Longing for God in an Age of Discouragement

The Gospel According to Zechariah

Bryan R. Gregory

• Publisher: P Publishing
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9781596381421
• eBook ISBN: 9781629955186
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

Zechariah addresses God's people as discouraged and in need of renewal—a situation familiar to many today. Here is a captivating vision of God and his work in the world.

PART ONE

AN AGE OF DISCOURAGEMENT

CHAPTER ONE

READING ZECHARIAH

All beginnings are hard. (Chaim Potok¹)

READING ZECHARIAH IN HISTORICAL CONTEXT

As a book of new beginnings, Zechariah is filled with vivid images and enigmatic visions. Within its pages are some of the most memorable passages in all the Old Testament, passages that paint dramatic pictures and offer pointed oracles for a people who—like us—find themselves discouraged by the problems within their own community and the larger geopolitical instability of recent years. Yet understanding these passages can prove difficult without at least a basic grasp of the historical situation in which Zechariah ministered, namely the early Persian period.²

Historically speaking, the Persians came to dominate the Near East almost overnight under the leadership of Cyrus the Great. In just two decades (559–539 B.C.), Cyrus had risen to power, assimilated the Median Empire (550 B.C.), marched westward to defeat and acquire Lydia, Lycia, and the Greek states in Asia Minor, taken control of territory extending eastward to India, and conquered the powerful Babylonian Empire (539 B.C.). With the defeat of Babylonia, the Persians inherited all the territory previously under Babylon’s control, part of which was Judah. However, appropriating these newly acquired territories would require both an enormous administrative effort and a shrewd sense of diplomacy.

While Cyrus did not overhaul the bureaucratic structure he inherited from the Babylonians, he did implement one very strategic change to win the allegiance of the local populations. He enacted a policy of tolerance under which the conquered peoples were allowed to reconstruct their temples and sanctuaries and return to their traditional religious practices. The benefit to the Persians was twofold: the policy promoted Cyrus as a magnanimous ruler, and at the same time, it generated income for the empire through taxation. Evidence of this policy exists both in the pages of Scripture as well as in a cuneiform document commonly known as the Cyrus Cylinder. The book of Ezra begins as follows:

In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah, the LORD moved the heart of Cyrus king of Persia to make a proclamation throughout his realm and to put it in writing:

“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says:

“ ‘The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah. Anyone of his people among you—may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem in Judah and build the temple of the LORD, the God of Israel, the God who is in Jerusalem. And the people of any place where survivors may now be living are to provide him with silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and with freewill offerings for the temple of God in Jerusalem.’ ” (Ezra 1:1–4 NIV)³

Similarly, in the Cyrus Cylinder, Cyrus describes his victory over Babylon and declares,

All the kings who sat in throne rooms, throughout the four quarters, from the Upper to the Lower Sea, those who dwelled in . . . all the kings of the west country who dwelled in tents, brought me their heavy tribute and kissed my feet in Babylon. From . . . to the cities of Ashur and Susa, Agade, Eshnunna, the cities of Zamban, Meternu, Der, as far as the region of the land of Gutium, the holy cities beyond the Tigris whose sanctuaries had been in ruins over a long period, the gods whose abode is in the midst of them, I returned to their places and housed them in lasting abodes. I gathered together all their inhabitants and restored to them their dwellings.⁴

In the specific case of the Jerusalem temple, Cyrus’ motivations were undoubtedly more about political and military advantage than heartfelt generosity. The western front of the empire had become problematic and the repopulation and rebuilding of the area would have stabilized the region as well as shored up his resistance to Egypt. Nevertheless, as the Ezra text indicates, the Judeans saw Cyrus’ edict (538 B.C.) not just as political maneuvering but also as God’s sovereign fulfillment of prophecy and an expression of the Lord’s intention to restore Israel. It was more than just an opportunity to return to their land from exile and to begin reconstruction of the temple; it was an indication that the long-awaited restoration was finally underway, and that the Lord was returning to Zion.

In response to the edict, exiles from the “houses of Judah and Benjamin” began returning to Jerusalem and its surrounding area to rebuild the temple (Ezra 1:5–6 ESV). By Persian designation, this area formed the province of Yehud. The province itself was relatively small, roughly circumscribing the land around Jerusalem with a radius of approximately seventeen miles (it included Jericho and Hazor to the north, Gezer to the west, and Beth-Zur and En-gedi to the south, with the Dead Sea and the Jordan River providing the eastern border).⁵ In the early days, the population of the entire province might have been no more than fifty thousand people.⁶

To provide the exiles with leadership, Cyrus appointed Sheshbazzar as the first governor of Yehud and charged him with rebuilding the temple and returning to it the gold and silver vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had removed and placed in his own temple in Babylon (Ezra 1:7–11; 5:14–15). The altar was rebuilt immediately so that the people could once again offer burnt offerings (Ezra 3:1–6). Shortly thereafter, preliminary work began on the foundations of the temple in 537 B.C. (Ezra 5:16).⁷

But the work quickly stalled, and over the next seventeen years little happened, due to both internal and external problems.⁸ Internally, some argued against rebuilding the temple (Hag. 1:2).⁹ It’s possible that this resistance was fueled by economic difficulties stemming from high inflation from Persian taxation and the natural instability of an agriculturally dependent economy, which had recently suffered from a drought (Hag. 1:6, 9–11; 2:16). Moreover, with new homes needing to be built to accommodate the returning exiles, the rebuilding of the temple likely would have been a low priority for many (Hag. 1:4). In addition, tensions over property rights between those returning and those who never left probably exacerbated the housing problem further, resulting in considerable strain on the community.¹⁰

Externally, the Samarian province to the north consistently troubled the Judeans as they tried to reestablish themselves. An appeal to their Persian overlords for help would have been fruitless since at that point “the Persian Empire under Cyrus had not established a sufficiently strong centralized government to allow for the high-level imposition of imperial will.”¹¹ Making matters worse, many in exile were simply unwilling to leave their now prosperous lives in Babylon (and Egypt) to come back to Judah, which sparked shock and resentment among those who were trying to begin the process of reconstruction. Not surprisingly, this constellation of problems—social, economic, and political—produced cynicism and discouragement among the people. In sum, “all indications are, therefore, that life in Yehud was difficult. Its people lived daily with the painful contrast between the glories of the past and the humiliation of the present. Very little of what the returnees had eagerly expected had been realized.”¹²

However, winds of change were beginning to blow. During those seventeen years, a number of developments occurred in the Persian Empire. In 530 B.C., Cyrus was killed in battle and his son Cambyses, a widely disliked tyrant, assumed control of the empire. Like his father, he preoccupied himself with military expansion. Though he conquered Egypt in 525 B.C., he died only three years later. Succeeding him was Darius I, a usurper whose reign was to last thirty-six years (522–486 B.C.). When he took command, the empire was in turmoil. To combat this, Darius worked to consolidate the empire by suppressing numerous revolts and reforming its administrative system. He divided the empire into twenty regions called “satrapies,” and stationed a Persian official (or satrap) in each one to promote loyalty to the empire, administer the law, and manage effective taxation. Each satrapy was then divided into districts, or provinces, with recognized governors to see after local affairs.

In 520 B.C., Darius appointed Zerubbabel, a descendent of David, as the provincial governor of Yehud, a post he likely held for about ten years. During these years, reconstruction on the temple finally resumed under the leadership of Zerubbabel and the high priest Joshua (Jeshua) and at the behest of the prophets Zechariah and Haggai (Ezra 3:8–11; Hag. 1:1, 14).

Even though temple building was in the best interest of the Persians who wanted to establish a solid provincial infrastructure, local challenges nevertheless surfaced. As the work of reconstruction progressed, adversaries within the province tried numerous strategies to thwart the efforts (Ezra 4:1–5). The conflicts attending the rebuilding seem to have prompted the Persians to send Tattenai, the governor of a neighboring province, along with some associates to Jerusalem to get to the bottom of it (Ezra 5:3–17). After sorting it all out, with Darius confirming Cyrus’ decree for the Jerusalem temple to be rebuilt, the construction was allowed to resume, though the builders continued to struggle with their task. At long last, however, the temple was completed “on the third day of the month of Adar in the sixth year of the reign of Darius the king,” that is in February of 515 B.C. (Ezra 6:15 ESV).

The next sixty-five years were a tumultuous time, both in Yehud and in the larger Persian Empire. As Darius continued to try to extend his domain westward and northward, he was eventually resisted by Greek cities, which openly rebelled against Persia in 499 B.C. The conflict, known as the Greco-Persian wars, lasted for several decades. In 490 B.C., Darius suffered a devastating defeat to Athens at the Battle of Marathon. Four years later, Darius’ son Xerxes I assumed the throne and continued the struggle. Though he suffered numerous defeats, he did manage to hold on to several eastern territories.

As events unfolded, with Persian resources being channeled to the war with Greece, other nations within the Persian Empire, such as Egypt and Babylonia, began asserting their independence, with Babylonia apparently becoming a separate satrapy in 481 B.C. On the western front, several revolts by the Egyptians prompted the Persians to march through Yehud’s territory in order to deal with the uprisings, some of which occurred during Xerxes’ reign and some of which occurred under the reign of Xerxes’ son Artaxerxes I, who assumed the throne after his father was assassinated in 464 B.C. Though the Egyptian revolts were defeated, not until the Peace of Callias (449 B.C.) did a temporary truce with Greece prevail.

These critical years (539–449 B.C.) provide the primary historical backdrop for understanding the visions and oracles in the book of Zechariah. The people of Judah and Jerusalem were struggling financially, frustrated politically, and divided socially. More than anything they needed theological spectacles through which to view and understand the events of their day and the difficult situations of their daily lives. Called to address this need, Zechariah brought a theological message that was thematically centered on two foci: the renewal of God’s people and the establishment of God’s kingdom.

First, Zechariah called for the renewal of God’s people. The very first words recorded as given to Zechariah are:

The LORD was very angry with your fathers. Therefore say to them, Thus declares the LORD of hosts: Return to me, says the LORD of hosts, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (Zech. 1:2–3)

Past generations were characterized by a hardness of heart. When the Lord had repeatedly sent prophets to urge the people to turn from their wicked ways and to repent for their evil deeds, the people largely ignored them. Eventually, their unrepentant disobedience ended with the judgment of the Assyrian exile of the northern tribes and the Babylonian exile of the southern tribes.

Yet God declared in Zechariah that he was not done with his people. He called them to repent and he promised that if they did he would cleanse them. Though they were filthy from their sins and the stain of exile, God assured them that they would once again be made clean (Zech. 3:1–10). Gone would be the false prophets, the idols, and the spirit of uncleanness (Zech. 13:1–3), as well as theft and false testimonies (Zech. 5:1–4). In their place would be mercy, justice, peace, and prosperity (Zech. 7:1–8:23). Significantly, the book of Zechariah ends with the declaration that Jerusalem will be so holy that even the common and unclean things like horses’ bells and cooking pots will be inscribed with “Holy to the Lord,” an inscription previously reserved for the gold plate on the high priest’s turban (Ex. 28:36; 39:30).

Second, Zechariah envisioned the establishment of God’s kingdom. In the section popularly known as the “night visions” (Zech. 1:7–6:8), the first and last vision form an inclusio—a repetition of certain features at the beginning and the end of a unit—with the theme that one day the Lord, the great King, will subdue all his e...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• PART ONE: AN AGE OF DISCOURAGEMENT
• PART TWO: THE NIGHT VISIONS
• PART THREE: EPILOGUE TO THE NIGHT VISIONS
• PART FOUR: THE APOCALYPTIC VISIONS
• Notes
• For Further Reading
• Index of Scripture