Zechariah Chapter 7

From The Open Bible Project

7:1 It happened in the fourth year of king Darius that the word of Yahweh came to Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Chislev.

• (a) Which contained part of November and part of December.

7:2 The people of Bethel sent Sharezer and Regem Melech, and their men, to entreat Yahweh's favor,

• (b) That is, the rest of the people that yet remained in Chaldea, sent to the Church at Jerusalem for the resolution of these questions, because these feasts were consented upon by the agreement of the whole Church, the one in the month that the temple was destroyed, and the other when Gedaliah was slain; (Jeremiah 41:2).

7:3 and to speak to the priests of the house of Yahweh of Armies, and to the prophets, saying, "Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years?"

• (c) By weeping and mourning are shown what exercises they used in their fasting.
• (d) That is, prepare myself with all devotion to his fast.
• (e) Which had been since the time the temple was destroyed.

7:4 Then the word of Yahweh of Armies came to me, saying,

7:5 "Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, 'When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh month for these seventy years, did you at all fast to me, really to me?

• (f) For there were both of the people, and of the priests, those who doubted with regard to this controversy, besides those who as yet remained in Chaldea, and argue about it, as of one of the chief points of their religion.
• (g) For they thought they had gained favour with God because of this fast, which they invented by themselves: and though fasting of itself is good, yet because they thought it a service toward God, and trusted in it, it is here reproved.

7:6 When you eat, and when you drink, don't you eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?

• (h) Did you not eat and drink for your own benefit and necessity, and so likewise you abstained according to your own imaginings, and not after the command and direction of my Law.

7:7 Aren't these the words which Yahweh proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and its cities around her, and the South and the lowland were inhabited?'"

• (i) By this he condemns their hypocrisy, who thought by their fasting to please God, and by such things as they invented, and in the meantime would not serve him as he had commanded.

7:8 The word of Yahweh came to Zechariah, saying,

7:9 "Thus has Yahweh of Armies spoken, saying, 'Execute true judgment, and show kindness and compassion every man to his brother.

• (k) He shows that they did not fast with a sincere heart, but because of hypocrisy, and that it was not done from a pure religion, because they lacked these offices of charity which should have declared that they were godly; (Matthew 23:23).

7:10 Don't oppress the widow, nor the fatherless, the foreigner, nor the poor; and let none of you devise evil against his brother in your heart.'

7:11 But they refused to listen, and turned their backs, and stopped their ears, that they might not hear.

• (l) And would not carry the Lord’s burden, which was sweet and easy, but would bear their own, which was heavy and grievous to the flesh, thinking to gain merit by it: which metaphor is taken from oxen, which shrink at the yoke; (Nehemiah 9:29).

7:12 Yes, they made their hearts as hard as flint, lest they might hear the law, and the words which Yahweh of Armies had sent by his Spirit by the former prophets. Therefore great wrath came from Yahweh of Armies.

• (m) Which declares that they did not only rebel against the Prophets, but against the Spirit of God that spoke in them.

7:13 It has come to pass that, as he called, and they refused to listen, so they will call, and I will not listen," said Yahweh of Armies;

7:14 "but I will scatter them with a whirlwind among all the nations which they have not known. Thus the land was desolate after them, so that no man passed through nor returned: for they made the pleasant land desolate."

• (n) That is, after they were taken captive.
• (o) By their sins by which they provoked God’s anger.