Zechariah 12

Jerusalem as a Burdensome Stone

The "idol shepherd" is Antichrist, whom retributive judgment is to raise up in the land of Judea in the last times. "If another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." He shall in the end suffer the sternest vengeance of God. This is no modern opinion.

There is no reason that I see for identifying the stone in Zech. 12:3, with that in Matt. 21:44. The former evidently means Jerusalem itself, the latter the Lord Himself in two positions answering to the two advents. First, in His humiliation, He is a stone as it were in the ground, and "whosoever shall fall on it shall be broken," verified in all unbelievers, but especially in the Jews; next, He is exalted to heaven, and coming again in power and great glory, He will execute destructive judgment — "on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." (Cf. Dan. 2, 7; Rev. 19). "A burdensome Stone" is another idea, and will be true of Jerusalem in the latter day, when the Assyrian heads a great Gentile confederacy after the Antichrist is disposed of, which is the subject of Zech. 12:2-6, 14:1-3: also Isaiah, Micah, Daniel, and other prophets, treat of this closing king of the North.

There is no intermingling of the Church or Christian body with the subjects of this prophecy. There may have been some partial application in the past, as there will assuredly be a complete fulfillment in the future; but it is Judah and Jerusalem that are in question, whatever profit the Church or Christian may and ought to draw from this as from all Scripture.

"They Shall Look on Me Whom They Have Pierced"

The double reference of John 19:36, and Rev. 1:7, is simply to link both advents into the prophecy, which mainly bears on the second, but presupposes the first, "They shall look on me whom they have pierced." But Rev. 1:7 is so far from intimating a general conversion of mankind previous to the return of the Lord, that it plainly enough insinuates their then unbelief, for "all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." He will be unwelcome to them.

The mourning of godly awakened consciences, when Jehovah-Jesus is seen, to the final deliverance of Jerusalem, and the total overthrow of all their Gentile foes, is most strikingly described in verses 10-14, but it is in terms which exclude the revival in Ezra's time, save as being a feeble earnest. Each felt alone with the Lord; and those families are specially named who represent prominent classes in Israel from the beginning, and throughout their history.

In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon. And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart; all the families that remain, every family apart, and their wives apart {Zech. 12:11-14}.

This is the individual, personal, deep, and genuine repentance of Israel when they see Him Whom they pierced. It is not a national, formal, or superficial conversion; it is the deep anguish of a people who have at last recognised their Messiah and mourned for their sin in rejecting Him. Each family apart, each heart alone with God in its grief and its restoration. This is the prelude to the great deliverance and blessing of the millennial age.