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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zechariah 5:5 - 5:5
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To this there is appended in Zec 5:5-11 a new view, which exhibits the further fate of the sinners who have been separated from the congregation of the saints. Zec 5:5. “And the angel that talked with me went forth, and said to me, Lift up now thine eyes, and see, what is this that goeth out there? Zec 5:6. And I said, What is it? And he said, This is the ephah going out. And He said, This is their aspect in all the land. Zec 5:7. And behold a disk of lead was lifted up, and there was a woman sitting in the midst of the ephah. Zec 5:8. And he said, This is wickedness; and he cast it into the midst of the ephah, and cast the leaden weight upon its mouth.” With the disappearing of the previous vision, the angelus interpres had also vanished from the eyes of the prophet. After a short pause he comes out again, calls the prophet's attention to a new figure which emerges out of the cloud, and so comes within the range of vision (הַיּוֹצֵאת הַזֹּאת), and informs him with regard to it: “This is the ephah which goeth out.” יָצָא, to go out, in other words, to come to view. The ephah was the greatest measure of capacity which really existed among the Hebrews for dry goods, and was about the size of a cubic foot; for the chōmer, which contained ten ephahs, appears to have had only an ideal existence, viz., for the purpose of calculation. The meaning of this figure is indicated generally in the words זֹאת עֵינָם כב, the meaning of which depends upon the interpretation to be given to עֵינָם. The suffix of this word can only refer to the sinners mentioned before, viz., the thieves and perjurers; for it is contrary to the Hebrew usage to suppose that the words refer to the expression appended, בְּכָל־הָאָרֶץ, in the sense of “all those who are in the whole land” (Koehler). Consequently עַיִן does not mean the eye, but adspectus, appearance, or shape, as in Lev 13:55; Eze 1:4.; and the words have this meaning: The ephah (bushel) is the shape, i.e., represents the figure displayed by the sinners in all the land, after the roll of the curse has gone forth over the land, i.e., it shows into what condition they have come through that anathema (Kliefoth). The point of comparison between the ephah and the state into which sinners have come in consequence of the curse, does not consist in the fact that the ephah is carried away, and the sinners likewise (Maurer), nor in the fact that the sin now reaches its full measure (Hofm., Hengstenberg); for “the carrying away of the sinners does not come into consideration yet, and there is nothing at all here about the sin becoming full.” It is true that, according to what follows, sin sits in the ephah as a woman, but there is nothing to indicate that the ephah is completely filled by it, so that there is no further room in it; and this thought would be generally out of keeping here. The point of comparison is rather to be found in the explanation given by Kliefoth: “Just as in a bushel the separate grains are all collected together, so will the individual sinners over the whole earth be brought into a heap, when the curse of the end goes forth over the whole earth.” We have no hesitation in appropriating this explanation, although we have not rendered הָאָרֶץ “the earth,” inasmuch as at the final fulfilment of the vision the holy land will extend over all the earth. Immediately afterwards the prophet is shown still more clearly what is in the ephah. A covering of lead (kikkâr, a circle, a rounding or a circular plate) rises up, or is lifted up, and then he sees a woman sitting in the ephah ('achath does not stand for the indefinite article, but is a numeral, the sinners brought into a heap appearing as a unity, i.e., as one living personality, instead of forming an atomistic heap of individuals). This woman, who had not come into the ephah now for the first time, but was already sitting there, and was only seen now that the lid was raised, is described by the angel as mirsha‛ath, ungodliness, as being wickedness embodied, just as in 2Ch 24:7 this name is given to godless Jezebel. Thereupon he throws her into the ephah, out of which she had risen up, and shuts it with the leaden lid, to carry her away, as the following vision shows, out of the holy land.