the high priest Joshua; apart, I say, from this, such a view is irreconcilable with the words themselves, inasmuch as it requires us to dilute the destruction into a deposition from office, or, strictly speaking, into a counteraction of their influence upon the people; and this is quite sufficient to overthrow it. What Hengstenberg says in vindication of it - namely, that “an actual extermination cannot be intended, because the shepherds appear immediately afterwards as still in existence” - is founded upon a false interpretation of the second half of the verse. So much is unquestionably correct, that we have not to think of the extermination or slaying of three particular individuals,

(Note: The attempts of rationalistic commentators to prove that the three shepherds are three kings of the kingdom of the ten tribes, have completely broken down, inasmuch as of the kings Zechariah, Shallu, and Menahem (2Ki 15:8-14), Shallum alone reigned an entire month, so that not even the ungrammatical explanation of Hitzig, to the effect that בְּיֶרַח אֶחָד refers to the reign of these kings, and not to their destruction, furnishes a sufficient loophole; whilst Maurer, Bleek, Ewald, and Bunsen felt driven to invent a third king or usurper, in order to carry out their view.)

and that not so much because it cannot be shown that three rulers or heads of the nation were ever destroyed in the space of a month, either in the times before the captivity or in those which followed, as because the persons occurring in this vision are not individuals, but classes of men. As the רֹעִים mentioned in Zec 11:5 as not sparing the flock are to be understood as signifying heathen rulers, so here the three shepherds are heathen liege-lords of the covenant nation. Moreover, as it is unanimously acknowledged by modern commentators that the definite number does not stand for an indefinite plurality, it is natural to think of the three imperial rulers into whose power Israel fell, that is to say, not of three rulers of one empire, but of the rulers of the three empires. The statement as to time, “in one month,” which does not affirm that the three were shepherds within one month, as Hitzig supposes, but that the three shepherds were destroyed in one month, may easily be reconciled with this, if we only observe that, in a symbolical transaction, even the distinctions of time are intended to be interpreted symbolically. There can be no doubt whatever that “a month” signifies a comparatively brief space of time. At the same time, it is equally impossible to deny that the assumption that “in a month” is but another way of saying in a very short time, is not satisfactory, inasmuch as it would have been better to say “in a week,” if this had been the meaning; and, on the other hand, a year would not have been a long time for the extermination of three shepherds. Nor can Hofmann's view be sustained, - namely, that the one month (= 30 days) is to be interpreted on the basis of Dan 9:24, as a prophetical period of 30 x 7 = 120 years, and that this definition of the time refers to the fact that the Babylonian, Medo-Persian, and Macedonian empires were destroyed within a period of 210 years. For there is no tenable ground for calculating the days of a month according to sabbatical periods, since there is no connection between the yerach of this verse and the שָׁבֻעִים of Daniel, to say nothing of the fact that the time which intervened between the conquest of Babylon and the death of Alexander the Great was not 210 years, but 215. The only way in which the expression “in one month” can be interpreted symbolically is that proposed by Kliefoth and Koehler, - namely, by dividing the month as a period of thirty days into three times ten days according to the number of the shepherds, and taking each ten days as the time employed in the destruction of a shepherd. Ten is the number of the completion or the perfection of any earthly act or occurrence. If, therefore, each shepherd was destroyed in ten days, and the destruction of the three was executed in a month, i.e., within a space of three times ten days following one another, the fact is indicated, on the one hand, that the destruction of each of these shepherds followed directly upon that of the other; and, on the other hand, that this took place after the full time allotted for his rule had passed away. The reason why the prophet does not say three times ten days, nor even thirty days, but connects the thirty days together into a month, is that he wishes not only to indicate that the time allotted for the duration of the three imperial monarchies is a brief one, but also to exhibit the unwearied activity of the shepherd, which is done more clearly by the expression “one month” than by “thirty days.”

The description of the shepherd's activity is followed, from Zec 11:8 onwards, by a description of the attitude which the flock assumed in relation to the service performed on its behalf. Zec 11:8. “And my soul became impatient over them, and their soul also became weary of me. Zec 11:9. Then I said, I will not feed you any more; what dieth may die, and what perisheth may perish; and those which remain may devour one another's flesh. Zec 11:10. And I took my staff Favour, and broke it in pieces, to destroy my covenant which I had made with all nations. Zec 11:11. And it was destroyed in that day; and so the wretched of the sheep, which gave heed to me, perceived that it was the word of Jehovah.” The way in which Zec 11:8 and Zec 11:8 are connected in the Masoretic text, has led the earlier commentators, and even Hengstenberg, Ebrard, and Kliefoth, to take the statement in Zec 11:8 as also referring to the shepherds. But this is grammatically impossible, because the imperfect c. Vav. sonec. וַתִּקְצַר in this connection, in which the same verbal forms both before and after express the sequence both of time and thought, cannot be used in the sense of the pluperfect. And this is the sense in which it must be taken, if the words referred to the shepherds, because the prophet's becoming impatient with the shepherds, and the shepherds' dislike to the prophet, must of necessity have preceded the destruction of the shepherds. Again, it is evident from Zec 11:9, as even Hitzig admits, that the prophet “did not become disgusted with the three shepherds, but with his flock, which he resolved in his displeasure to leave to its fate.” As the suffix אֶתְכֶם in Zec 11:9 is taken by all the commentators (except Kliefoth) as referring to the flock, the suffixes בָּהֶם and נַפְשָׁם in Zec 11:8 must also point back to the flock (הַצֹּאן, Zec 11:7). קָֽצְרָה נֶפֶשׁ, to become impatient, as in Num 21:4. בָּחַך, which only occurs again in Pro 20:21 in the sense of the Arabic bchl, to be covetous, is used here in the sense of the Syriac, to experience vexation or disgust. In consequence of the experience which the shepherd of the Lord had had, according to Zec 11:8, he resolves to give up the feeding of the flock, and relinquish it to its fate, which is described in Zec 11:9 as that of perishing and destroying one another. The participles מֵתָה, נִכְחֶדֶת, and נִשְׁאָרוֹת are present participles, that which dies is destroyed (perishes) and remains; and the imperfects תָּמוּת, תִּכָּחֵד, and תֹּאכַלְנָה are not jussive, as the form תָּמוּת clearly proves, but are expressive of that which can be or may happen (Ewald, §136, d, b).

As a sign of this, the shepherd breaks one staff in pieces, viz., the nō‛am, to intimate that the good which the flock has hitherto received through this staff will be henceforth withdrawn from it; that is to say, that the covenant which God has made with all nations is to be repealed or destroyed. This covenant is not the covenant made with Noah as the progenitor of all men after the flood (Kliefoth), nor a relation entered into by Jehovah with all the nationalities under which each nationality prospered, inasmuch as the shepherd continued again and again to remove its flock-destroying shepherds out of the way (Hofmann, Schriftbeweis, ii. 2, p. 607). For in the covenant with Noah, although the continuance of this earth was promised, and the assurance given that there should be no repetition of a flood to destroy all living things, there was no guarantee of protection from death or destruction, or from civil wars; and history has no record of any covenant made by Jehovah with the nationalities, which secured to the nations prosperity on the one hand, or deliverance from oppressors on the other. The covenant made by God with all nations refers, according to the context of this passage, to a treaty made with them by God in favour of His flock the nation of Israel, and is analogous to the treaty made by God with the beasts, according to Hos 2:20, that they should not injure His people, and the treaty made with the stones and the beasts of the field (Job 5:23, cf. Eze 34:25). This covenant consisted in the fact that God imposed upon the nations of the earth the obligation not to hurt Israel or destroy it, and was one consequence of the favour of Jehovah towards His people. Through the abrogation of this covenant Israel is delivered up to the nations, that they may be able to deal with Israel again in the manner depicted in Zec 11:5. It is true that Israel is not thereby delivered up at once or immediately to that self-immolation which is threatened in Zec 11:9, nor is this threat carried into effect through the breaking in pieces of one staff, but is only to be fully realized when the second staff is broken, whereby the shepherd entirely relinquishes the feeding of the flock. So long as the shepherd continues to feed the flock with the other staff, so long will utter destruction be averted from it, although by the breaking of the staff Favour, protection against the nations of the world is withdrawn from it. Zec 11:11. From the abrogation of this covenant the wretched among the sheep perceived that this was Jehovah's word. כֵּן, so, i.e., in consequence of this. The wretched sheep are characterized as הַשֹּׁמְרִים אֹתִי, “those which give heed to me.” אֹתִי refers to the prophet, who acts in the name of God, and therefore really to the act of God Himself, What is affirmed does not apply to one portion, but to all, עֲנִיֵּי הַצֹּאן, and proves that we are to understand by these the members of the covenant nation who give heed to the word of God. What these godly men recognised as the word of Jehovah, is evident from the context, viz., not merely the threat expressed in Zec 11:9, and embodied in the breaking of the staff Favour, but generally speaking the whole of the prophet's symbolical actions, including both the feeding of the flock with the staves, and the breaking of the one staff. The two together were an embodied word of Jehovah; and the fact that it was so was discerned, i.e., discovered by the righteous, from the effect produced upon Israel by the breaking of the staff Favour, i.e., from the consequences of the removal of the obligation imposed upon the heathen nations to do no hurt to Israel.