ZECHARIAH 9


1 The burden [oracle of doom] of the word of Yahweh in [RV - "upon". The burden related to the land, it was not given "in" the land] the land of Hadrach, and Damascus shall be the rest thereof: when the eyes of man, as of all the tribes of Israel, shall be toward Yahweh.


Hadrach 


It has been identifed as Haearika mentioned by Assyrian kings as an Aramean district near Damascus and and Hamath (H Rawlinson).

The decisive battle of Issus in which Alexander defeated the Persians, laid open

Syria and Palestine to his attack. He invaded the land of Hadrach, occupied Damascus, and from from there moved against Tyre and Sidon.

The Christadelphian Expositor



11 As for thee also, by the blood of thy covenant I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit wherein is no water.

...These prisoners are the King's dead, called "thy dead" and "my dead body, " by the prophet in the song he inscribes to the Lord for Judah, saying, "Thy dead shall live (as) my dead body shall they arise." Then calling, to this mystical body of the dead, barred in by the gates of the invisible, he says, "Awake, and sing ye that dwell in the dust!" and reverting to the Lord he adds, "Thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead (Isa 26: 19)."

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Yahweh's covenant with Moses inferior to 'the better hope' (Heb 7:19)


Moses set before them such an occupation of the land as is amply illustrated in their turbulent and eventful history. They had possessed the land indeed; but the Mosaic testament gave them no other hope than a prolonged, and prosperous, and peaceful life in it, if they forsook not the covenant. This was a hope, like the hope of the nations, bounded by things seen and temporal.

After death Moses promised them nothing in his will, not even resurrection. The better covenant, however, purged by the blood of Jesus did. It promised them a resurrection from the dead; it promised them incorruptibility and life; it promised them that they should "possess the land, and dwell therein forever;' it promised them exaltation to the kingdom and the power, and the glory to be manifested there; and to the possession of dominion over all the nations of the earth; it promised them the inheritance of these things when the seed of Abraham and of David should sit upon the throne of his glory; and as the Branch of righteousness, execute judgment and justice in the land. This was the better hope of the better testament, and surpassed the Mosaic in desirableness, as infinitely as things unseen and eternal do those that are seen and temporal.

But as "all the people" were sprinkled with the blood by which Moses dedicated the covenant, he enjoined upon them before they could attain to the inferior hope it set before them, so also is it necessary that every one, without exception, should be sprinkled with the precious blood of the better testament, even with that of Jesus, before he can become entitled to the better hope.

The blood of the New Covenant speaks better things than the blood of the Mosaic. It speaks of the "good things to come" of which Jesus is the high-priest, and not Aaron. It speaks of the good things of the better hope, and of the eternal redemption he hath obtained for his people individually and nationally. It is Israel's Hope emphatically; and no gentile man or nation can partake of it, that is not sprinkled with the blood of the covenant that sets it forth.

Even Israel's own nation will partake of it in no sense until "all the people" are sprinkled by the covenant blood; for it is by virtue of that blood alone, that they possess the land to be expelled no more; and as for the righteous dead, it is 

"by the blood of thy covenant, O Messiah, that Yahweh sends forth thy prisoners out of the pit, in which there is no water."

But Moses sprinkled the Book and all the people with a bunch of hyssop and scarlet wool. He had a vessel containing the water and the blood within convenient reach; but where is the blood of the better covenant? How can access be obtained to it? How can it be sprinkled upon all the people from age to age, and generation to generation, who shall inherit the hope when the time of its development shall arrive? These are questions easily replied to from the testimony of God.

The blood of the covenant was poured out of Jesus' side, bathing his body, and dripping on the dust of Palestine. Had any one caught the blood in a vessel, and with a bunch of hyssop and scarlet wool sprinkled even believing people around, it would have availed them nothing. It would have been presumptive evidence that those upon whom it was found had been engaged in his murder; but it would have been no proof of their interest in the hope of the covenant which it dedicated.

It was, when pouring out, the blood of an unrisen Christ; and therefore of no then present efficacy. After Jesus had come to life again, and ascended to the Father, the blood which was dried up was nowhere to be found here; nor if to be found, was it then known to what use it was to be applied. It is evident, therefore, that the existence of, or accessibility to the material blood, is not a question needing to be entertained; and that it was not intended to be used ceremonially, as Moses used the blood of his will.

Romish priests pretend to manufacture, or rather incantate wine into material blood of Christ, which like greedy cannibals they permit none to quaff, but their impious selves. But the common use of the covenant blood in sprinkling or drinking was never intended. The blood of the covenant which sanctifies, is no common or unholy thing. It is too precious to be dispensed indiscriminately in any sense; or to be placed at the disposal of ignorant and fleshly-minded priests.

Save the drops that bedewed the dust, Christ took with him his blood to heaven; for "with his own blood he entered in once into the holy place," into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us." Standing there before the throne, he appeared as a lamb that had been slain, his wool of snowy white, dyed scarlet with his blood. There is the blood of the covenant; not on earth, but in the holiest of all.

Mystery of the Covenant of the Holy Land explained.



14 And Yahweh shall be seen over them, and his arrow shall go forth as the lightning: and Adonai Yahweh shall blow the [7th] trumpet, and shall go with whirlwinds of the south.

The "lightnings" and "arrows" of the Eternal Spirit are to scatter and put the armies of the nations to the rout.

An arrow is an instrument of death, and requires a bow for its projection, strong and well strung, to give the arrow the velocity and deadliness of lightning. Now, the prophets tell us that Judah, Ephraim, and the resurrected Sons of Zion, are Yahweh's bow and arrow, battleaxe and sword. But before they are developed in this character, they are "prisoners of hope in the pit where no water is" of life, physical or national.

They must, therefore, become the subject of a personal and political resurrection; those who are dead in the grave, of a personal; and Judah and Ephraim dispersed among the nations, politically dead and buried there, of a national resurrection, "standing upon their feet an exceedingly great army" ready for action as the result (Ezek. 37:10).

With reference to this crisis the Spirit of Christ in the prophet saith,

"Fear not thou worm Jacob, ye men of Israel: I will help thee, saith Yahweh, even thy near kinsman, the Holy One of Israel. Behold I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument, having teeth; thou shalt thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills as chaff. Thou shalt fan them and the wind shall carry them away, and the whirlwind shall scatter them; and thou shalt rejoice in YAHWEH (He who shall be), and shalt glory in the Holy One of Israel -- i.e., Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews" (Isaiah 41:14-16).

Phanerosis - His Face As The Appearance of Lightning" 

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This trumpet thus divinely blown, is the winding up of the seventh apocalyptic trumpet. All the preceding events of the seven are operative to the development of this crisis in which is "filled up the wrath of Deity." The sounding by Adonai Yahweh of this closing blast of the seven is the great apocalyptic day of sacrifice - the slaying of the beasts, before the sins of the nations are covered over, and they become "blessed with faithful Abraham," and "in Abraham and his seed."

He executes the Second and Third angel-missions, reaps the harvest, and treads the winepress. All this pertains to "the war of the great day of Almighty Power." It prostrates Babylon, breaks in pieces the powers of the nations, and establishes the power of the kingdom in all the earth.

The final purpose, then, of the seven trumpets is to abolish the Laodicean Apostasy, which enthroned itself in the reign of Constantine the First, and of which he was the new-born defender of its faith. This is the grand and glorious consummation prepared for the Catholic and Protestant hierarchies of what the world styles "Christendom."

They will then have answered their purpose in the providence of heaven of a spiritual

police in aid of the civil government of the nations. There will be no more any use for them; because the nations being enlightened and blessed, will no longer require deceivers and impostors to rule them by terror and imposition.

"All nations shall come and worship before thee, Ο Lord; for thy judgments are made manifest" - Apoc. 15:4.



15 Yahweh of hosts shall defend them; and they shall devour, and subdue with sling stones; and they shall drink, and make a noise as through wine; and they shall be filled like bowls, and as the corners of the altar.

"The slingers of stones," or as we term them in modern technique, the gunners, cannoniers, or artillerists, whose ordinance is the glory and strength of the armies of the world --the fire and brimstone of their warfare shall be conquered; "they shall conquer the slingers of stones" (Zech. 9:15 -- R.V.), and scatter their hosts as chaff before the whirlwinds of Teman.

Phanerosis - His Face As The Appearance of Lightning"



16 And Yahweh their Elohim shall save them in that day as the flock of his people: for they shall be as the stones of a crown, lifted up as an ensign upon his land.

The result is the destruction of the army of the Gog nations, of which only

'a sixth part'

escapes; and the setting up of the ensign erect again, no more to be trampled under feet of the Gentiles.

...The colonization I termed, 'a lifting up of an ensign,' (a phrase of comparison of course, 'as' being understood,) to distinguish it from the lifting up of the Lord, and by the Lord—an ensign lifted up by the British power; itself, however, unconscious that the colonization was a sign.

...The battle of Armageddon, which breaks the Image, is at the Lord's coming; the war, which reduces its fragments to chaff, is after his return. Ezekiel speaks of the battle in particular; and in the conclusion of his prophecy announces the result of the general war, which is not only the comminution [breaking to powder] of the whole image, but the full accomplishment of the work of restoration, as expressed in the words,

'I have gathered them unto their own land, and have left none of them any more there'

in the enemy's country. 'They that dwell in the cities of Israel,' who go forth to burn the weapons and bury the slain, are precisely the survivors of that colony residing in the land at the time of the battle, to save whom the Lord strikes the blow.

The salvation of this third part by the Advent victory is the beginning of deliverance to the whole nation. It must have been pre-adventually settled in the land, or it could not be there to witness the fight. It would be very incongruous for there to be so great a carnage, and all the survivors fled, and no Israelites at hand to put Gog's multitude under ground.

The circumstances of the case evidently necessitate a pre-adventual settlement to some extent.

True; the Jews were to be 'led away captive into all the nations,' (ta ethnee,) but it does not say that they were all to continue captives in exile, without remission, till the times of the Gentiles were fulfilled. They were led away by the Roman power into all the nations of that dominion; but not into 'all nations,' and 'all the world,' in the modern Gentile sense of those phrases.

It is Jerusalem that is to be trodden down of the Gentiles until the fulfilment of their times. A little transient good fortune to the city in no way affects the verity of this. Jerusalem, in the days of the Saracens and Crusaders, became the throne of a kingdom which continued many years.

'King of Jerusalem, ' is [was] one of his Austrian Apostolic Majesty's titles, derived from his ancestral relation to that Kingdom. Hence, as in the days of Pontius Pilate, the Jews acknowledged 'no other king but Cæsar;' so now [1852], Cæsar, the imperial chief of 'the Holy Roman Empire,' claims the same sovereignty.

Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Sept 1852