Zechariah 10:3-12

This is made up of several fragments. Zechariah 10:3 a is apparently the beginning of a denunciation of Israel's leaders founded upon Ezekiel 34, whereas Zechariah 10:3 b describes the Lord as visiting His distressed sheep, and making them as his warhorse. The cue which has caused Zechariah 10:3 b to be attached to Zechariah 10:3 a is the word visit, which the EV renders punish in the first instance. The Jewish sheep became warhorses in the Maccabean struggle.

Zechariah 10:4, which is a later insertion, presents considerable difficulty.

Zechariah 10:4 a apparently means that Judah possesses all the requisites of an autonomous state; the last clause, however, seems to mean that the foreign exaotors of tribute will depart from the land (cf. Zechariah 9:8, 1Ma_13:36 ff.).

Zechariah 10:5 originally followed Zechariah 10:3; it describes the Maccabean victory, the description being continued in Zechariah 10:7.

Zechariah 10:6 is an insertion from another source, though perhaps of the same date.

Zechariah 10:8. A Prediction of the Return of the Dispersion.Will hiss, or better, will whistle (i.e. as a signal), is perhaps suggested by Isaiah 5:26; Isaiah 7:18. The sowing of Israel among the nations may imply the increase of Israel, as seed increases when it is sown (cf. Hosea 2:23). Zechariah 10:11 is an independent prediction of the return of the dispersion, perhaps by the author of Zechariah 9:1. For the sea of affliction read with Wellhausen the sea of Egypt, i.e. the Gulf of Suez. The smiting of the sea is here, as in Isaiah 11:15, a metaphorical description of the removal of the political obstacles in the way of the return of the dispersion. Assyria, as is stated above, means the Syro-Greek empire (cf. Ezra 6:22; Isaiah 11:11 *, Isaiah 19:23 f.). This passage strongly resembles Isaiah 11:11 f. For they shall walk up and down the LXX has rightly they shall make their boast.