7 And behold, there was lifted up a round plate of lead; and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah.
The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw.
The burden of Moab: For in the night of being laid waste, Ar of Moab is destroyed; for in the night of being laid waste, Kir of Moab is destroyed!
They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? Would not that land be utterly polluted? But thou hast committed fornication with many lovers; yet return to me, saith Jehovah. Lift up thine eyes unto the heights and see, where hast thou not been lain with? In the ways hast thou sat for them, as an Arab in the wilderness; and thou hast polluted the land with thy fornications and with thy wickedness.
And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah unto Jerusalem: Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of the Canaanite: thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother a Hittite. And as for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water for cleansing; thou wast not rubbed with salt at all, nor swaddled at all. No eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, from abhorrence of thy person, in the day that thou wast born. And I passed by thee, and saw thee weltering in thy blood, and I said unto thee, in thy blood, Live! yea, I said unto thee, in thy blood, Live! I caused thee to multiply, as the bud of the field; and thou didst increase and grow great, and thou camest to fulness of beauty; [thy] breasts were fashioned, and thy hair grew: but thou wast naked and bare. And I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, and behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness; and I swore unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord Jehovah, and thou becamest mine. And I washed thee with water, and thoroughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil; and I clothed thee with embroidered work, and shod thee with badgers' skin, and I bound thee about with byssus, and covered thee with silk. And I decked thee with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck; and I put a ring on thy nose, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thy head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver, and thy raiment was byssus, and silk, and embroidered work. Thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil; and thou becamest exceedingly beautiful, and thou didst prosper into a kingdom. And thy fame went forth among the nations for thy beauty; for it was perfect through my magnificence, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord Jehovah. But thou didst confide in thy beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy whoredoms on every one that passed by: his it was. And of thy garments thou didst take, and madest for thyself high places decked with divers colours, and didst play the harlot thereupon: [the like] hath not come to pass, and shall be no more. And thou didst take thy fair jewels of my gold and of my silver, which I had given thee, and madest to thyself images of males, and didst commit fornication with them. And thou tookest thine embroidered garments, and coveredst them; and thou didst set mine oil and mine incense before them. And my bread which I had given thee, the fine flour and the oil and the honey wherewith I fed thee, thou didst even set it before them for a sweet savour: thus it was, saith the Lord Jehovah. And thou didst take thy sons and thy daughters, whom thou hadst borne unto me, and these didst thou sacrifice unto them, to be devoured. Were thy whoredoms a small matter, that thou didst slay my children and give them up in passing them over to them? And in all thine abominations and thy whoredoms thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, when thou wast weltering in thy blood. And it came to pass after all thy wickedness (woe, woe unto thee! saith the Lord Jehovah), that thou didst also build unto thee a place of debauchery, and didst make thee a high place in every street: thou didst build thy high place at every head of the way, and madest thy beauty to be abhorred, and thou didst open thy feet to every one that passed by, and multiply thy whoredom. And thou didst commit fornication with the Egyptians thy neighbours, great of flesh; and didst multiply thy whoredom to provoke me to anger. And behold, I stretched out my hand over thee, and diminished thine appointed portion; and I gave thee over unto the will of them that hate thee, the daughters of the Philistines, who were confounded at thy lewd way. And thou didst commit fornication with the Assyrians, because thou wast insatiable; yea, thou didst commit fornication with them, and yet couldest not be satisfied. And thou didst multiply thy whoredom with the land of merchants, Chaldea, and yet thou wast not satisfied herewith. How weak is thy heart, saith the Lord Jehovah, seeing thou doest all these [things], the work of a whorish woman, under no restraint; in that thou buildest thy place of debauchery at the head of every way, and makest thy high place in every street! And thou hast not been as a harlot, in that thou scornest reward, O adulterous wife, that taketh strangers instead of her husband. They give rewards to all harlots; but thou gavest thy rewards to all thy lovers, and rewardedst them, that they might come unto thee on every side for thy whoredoms. And in thee is the contrary from [other] women, in thy whoredoms, in that none followeth thee to commit fornication; and whereas thou givest a reward, and no reward is given unto thee, so art thou contrary. Therefore, O harlot, hear the word of Jehovah. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Because thy money hath been poured out, and thy nakedness discovered through thy fornications with thy lovers, and with all the idols of thine abominations, and because of the blood of thy children which thou didst give unto them; therefore, behold, I will gather all thy lovers with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all that thou hast loved, with all that thou hast hated, -- I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness. And I will judge thee with the judgments of women that commit adultery and shed blood; and I will give thee up to the blood of fury and jealousy; and I will give thee into their hand, and they shall throw down thy place of debauchery, and shall break down thy high places; and they shall strip thee of thy garments, and shall take thy fair jewels, and leave thee naked and bare. And they shall bring up an assemblage against thee, and they shall stone thee with stones, and thrust thee through with their swords. And they shall burn thy houses with fire, and execute judgments upon thee in the sight of many women; and I will cause thee to cease from being a harlot, and thou also shalt give no more any reward. And I will appease my fury against thee, and my jealousy shall depart from thee; and I will be quiet, and will be no more angry. Because thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, but hast raged against me in all these [things], behold, therefore, I also will recompense thy way upon [thy] head, saith the Lord Jehovah, and thou shalt not commit this lewdness besides all thine abominations. Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall speak in a proverb against thee, saying, As the mother, [so is] her daughter! Thou art the daughter of thy mother that loathed her husband and her children; and thou art the sister of thy sisters, who loathed their husbands and their children. Your mother was a Hittite, and your father an Amorite. And thine elder sister is Samaria that dwelleth at thy left hand, she and her daughters; and thy younger sister, that dwelleth at thy right hand, is Sodom and her daughters. And thou hast not walked in their ways, nor done according to their abominations; but as though that were a very little, thou hast been more corrupt than they in all thy ways. [As] I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, Sodom thy sister hath not done, she nor her daughters, as thou hast done, thou and thy daughters! Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom: pride, fulness of bread, and careless ease was in her and in her daughters, but she did not strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me, and I took them away when I saw [it]. And Samaria hath not sinned according to the half of thy sins; but thou hast multiplied thine abominations more than they, and hast justified thy sisters by all thine abominations which thou hast done. Thou also, who hast judged thy sisters, bear thine own confusion, because of thy sins in which thou hast acted more abominably than they: they are more righteous than thou. So be thou ashamed also, and bear thy confusion, in that thou hast justified thy sisters. And I will bring again their captivity, the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, and the captivity of Samaria and her daughters, and the captivity of thy captives in the midst of them; that thou mayest bear thy confusion, and mayest be confounded for all that thou hast done, in that thou comfortest them. And thy sisters, Sodom and her daughters, shall return to their former estate, and Samaria and her daughters shall return to their former estate; thou also and thy daughters, ye shall return to your former estate. Yea, Sodom thy sister was not mentioned by thy mouth in the day of thy pride, before thy wickedness was discovered, as at the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all that are round about her, the daughters of the Philistines, who despise thee on every side. Thy lewdness and thine abominations, thou bearest them, saith Jehovah. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah: I will even deal with thee as thou hast done, who hast despised the oath, and broken the covenant. Nevertheless I will remember my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth, and I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. And thou shalt remember thy ways, and be confounded, when thou shalt receive thy sisters who are older than thou, together with those who are younger than thou; for I will give them unto thee for daughters, but not by virtue of thy covenant. And I will establish my covenant with thee, and thou shalt know that I [am] Jehovah; that thou mayest remember, and be ashamed, and no more open thy mouth because of thy confusion, when I forgive thee all that thou hast done, saith the Lord Jehovah.
And the word of Jehovah came unto me, saying, Son of man, there were two women, daughters of one mother. And they committed whoredom in Egypt; they committed whoredom in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there were handled the teats of their virginity. And their names were Oholah the elder, and Oholibah her sister; and they were mine, and they bore sons and daughters. As for their names: Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem Oholibah. And Oholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she lusted after her lovers, after the Assyrians [her] neighbours, clothed with blue, governors and rulers, all of them attractive young men, horsemen riding upon horses. And she bestowed her whoredoms upon them, all of them the choice of the children of Asshur; and with all after whom she lusted, with all their idols she defiled herself. Neither left she her whoredoms [brought] from Egypt; for in her youth they had lain with her, and had handled the breasts of her virginity, and poured their fornication upon her. Therefore I gave her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the children of Asshur, after whom she lusted. These discovered her nakedness, they took her sons and her daughters, and slew her with the sword; and she became a name among women; and they executed judgment upon her. And her sister Oholibah saw [this], and was more corrupt in her passion than she, and in her fornications more than the whoredoms of her sister. She lusted after the children of Asshur [her] neighbours, governors and rulers, clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all of them attractive young men. And I saw that she was defiled: both took one way. And she increased her fornications; for she saw men portrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans portrayed with vermilion, girded with girdles upon their loins, with flowing turbans on their heads, all of them captains in appearance, [after] the likeness of the children of Babylon, of Chaldea, the land of their nativity. And as soon as she saw them with her eyes, she lusted after them, and sent messengers unto them into Chaldea. And the children of Babylon came to her into the bed of love, and they defiled her with their fornication; she too defiled herself with them, and her soul was alienated from them. And she discovered her whoredoms, and discovered her nakedness; and my soul was alienated from her, like as my soul was alienated from her sister. Yet she multiplied her whoredoms, calling to remembrance the days of her youth, wherein she played the harlot in the land of Egypt; and she lusted after their paramours, whose flesh is [as] the flesh of asses, and whose issue is [as] the issue of horses. And thou didst look back to the lewdness of thy youth, in the handling of thy teats by the Egyptians, for the breasts of thy youth. Therefore, Oholibah, thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy soul is alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side. The children of Babylon, and all the Chaldeans, Pekod and Shoa and Koa, all the children of Asshur with them; all of them attractive young men, governors and rulers, great lords and renowned, all of them riding upon horses. And they shall come against thee [with] armour, chariots and wheels, and with an assemblage of peoples; they shall set themselves against thee [with] target, and shield, and helmet round about; and I will put judgment before them, and they shall judge thee according to their judgments. And I will set my jealousy against thee, and they shall deal furiously with thee: they shall cut off thy nose and thine ears, and thy remnant shall fall by the sword; they shall take thy sons and thy daughters; and thy residue shall be devoured by the fire. They shall also strip the of thy garments, and take away thy fair jewels. And I will make thy lewdness to cease from thee, and thy whoredom [brought] from the land of Egypt; and thou shalt not lift up thine eyes unto them, nor remember Egypt any more. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I will give thee over into the hand of them whom thou hatest, into the hand of them from whom thy soul is alienated. And they shall deal with thee in hatred, and shall take away all thy labour, and shall leave thee naked and bare; so that the nakedness of thy whoredoms shall be discovered, both thy lewdness and thy fornications. These things shall be done unto thee, because thou hast gone a whoring after the nations, because thou hast defiled thyself with their idols. Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister; and I have given her cup into thy hand. Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Thou shalt drink of thy sister's cup deep and large; thou shalt be for a laughing-stock and a derision, [for] it containeth much. Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and desolation, the cup of thy sister Samaria; thou shalt even drink it and suck it out, and thou shalt gnaw the sherds thereof, and pluck off thine own breasts: for I have spoken [it], saith the Lord Jehovah. Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Because thou hast forgotten me, and cast me behind thy back, therefore bear thou also thy lewdness and thy fornications. And Jehovah said unto me, Son of man, wilt thou judge Oholah and Oholibah? yea, declare unto them their abominations. For they have committed adultery, and blood is in their hands; and with their idols have they committed adultery, and have also passed over unto them their children, whom they bore unto me, to be devoured. Moreover this have they done unto me: in the same day have they defiled my sanctuary and profaned my sabbaths. For when they had slaughtered their children unto their idols, they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it; and behold, thus have they done in the midst of my house. And furthermore, they sent for men to come from far, unto whom a messenger was sent; and behold, they came: for whom thou didst wash thyself, paintedst thine eyes, and deckedst thyself with ornaments; and satest upon a stately bed, with a table prepared before it, whereupon thou hadst set mine incense and mine oil. And the voice of a multitude living carelessly was with her; and with people of the common sort were brought Sabeans from the wilderness, and they put bracelets upon their hands, and a beautiful crown upon their heads. And I said of her that was old in adulteries, Will she now commit her fornications, even she. And they went in unto her, as they go in unto a whorish woman: so went they in unto Oholah and unto Oholibah the lewd women. And righteous men, they shall judge them with the judgment of adulteresses, and with the judgment of women that shed blood; for they are adulteresses, and blood is in their hands. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah: I will bring up an assemblage against them, and will give them to be driven hither and thither and spoiled. And the assemblage shall stone them with stones, and despatch them with their swords; they shall kill their sons and their daughters, and burn their houses with fire. And I will cause lewdness to cease out of the land, and all women shall receive instruction and shall not do according to your lewdness. And they shall recompense your lewdness upon you, and ye shall bear the sins of your idols; and ye shall know that I [am] the Lord Jehovah.
The word of Jehovah that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. The beginning of the word of Jehovah through Hosea. And Jehovah said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms; for the land is entirely given up to whoredom, away from Jehovah. And he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; and she conceived and bore him a son.
And one of the seven angels, which had the seven bowls, came and spoke with me, saying, Come here, I will shew thee the sentence of the great harlot who sits upon the many waters; with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and they that dwell on the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication. And he carried me away in spirit to a desert; and I saw a woman sitting upon a scarlet beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was clothed in purple and scarlet, and had ornaments of gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and the unclean things of her fornication; and upon her forehead a name written, Mystery, great Babylon, the mother of the harlots, and of the abominations of the earth. And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus. And I wondered, seeing her, with great wonder. And the angel said to me, Why hast thou wondered? *I* will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast which carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. The beast which thou sawest was, and is not, and is about to come up out of the abyss and go into destruction: and they who dwell on the earth, whose names are not written from the founding of the world in the book of life, shall wonder, seeing the beast, that it was, and is not, and shall be present. Here is the mind that has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains, whereon the woman sits. And there are seven kings: five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; and when he comes he must remain [only] a little while. And the beast that was and is not, he also is an eighth, and is of the seven, and goes into destruction. And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have not yet received a kingdom, but receive authority as kings one hour with the beast. These have one mind, and give their power and authority to the beast. These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them; for he is Lord of lords and King of kings: and they [that are] with him called, and chosen, and faithful. And he says to me, The waters which thou sawest, where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues. And the ten horns which thou sawest, and the beast, these shall hate the harlot, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and shall burn her with fire; for God has given to their hearts to do his mind, and to act with one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast until the words of God shall be fulfilled. And the woman which thou sawest is the great city, which has kingship over the kings of the earth.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Zechariah 5
Commentary on Zechariah 5 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Sixth Vision: The Flying Roll, and the Woman in the Ephah - Zechariah 5:1-11
These two figures are so closely connected, that they are to be taken as one vision. The circumstance, that a pause is introduced between the first and second view, in which both the ecstatic elevation and the interpreting angel leave the prophet, so that it is stated in Zechariah 5:5 that “the angel came forth,” furnishes no sufficient reason for the assumption that there were two different visions. For the figure of the ephah with the woman sitting in it is also divided into two views, since the prophet first of all sees the woman and receives the explanation (Zechariah 5:5-8), and the further development of the vision is then introduced in Zechariah 5:9 with a fresh introductory formula, “And I lifted up my eyes, and saw.” And just as this introductory formula, through which new and different visions are introduced in Zechariah 2:1 and Zechariah 2:5, by no means warrants us in dividing what is seen here into two different visions; so there is nothing in the introduction in Zechariah 5:5 to compel us to separate the vision of the flying roll (Zechariah 5:1-4) from the following vision of the ephah, since there is no such difference in the actual contents of the two as to warrant such a separation. They neither stand in such a relation to one another, as that the first sets forth the extermination of sinners out of the holy land, and the second the extermination of sin itself, as Maurer supposes; nor does the one treat of the fate of the sinners and the other of the full measure of the sin; but the vision of the flying roll prepares the way for, and introduces, what is carried out in the vision of the ephah (Zechariah 5:5-11), and the connection between the two is indicated formally by the fact that the suffix in עינם in Zechariah 5:6 refers back to Zechariah 5:3 and Zechariah 5:4.
Zechariah 5:1. “And I lifted up my eyes again, and saw, and behold a flying roll. Zechariah 5:2. And he said to me, What seest thou? And I said, I see a flying roll; its length twenty cubits, and its breadth ten cubits. Zechariah 5:3. And he said to me, This is the curse that goeth forth over the whole land: for every one that stealeth will be cleansed away from this side, according to it; and every one that sweareth will be cleansed away from that side, according to it. Zechariah 5:4. I have caused it to go forth, is the saying of Jehovah of hosts, and it will come into the house of the thief, and into the house of him that sweareth by my name for deceit: and it will pass the night in the midst of his house, and consume both its beams and its stones.” The person calling the prophet's attention to the vision, and interpreting it, is the angelus interpres . This is not specially mentioned here, as being obvious from what goes before. The roll (book-scroll, m e gillâh = m e gillath sēpher , Ezekiel 2:9) is seen flying over the earth unrolled, so that its length and breadth can be seen. The statement as to its size is not to be regarded as “an approximative estimate,” so that the roll would be simply described as of considerable size (Koehler), but is unquestionably significant. It corresponds both to the size of the porch of Solomon's temple (1 Kings 6:3), and also to the dimensions of the holy place in the tabernacle, which was twenty cubits long and ten cubits broad. Hengstenberg, Hofmann, and Umbreit, following the example of Kimchi, assume that the reference is to the porch of the temple, and suppose that the roll has the same dimensions as this porch, to indicate that the judgment is “a consequence of the theocracy” or was to issue from the sanctuary of Israel, where the people assembled before the Lord. But the porch of the temple was neither a symbol of the theocracy, nor the place where the people assembled before the Lord, but a mere architectural ornament, which had no significance whatever in relation to the worship. The people assembled before the Lord in the court, to have reconciliation made for them with God by sacrifice; or they entered the holy place in the person of their sanctified mediators, the priests, as cleansed from sin, there to appear before God and engage in His spotless worship. The dimensions of the roll are taken from the holy place of the tabernacle, just as in the previous vision the candlestick was the mosaic candlestick of the tabernacle. Through the similarity of the dimensions of the roll to those of the holy place in the tabernacle, there is no intention to indicate that the curse proceeds from the holy place of the tabernacle or of the temple; for the roll would have issued from the sanctuary, if it had been intended to indicate this. Moreover, the curse or judgment does indeed begin at the house of God, but it does not issue or come from the house of God. Kliefoth has pointed to the true meaning in the following explanation which he gives: “The fact that the writing, which brings the curse upon all the sinners of the earth, has the same dimensions as the tabernacle, signifies that the measure will be meted out according to the measure of the holy place;” and again, “the measure by which this curse upon sinners will be meted out, will be the measure of the holy place.” With this measure would all sinners be measured, that they might be cut off from the congregation of the Lord, which appeared before God in the holy place.
The flight of the roll symbolized the going forth of the curse over the whole land. כּל־הארץ is rendered by Hofmann, Neumann, and Kliefoth “the whole earth,” because “it evidently signifies the whole earth in v. Zechariah 4:10, Zechariah 4:14, and Zechariah 6:5” (Kliefoth). But these passages, in which the Lord of the whole earth is spoken of, do not prove anything in relation to our vision, in which כּל־הארץ is unmistakeably limited to the land of Canaan (Judah) by the antithesis in Zechariah 5:11, “the land of Shinar.” If the sinners who are smitten by the curse proceeding over כּל־הארץ are to be carried into the land of Sinar , the former must be a definite land, and not the earth as the sum of all lands. It cannot be argued in opposition to this, that the sin of the land in which the true house of God and the true priesthood were, was wiped away by expiation, whereas the sin of the whole world would be brought into the land of judgment, when its measure was concluded by God; for this antithesis is foreign not only to this vision, but to the Scriptures universally. The Scriptures know nothing of any distribution or punishment of sins according to different lands, but simply according to the character of the sinners, viz., whether they are penitent or hardened. At the same time, the fact that כּל־הארץ denotes the whole of the land of Israel, by no means proves that our vision either treats of the “carrying away of Israel into exile,” which had already occurred (Ros.), or “sets before them a fresh carrying away into exile, and one still in the future” (Hengstenberg), or that on the coming of the millennial kingdom the sin and the sinners will be exterminated from the whole of the holy land, and the sin thrown back upon the rest of the earth, which is still under the power of the world (Hofmann). The vision certainly refers to the remote future of the kingdom of God; and therefore “the whole land” cannot be restricted to the extent and boundaries of Judaea or Palestine, but reaches as far as the spiritual Israel or church of Christ is spread over the earth; but there is no allusion in our vision to the millennial kingdom, and its establishment within the limits of the earthly Canaan. The curse falls upon all thieves and false swearers. הנּשׁבּע in Zechariah 5:3 is defined more precisely in Zechariah 5:4, as swearing in the name of Jehovah for deceit, and therefore refers to perjury in the broadest sense of the word, or to all abuse of the name of God for false, deceitful swearing. Thieves are mentioned for the sake of individualizing, as sinners against the second table of the decalogue; false swearers, as sinners against the first table. The repetition of מזּה כּמוה points to this; for mizzeh , repeated in correlative clauses, signifies hinc et illinc , hence and thence, i.e., on one side and the other (Exodus 17:12; Numbers 22:24; Ezekiel 47:7), and can only refer here to the fact that the roll was written upon on both sides, so that it is to be taken in close connection with כּמוה : “on this side ... and on that, according to it” (the roll), i.e., according to the curse written upon this side and that side of the roll. We have therefore to picture the roll to ourselves as having the curse against the thieves written upon the one side, and that against the perjurers upon the other. The supposition that mizzeh refers to כּל־הארץ is precluded most decidedly, by the fact that mizzeh does not mean “thence,” i.e., from the whole land, but when used adverbially of any place, invariably signifies “hence,” and refers to the place where the speaker himself is standing. Moreover, the double use of mizzeh is at variance with any allusion to hâ'ârets , as well as the fact that if it belonged to the verb, it would stand after כּמוה , whether before or after the verb. Niqqâh , the niphal , signifies here to be cleaned out, like καθαρίζεσωαι in Mark 7:19 (cf. 1 Kings 14:10; Deuteronomy 17:12). This is explained in Zechariah 5:4 thus: Jehovah causes the curse to go forth and enter into the house of the thief and perjurer, so that it will pass the night there, i.e., stay there ( lâneh third pers. perf. of lūn , from lânâh , to be blunted, like zûreh in Isaiah 59:5, and other verbal formations); it will not remain idle, however, but work therein, destroying both the house and sinners therein, so that beams and stones will be consumed (cf. 1 Kings 18:38). The suffix in כּלּתּוּ (for כּלּתהוּ , cf. Ges. §75, Anm. 19) refers to the house, of course including the inhabitants. The following nouns introduced with ואת are in explanatory apposition: both its beams and its stones. The roll therefore symbolizes the curse which will fall upon sinners throughout the whole land, consuming them with their houses, and thus sweeping them out of the nation of God.
To this there is appended in Zechariah 5:5-11 a new view, which exhibits the further fate of the sinners who have been separated from the congregation of the saints. Zechariah 5:5. “And the angel that talked with me went forth, and said to me, Lift up now thine eyes, and see, what is this that goeth out there? Zechariah 5:6. And I said, What is it? And he said, This is the ephah going out. And He said, This is their aspect in all the land. Zechariah 5:7. And behold a disk of lead was lifted up, and there was a woman sitting in the midst of the ephah. Zechariah 5:8. And he said, This is wickedness; and he cast it into the midst of the ephah, and cast the leaden weight upon its mouth.” With the disappearing of the previous vision, the angelus interpres had also vanished from the eyes of the prophet. After a short pause he comes out again, calls the prophet's attention to a new figure which emerges out of the cloud, and so comes within the range of vision ( היּוצאת הזּאת ), and informs him with regard to it: “This is the ephah which goeth out.” יצא , to go out, in other words, to come to view. The ephah was the greatest measure of capacity which really existed among the Hebrews for dry goods, and was about the size of a cubic foot; for the chōmer , which contained ten ephahs, appears to have had only an ideal existence, viz., for the purpose of calculation. The meaning of this figure is indicated generally in the words זאת עינם כב , the meaning of which depends upon the interpretation to be given to עינם . The suffix of this word can only refer to the sinners mentioned before, viz., the thieves and perjurers; for it is contrary to the Hebrew usage to suppose that the words refer to the expression appended, בּכל־הארץ , in the sense of “all those who are in the whole land” (Koehler). Consequently עין does not mean the eye, but adspectus , appearance, or shape, as in Leviticus 13:55; Ezekiel 1:4.; and the words have this meaning: The ephah (bushel) is the shape, i.e., represents the figure displayed by the sinners in all the land, after the roll of the curse has gone forth over the land, i.e., it shows into what condition they have come through that anathema (Kliefoth). The point of comparison between the ephah and the state into which sinners have come in consequence of the curse, does not consist in the fact that the ephah is carried away, and the sinners likewise (Maurer), nor in the fact that the sin now reaches its full measure (Hofm., Hengstenberg); for “the carrying away of the sinners does not come into consideration yet, and there is nothing at all here about the sin becoming full.” It is true that, according to what follows, sin sits in the ephah as a woman, but there is nothing to indicate that the ephah is completely filled by it, so that there is no further room in it; and this thought would be generally out of keeping here. The point of comparison is rather to be found in the explanation given by Kliefoth: “Just as in a bushel the separate grains are all collected together, so will the individual sinners over the whole earth be brought into a heap, when the curse of the end goes forth over the whole earth.” We have no hesitation in appropriating this explanation, although we have not rendered הארץ “the earth,” inasmuch as at the final fulfilment of the vision the holy land will extend over all the earth. Immediately afterwards the prophet is shown still more clearly what is in the ephah. A covering of lead ( kikkâr , a circle, a rounding or a circular plate) rises up, or is lifted up, and then he sees a woman sitting in the ephah ( 'achath does not stand for the indefinite article, but is a numeral, the sinners brought into a heap appearing as a unity, i.e., as one living personality, instead of forming an atomistic heap of individuals). This woman, who had not come into the ephah now for the first time, but was already sitting there, and was only seen now that the lid was raised, is described by the angel as mirsha‛ath , ungodliness, as being wickedness embodied, just as in 2 Chronicles 24:7 this name is given to godless Jezebel. Thereupon he throws her into the ephah, out of which she had risen up, and shuts it with the leaden lid, to carry her away, as the following vision shows, out of the holy land.
Zechariah 5:9. “And I lifted up my eyes, and saw, and behold there came forth two women, and wind in their wings, and they had wings like a stork's wings; and they carried the ephah between earth and heaven. Zechariah 5:10. And I said to the angel that talked with me, Whither are these taking the ephah? Zechariah 5:11. And he said to me, To build it a dwelling in the land of Shinar: and it will be placed and set up there upon its stand.” The meaning of this new scene may easily be discovered. The ephah with the woman in it is carried away between earth and heaven, i.e., through the air. Women carry it because there is a woman inside; and two women, because two persons are required to carry so large and heavy a measure, that they may lay hold of it on both sides ( תּשּׂנה with the א dropped; cf. Ges. §74, Anm. 4). These women have wings, because it passes through the air; and a stork's wings, because these birds have broad pinions, and not because the stork is a bird of passage or an unclean bird. The wings are filled with wind, that they may be able to carry their burden with greater velocity through the air. The women denote the instruments or powers employed by God to carry away the sinners out of His congregation, without any special allusion to this or the other historical nation. This is all that we have to seek for in these features, which only serve to give distinctness to the picture. But the statement in Zechariah 5:11 is significant: “to build it a house in the land of Shinar.” The pronoun לה with the suffix softened instead of לּהּ , as in Exodus 9:18; Leviticus 13:4 (cf. Ewald, §247, d ), refers grammatically to האיפה ; but so far as the sense is concerned, it refers to the woman sitting in the ephah, since a house is not built for a measure, but only for men to dwell in. This also applies to the feminine form הנּתחה , and to the suffix in מכנתהּ . The building of a house indicates that the woman is to dwell there permanently, as is still more clearly expressed in the second hemistich. הוּכן refers to בּית , and is not to be taken hypothetically, in the sense of “as soon as the house shall be restored,” but is a perfect with Vav consec. ; and hūkhan , the hophal of kūn , is not to be taken in the sense of restoring, but, in correspondence with m e khunâh , in the sense of establishing or building on firm foundations. M e khunâh : the firmly established house. In this the woman of sin is brought to rest. The land in which the woman of sin carried away out of the holy land is permanently to dwell, is the land of Shinar . This name is not to be identified with Babel , so as to support the conclusion that it refers to a fresh removal of the people of Israel into exile; but according to Genesis 10:10 and Genesis 11:2, Shinar is the land in which Nimrod founded the first empire, and where the human race built the tower of Babel which was to reach to the sky. The name is not to be taken geographically here as an epithet applied to Mesopotamia, but is a notional or real definition, which affirms that the ungodliness carried away out of the sphere of the people of God will have its permanent settlement in the sphere of the imperial power that is hostile to God. The double vision of this chapter, therefore, shows the separation of the wicked from the congregation of the Lord, and their banishment into and concentration within the ungodly kingdom of the world. This distinction and separation commenced with the coming of the Messiah, and runs through all the ages of the spread and development of the Christian church, until at the time of the end they will come more and more into outward manifestation; and the evil, having been sifted out by the judicial power of God and His Spirit, will form itself into a Babel of the last days, as Ezekiel 38 and 39 clearly show, and attempt a last struggle with the kingdom of God, in which it will be overcome and destroyed by the last judgment.