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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Zechariah 9:16 - 9:16
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Through this victory over the world-power Israel will attain to glory. Zec 9:16. “And Jehovah their God will endow them with salvation in that day, like a flock His people; for stones of a crown are they, sparkling in His land. Zec 9:17. For how great is its goodness, and how great its beauty! Corn will make youths to sprout, and new wine maidens.” הוֹשִׁיעַ does not mean to help or deliver here; for this would affirm much too little, after what has gone before. When Israel has trodden down its foes, it no longer needs deliverance. It denotes the granting of positive salvation, which the explanatory clause that follows also requires. The motive for this is indicated in the clause, “like a flock His people.” Because Israel is His (Jehovah's) people, the Lord will tend it as a shepherd tends his flock. The blessings which Jehovah bestows upon His people are described by David in Psa 23:1-6. The Lord will do this also, because they (the Israelites) are crown-stones, namely as the chosen people, which Jehovah will make a praise and glory for all nations (Zep 3:19-20). To the predicate אַבְנֵי נֵזֶר the subject הֵמָּה may easily be supplied from the context, as for example in מַגִּיד in Zec 9:12. To this subject מִתְנוֹסְסוֹת וגו attaches itself. This verb is connected with nēs, a banner, in Psa 60:6, the only other passage in which it occurs; but here it is used in the sense of nâtsats, to glitter or sparkle. The meaning, to lift up, which is given by the lexicons, has no foundation, and is quite unsuitable here. For crown-stones do not lift themselves up, but sparkle; and the figure of precious stones, which sparkle upon the land, denotes the highest possible glory to which Israel can attain. The suffix attached to אַדְמָתוֹ refers to Jehovah, only we must not identify the land of Jehovah with Palestine. The application of this honourable epithet to Israel is justified in Zec 9:17, by an allusion to the excellence and beauty to which it will attain. The suffixes in טוּבוֹ and יָפְיוֹ cannot refer to Jehovah, as Ewald and Hengstenberg suppose, but refer to עַמּוֹ, the people of Jehovah. יֳפִי is quite irreconcilable with an allusion to Jehovah, since this word only occurs in connection with men and the Messianic King (Psa 45:3; Isa 33:17); and even if it were used of Jehovah, it would still be unsuitable here. For though the vigorous prosperity of the nation is indeed a proof of the goodness of God, it is not a proof of the beauty of God. Mâh is an exclamation of Amazement: “how great!” (Ewald, §330, a). טוּב, when affirmed of the nation, is not moral goodness, but a good appearance, and is synonymous with יֳפִי, beauty, as in Hos 10:11. This prosperity proceeds from the blessings of grace, which the Lord causes to flow down to His people. Corn and new wine are mentioned as such blessings, for the purpose of individualizing, as indeed they frequently are (e.g., Deu 33:28; Psa 72:16), and are distributed rhetorically between the youths and the maidens.