Seers are most needed at times of trauma and transition, as major shifts, personal and public, require vision, inspiration, and a larger perspective than the daily grind.
That’s where Zechariah comes in.
Zechariah, son of Berechiah, son of Iddo traces his lineage at least two generations back - likely to Judean refugees who were exiled from Jerusalem in 587 BCE. It’s most likely a prestigious line of priests and leaders.
The mention of his immediate ancestors in the opening line of the book is not incidental. Like Haggai, the 10th of the 12 minor prophets, who lived at the same time and place as Zechariah, this prophet is among the first generation of Judeans who are coming back to rebuild their homes and pick up where their grandparents were forced to pause.
Like all pioneering efforts - this one is far from simple. Zechariah, whose name means ‘God Remembers’ - will work hard to give the hard working people visions that will inspire and support the rebuilding efforts, despite many obstacles.
His words are carefully dated. Like Haggai, he began recording his visions in the year 520 BCE - the 2nd year of the Persian Emperor Darius II. It’s a brief political moment of relative respite for the people and a chance to think a bit beyond immediate survival.
More specifically, his first major prophecy was delivered five months after the launch of Haggai’s campaign to get the temple rebuilt, rousing public support to get the modest building project to resume.
Like Haggai, Zechariah is known as one of the ‘latter prophets’ -- distinguished from the earlier prophets whose voices were heard before the Babylonian exile. The dates he chooses to locate his prophetices also gives us an indication of the shift from an earlier era in Jewish history. The differences can be seen in the choice of some words that indicate cultural shifts. The Introduction to his second vision contains the name of a month that would not have been known or used prior to the Babylonian exile:
בְּיוֹם֩ עֶשְׂרִ֨ים וְאַרְבָּעָ֜ה לְעַשְׁתֵּֽי־עָשָׂ֥ר חֹ֙דֶשׁ֙ הוּא־חֹ֣דֶשׁ שְׁבָ֔ט בִּשְׁנַ֥ת שְׁתַּ֖יִם לְדָרְיָ֑וֶשׁ הָיָ֣ה דְבַר־יְהֹוָ֗ה אֶל־זְכַרְיָה֙ בֶּן־בֶּ֣רֶכְיָ֔הוּ בֶּן־עִדּ֥וֹא הַנָּבִ֖יא לֵאמֹֽר׃
“On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month of the second year of Darius—the month of Shevat—this word of YHWH came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berechiah son of Iddo”
Zechariah 1: 7
The Month of Shevat is familiar today to anybody who knows the Jewish calendar - but it’s a Babylonian name, adopted, like other cultural and religious concepts, by the Persians empire - and by the exiled Jews who came back to Jerusalem but kept the empire’s calendar. These are still the names of the months we use today.
There is another intriguing reference to these foreign month names, demonstrating the gradual integration of the empire’s calendar onto the Jewish year. The so-called ‘Passover Papyrus’ is a fragment of a letter sent from a Judean official in Jerusalem to the Jewish communal leaders on the tiny island of Elephantine off the shore of Egypt, in 419 BCE - a century after Zechariah.
Dr. Idan Dershowitz writes about the signfinace of this letter and the community whose fascinating story it tells. The sender of the letter, Hannaiah, discusses Passover and names the month of its celebration not by its biblical name, Aviv, but by the Babylonian name, Nissan.
But what Zecharia is really famous for is not how he named units of time but how he transcended time and space through his nocturnal visions. The first chapter opens a long series of mystical revelations that the prophet himself admits are sometimes beyond his comprehension.
In his 11th century CE commentary on the prophets, Rashi adds an unusual note:
“The prophecy of Zechariah is very opaque because it contains visions that resemble dreams that invite interpretation, but we are unable to verify their interpretations until the coming of the Righteous Teacher.”
By ‘righteous teacher’ Rashi means the Messiah. In other words, this makes no sense and best to try and read Zechariah's words for whatever we make of them.
This is how the first vision begins:
רָאִ֣יתִי ׀ הַלַּ֗יְלָה וְהִנֵּה־אִישׁ֙ רֹכֵב֙ עַל־ס֣וּס אָדֹ֔ם וְה֣וּא עֹמֵ֔ד בֵּ֥ין הַהֲדַסִּ֖ים אֲשֶׁ֣ר בַּמְּצֻלָ֑ה וְאַחֲרָיו֙ סוּסִ֣ים אֲדֻמִּ֔ים שְׂרֻקִּ֖ים וּלְבָנִֽים׃
“In the night, I had a vision. I saw a man, mounted on a red horse, standing among the myrtles in the Deep, and behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses.”
Zechariah 1.8
Who is the rider, what’s with the myrtles, and why the specific colors of the horses? (Sorrel seems an unclear but most popular translation. Some suggest it means ‘black’)
This first vision offers hope and consolation, a vindication that after seventy years of exile, as envisioned by Jeremiah, the time has come for consolation - and the return to the land.
In the coming chapters the visions will add up and deepen, with some of these motifs returning, slowly revealing the bigger picture of what was a complicated and layered process of political upheavals, national formation and spiritual awakening. In the next chapter, the man on the red horse will deliver the rest of the message.
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