Old Testament
Zechariah
14 chapters
Start reading: Zechariah 1About this book
Zechariah is a book of visions and promises written to encourage a discouraged community. The exiles had come home from Babylon, but the temple lay unfinished and the future looked small. Zechariah begins with a call to return to the Lord, then receives eight visions in a single night: riders patrolling the earth, a measuring line over Jerusalem, a high priest cleansed of his filthy clothes, a lampstand fed by olive trees, and more. Together they say that God has not abandoned his people, that he will purify them and that the work will be finished by his Spirit rather than by human power. The second half turns toward the future with two oracles about a humble king riding a donkey, a rejected shepherd, mourning over one who was pierced, and the Lord reigning over all the earth. The New Testament draws on these chapters often when it describes Jesus, especially in the events of his final week. Christians differ on how literally to read the last chapters, but nearly all hear in them the hope that God will dwell with his people.
- Author
- The prophet Zechariah, grandson of Iddo; many scholars think chapters 9–14 come from a later hand or period.
- Date
- Begins in 520 BC, in the second year of Darius; the later chapters are dated by scholars from the same period to somewhat later.
- Audience
- The Jews who returned to Jerusalem after the exile and were rebuilding the temple.
Themes
Outline
- 1:1–1:6A call to return
- 1:7–6:15Eight night visions
- 7:1–8:23A question about fasting and promises of restoration
- 9:1–11:17The coming king and the rejected shepherd
- 12:1–14:21Mourning, cleansing and the Lord's reign
Key verses
Chapters of Zechariah
- 1Zechariah 1In the second year of Darius, Zechariah calls the returned exiles to return to the Lord, so that he will return to them, and not to be like their ancestors who ignored the earlier prophets.
- 2Zechariah 2Zechariah sees a man with a measuring line going to measure Jerusalem.
- 3Zechariah 3Zechariah sees Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, with Satan at his right hand to accuse him.
- 4Zechariah 4An angel wakes Zechariah to show him a solid gold lampstand with a bowl on top and seven lamps, fed by two olive trees standing on either side.
- 5Zechariah 5Zechariah sees a huge flying scroll, about thirty feet long and fifteen wide, which is the curse going out over the whole land.
- 6Zechariah 6In the last night vision, four chariots come out from between two bronze mountains, pulled by red, black, white and dappled horses, and are the four spirits of heaven that patrol the earth, having settled the Lord's spirit in the north.
- 7Zechariah 7Two years later, delegates from Bethel come to ask whether they should keep mourning and fasting in the fifth month, as they have done for years since the temple's destruction.
- 8Zechariah 8The chapter is a series of promises from the Lord Almighty.
- 9Zechariah 9An oracle announces judgment on neighboring cities such as Damascus, Tyre and the Philistine cities, while God protects his own house.
- 10Zechariah 10The chapter opens with an instruction to ask the Lord for rain in the spring, since he makes the storm clouds and gives showers, while idols, diviners and false dreams deceive and leave people wandering like sheep without a shepherd.
- 11Zechariah 11Lebanon's doors are told to open, for fire will devour its cedars; shepherds wail because their glory is ruined.
- 12Zechariah 12Another oracle announces that Jerusalem will be a cup that sends the nations reeling and an immovable rock, and the Lord will defend the inhabitants so that the feeble will be like David and the house of David like God.
- 13Zechariah 13On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and impurity.
- 14Zechariah 14The final chapter looks to a day of the Lord when the nations gather against Jerusalem and the city is taken, but the Lord goes out to fight, standing on the Mount of Olives, which splits in two to make a valley of escape.