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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zechariah 8:20 - 8:20
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Zec 8:20. “Thus saith Jehovah of hosts: Yet will nations come, and inhabitants of many cities. Zec 8:21. And the inhabitants of one (city) will go to another, and say, 'We will go, go away, to supplicate the face of Jehovah, and to seek Jehovah of hosts.' 'I will also go.' Zec 8:22. And many peoples and strong nations will come, to seek Jehovah of hosts in Jerusalem, and to supplicate the face of Jehovah.” These verses do not announce a further or second glorification, which God has designed for His people, but simply indicate the nature and magnitude of the salvation appointed for Israel, through which its fast-days will be turned into days of joy. Hitherto Israel had kept days of mourning and fasting on account of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple; but in the future the Lord will so glorify His city and His house, that not only will Israel keep joyful feasts there, but many and strong heathen nations will go to the house of God, to seek and worship the God of hosts. עֹד is used with emphasis, so that it resembles a sentence: “It will still come to pass, that,” etc. This is how אֲשֶׁר in Zec 8:21 and Zec 8:23 is to be taken, and not as the introduction to the saying preceded energetically by עֹד, for which Hitzig is wrong in referring to Mic 6:10. For the fact itself, compare Mic 4:1., Isa 2:2., Jer 16:19. In Zec 8:21 the thought is individualized. The inhabitants of one city call upon those of another. נֵלְכָה הָלוֹךְ, “we will go to supplicate,” etc.; and the population of the other city responds to the summons by saying, “I also will go.” חַלּוֹת אֶת־פְּנֵי, as in Zec 7:2.