I. THE MARSHALLING OF THE FORCES. The "trumpet" calls to arms. On one side are the armies of heaven, and on the other the hosts of darkness.

II. THE TERRIBLENESS OF THE STRUGGLE. Characterized by:

1. Might, as of a storm carrying havoc far and wide.

2. Fury, as of wild beasts raging and ravening.

3. Deadliness, as of arrows that strike quick, and with fatal effect.

III. THE SPLENDOUR OF THE VICTORY. Complete overthrow of God's enemies. Establishment of his people as a flock, in unity and peace. Human agency, but Divine efficiency. Everything here to rouse ardour, to quicken flagging energies, and to nerve the soul to the highest endeavours, under the eye of the great Captain of our salvation. - F.

The double recompense which the Lord will make to His people will consist in the fact that He not only liberates them out of captivity and bondage, and makes them into an independent nation, but that He helps them to victory over the power of the world, so that they will tread it down, i.e. completely subdue it. The first thought is not explained more fully because it is contained implicite in the promise of return to a strong place, the double only is more distinctly defined, namely, the victory over Javan. The expression, "I stretch," etc., implies that the Lord will subdue the enemies by Judah and Ephraim, and therefore Israel will carry on this conflict in the power of its God — Keil.

I. THAT GOD WORKS AMONGST THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH. God is here represented as raising up Zion against Greece. "And raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece." The literal reference, it may be, is to the help which He would render the Maccabees, as the heroic leaders of the Jews, to overcome the successors of the Grecian Alexander, Antiochus Epiphanes, and the other Grecian oppressors of Judah. He works with the Jew and the Greek, or Gentile — the two great divisions of mankind. He is in their conflicts and their battles.

1. He works universally amongst men. He works with the "sons" of Zion and the "sons" of Greece. He operates with all, with the remote and the distant, with the little and the great, with the good and the bad; He is in all human history. All good He originates, all evil He overrules.

2. He works by human agency amongst men. "When I have bent Judah for Me, filled the bow with Ephraim." God carries out His purposes with man by the agency of man; wicked kings are His tools, obscure saints are His ministers of state.

3. He works manifestly amongst men. "And the Lord shall be seen over them"; or, as Keil renders it, "Jehovah shall appear above them."

4. He works terribly amongst men. "And His arrow shall go forth as the lightning, and the Lord God shall blow the trumpet, and shall go with whirlwinds of the south." "Like lightning will His arrow go forth, and the Lord Jehovah will blow the trumpets, and will pass along in storms of the south." — Keil. He is in the crashings of conflagrating cities, in the booming thunders of contending armies, in the wild whirlwinds of battling kingdoms; with Him there is "terrible majesty" as He proceeds on His march in human history.

II. God works amongst the nations of the earth IN THE INTERESTS OF HIS PEOPLE.

1. He works for their defence. "The Lord of hosts shall defend them," or shelter them.

2. He works for their victory. "They shall devour and subdue with sling stones," etc. "Jehovah of hosts shall protect them, and they shall devour and tread down the sling. stones, they shall drink, they shall be noisy, as those who drink wine; they shall be full as the bowl, as the corners of the altar." — Henderson. The idea is their complete triumph over their enemies. Hengstenberg observes that there is not the least indication that a spiritual conflict is intended. Quite true, but a spiritual conflict it may illustrate, and its victory too.

3. He works for their salvation. "And the Lord their God shall save them in that day as the flock of His people."

4. He works for their glory. "They shall be as the stones of a crown, lifted up as an ensign upon His land." Or, as Hengstenberg renders it, "For crowned jewels shall they be rising up upon His land." There is true glory awaiting the good. There is a crown of glory laid up in heaven, etc.

5. He works for their perfection. "For how great is His goodness, and how great is His beauty! Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids." We accept the rendering of Keil here, which is not only faithful to the original, but in harmony with the context. The prophet is speaking of the high privileges of God's people, and not of the excellences of the Supreme. It is an exclamation of admiration of the high privileges of the godly.

(Homilist.)

Aram, Javan, Jebusites, Zechariah, ZidonAshdod, Ashkelon, Damascus, Ekron, Euphrates River, Gaza, Greece, Hadrach, Hamath, Jerusalem, Philistia, Sidon, Tyre, ZionArms, Arrow, Arrows, Bend, Bent, Bow, Brandish, Ephraim, E'phraim, Fill, Filled, Greece, Hero, Indeed, Javan, Judah, Mighty, O, Raise, Raised, Rouse, Sons, Stir, Stirred, Sword, Trodden, War, Warrior's, Wield, Zion1. God defends his church.
9. Zion is exhorted to rejoice for the coming of Christ, and his peaceable kingdom.
12. God's promises of victory and defense.

Zechariah 9:13

     5206   archers
     5236   bow and arrow
     8728   enemies, of Israel and Judah

Zechariah 9:9-13

     1443   revelation, OT

Messiah's Entrance into Jerusalem
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: He is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass. -- And He shall speak peace unto the heathen. T he narrowness and littleness of the mind of fallen man are sufficiently conspicuous in the idea he forms of magnificence and grandeur. The pageantry and parade of a Roman triumph, or of an eastern monarch, as described in history, exhibit him to us …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1

And the Manner of his Entry into Jerusalem, which was the Capital of Judæa...
And the manner of His entry into Jerusalem, which was the capital of Judæa, where also was His royal seat and the temple of God, the prophet Isaiah declares: Say ye to the daughter of Sion, Behold a king corneth unto thee meek and sitting upon an ass, a colt the foal of an ass. [233] (Isa. lxii. 11, Zech. ix. 9) For, sitting. on an ass's colt, so He entered into Jerusalem, the multitudes strewing and putting down for Him their garments. And by the daughter of Sion he means Jerusalem. …
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching

Caesarea. Strato's Tower.
The Arabian interpreter thinks the first name of this city was Hazor, Joshua 11:1. The Jews, Ekron, Zephaniah 2:4. "R. Abhu saith," (he was of Caesarea,) "Ekron shall be rooted out"; this is Caesarea, the daughter of Edom, which is situated among things profane. She was a goad, sticking in Israel, in the days of the Grecians. But when the kingdom of the Asmonean family prevailed, it overcame her, &c. R. Josi Bar Chaninah saith, What is that that is written, 'And Ekron shall be as a Jebusite?' (Zech …
John Lightfoot—From the Talmud and Hebraica

History of the Interpretation.
1. AMONG THE JEWS. This History, as to its essential features, might, a priori, be sketched with tolerable certainty. From the nature of the case, we could scarcely expect that the Jews should have adopted views altogether erroneous as to the subject of the prophecy in question; for the Messiah appears in it, not in His humiliation, but in His glory--rich in gifts and blessings, and Pelagian self-delusion will, a priori, return an affirmative answer to the question as to whether one is …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

Hosanna!
Assuredly, this honor paid to our Lord was passing strange; a gleam of sunlight in a day of clouds, a glimpse of summer-tide in a long and dreary winter. He that was, as a rule, "despised and rejected of men", was for the moment surrounded with the acclaim of the crowd. All men saluted him that day with their Hosannas, and the whole city was moved. It was a gala day for the disciples, and a sort of coronation day for their Lord. Why was the scene permitted? What was its meaning? The marvel is, that …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891

And thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, too little to be among the thousands of Judah
"And thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, too little to be among the thousands of Judah, out of thee shall come forth unto Me (one) [Pg 480] to be Ruler in Israel; and His goings forth are the times of old, the days of eternity." The close connection of this verse with what immediately precedes (Caspari is wrong in considering iv. 9-14 as an episode) is evident, not only from the [Hebrew: v] copulative, and from the analogy of the near relation of the announcement of salvation to the prophecy of disaster …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

The Christian State
Scripture references: Matthew 22:17-22; 17:24-27; Acts 23:5; John 6:15; Matthew 4:8-10; John 18:36-38; Mark 14; 61,62; John 18:33; 19:19; Isaiah 9:6,7; 60:3; Zechariah 9:10; Daniel 7:14; Matthew 26:64; 26:53,54; 16:16,17; 25:31,32. CHRIST AND THE STATE The Relation of Christ to the State.--He was an intense patriot. He loved His country. The names of His great countrymen, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joshua and David, were ever on His lips. He offered Himself as the national Messiah (Matthew 21:1-17), …
Henry T. Sell—Studies in the Life of the Christian

Jesus' Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem.
(from Bethany to Jerusalem and Back, Sunday, April 2, a.d. 30.) ^A Matt. XXI. 1-12, 14-17; ^B Mark XI. 1-11; ^C Luke XIX. 29-44; ^D John XII. 12-19. ^c 29 And ^d 12 On the morrow [after the feast in the house of Simon the leper] ^c it came to pass, when he he drew nigh unto Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount that is called Olivet, ^a 1 And when they came nigh unto Jerusalem, and came unto Bethphage unto { ^b at} ^a the mount of Olives [The name, Bethphage, is said to mean house of figs, but the …
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

The First Day in Passion-Week - Palm-Sunday - the Royal Entry into Jerusalem
At length the time of the end had come. Jesus was about to make Entry into Jerusalem as King: King of the Jews, as Heir of David's royal line, with all of symbolic, typic, and prophetic import attaching to it. Yet not as Israel after the flesh expected its Messiah was the Son of David to make triumphal entrance, but as deeply and significantly expressive of His Mission and Work, and as of old the rapt seer had beheld afar off the outlined picture of the Messiah-King: not in the proud triumph of war-conquests, …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah

The Formation of the Old Testament Canon
[Sidenote: Israel's literature at the beginning of the fourth century before Christ] Could we have studied the scriptures of the Israelitish race about 400 B.C., we should have classified them under four great divisions: (1) The prophetic writings, represented by the combined early Judean, Ephraimite, and late prophetic or Deuteronomic narratives, and their continuation in Samuel and Kings, together with the earlier and exilic prophecies; (2) the legal, represented by the majority of the Old Testament …
Charles Foster Kent—The Origin & Permanent Value of the Old Testament

The Blessings of Noah Upon Shem and Japheth. (Gen. Ix. 18-27. )
Ver. 20. "And Noah began and became an husbandman, and planted vineyards."--This does not imply that Noah was the first who began to till the ground, and, more especially, to cultivate the vine; for Cain, too, was a tiller of the ground, Gen. iv. 2. The sense rather is, that Noah, after the flood, again took up this calling. Moreover, the remark has not an independent import; it serves only to prepare the way for the communication of the subsequent account of Noah's drunkenness. By this remark, …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

The Quotation in Matt. Ii. 6.
Several interpreters, Paulus especially, have asserted that the interpretation of Micah which is here given, was that of the Sanhedrim only, and not of the Evangelist, who merely recorded what happened and was said. But this assertion is at once refuted when we consider the object which Matthew has in view in his entire representation of the early life of Jesus. His object in recording the early life of Jesus is not like that of Luke, viz., to communicate historical information to his readers. …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

Fifthly, as this Revelation, to the Judgment of Right and Sober Reason,
appears of itself highly credible and probable, and abundantly recommends itself in its native simplicity, merely by its own intrinsic goodness and excellency, to the practice of the most rational and considering men, who are desirous in all their actions to have satisfaction and comfort and good hope within themselves, from the conscience of what they do: So it is moreover positively and directly proved to be actually and immediately sent to us from God, by the many infallible signs and miracles …
Samuel Clarke—A Discourse Concerning the Being and Attributes of God

The Gospel Feast
"When Jesus then lifted up His eyes, and saw a great company come unto Him, He saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread that these may eat?"--John vi. 5. After these words the Evangelist adds, "And this He said to prove him, for He Himself knew what He would do." Thus, you see, our Lord had secret meanings when He spoke, and did not bring forth openly all His divine sense at once. He knew what He was about to do from the first, but He wished to lead forward His disciples, and to arrest and …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII

The Gospel of the Kingdom.
"This is He whom Seers in old time Chanted of with one accord; Whom the voices of the Prophets Promised in their faithful word." We have seen that, in the providence of God, John the Baptist was sent to proclaim to the world that "The Kingdom of Heaven" was at hand, and to point out the King. And as soon as the Herald had raised the expectation of men by the proclamation of the coming Kingdom, our Lord began His public ministry, the great object of which was the founding of His Kingdom for the salvation …
Edward Burbidge—The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it?

Zechariah
CHAPTERS I-VIII Two months after Haggai had delivered his first address to the people in 520 B.C., and a little over a month after the building of the temple had begun (Hag. i. 15), Zechariah appeared with another message of encouragement. How much it was needed we see from the popular despondency reflected in Hag. ii. 3, Jerusalem is still disconsolate (Zech. i. 17), there has been fasting and mourning, vii. 5, the city is without walls, ii. 5, the population scanty, ii. 4, and most of the people …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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