Zechariah 1:21

1:21 I asked, “What are these going to do?” He answered, “These horns are the ones that have scattered Judah so that there is no one to be seen. 1  But the blacksmiths have come to terrify Judah’s enemies 2  and cut off the horns of the nations that have thrust themselves against the land of Judah in order to scatter its people.” 3 

Zechariah 5:3

5:3 The speaker went on to say, “This is a curse 4  traveling across the whole earth. For example, according to the curse whoever steals 5  will be removed from the community; or on the other hand (according to the curse) whoever swears falsely will suffer the same fate.”

Zechariah 12:10

12:10 “I will pour out on the kingship 6  of David and the population of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication so that they will look to me, 7  the one they have pierced. They will lament for him as one laments for an only son, and there will be a bitter cry for him like the bitter cry for a firstborn. 8 

1 tn Heb “so that no man lifts up his head.”

2 tn Heb “terrify them”; the referent (Judah’s enemies) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

3 tn Heb “to scatter it.” The word “people” has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

4 tn The Hebrew word translated “curse” (אָלָה, ’alah) alludes to the covenant sanctions that attend the violation of God’s covenant with Israel (cf. Deut 29:12, 14, 20-21).

5 sn Stealing and swearing falsely (mentioned later in this verse) are sins against mankind and God respectively and are thus violations of the two major parts of the Ten Commandments. These two stipulations (commandments 8 and 3) represent the whole law.

6 tn Or “dynasty”; Heb “house.”

7 tc Because of the difficulty of the concept of the mortal piercing of God, the subject of this clause, and the shift of pronoun from “me” to “him” in the next, many mss read אַלֵי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (’ale ’et ’asher, “to the one whom,” a reading followed by NAB, NRSV) rather than the MT’s אֵלַי אֵת אֲשֶׁר (’ela ’et ’asher, “to me whom”). The reasons for such alternatives, however, are clear – they are motivated by scribes who found such statements theologically objectionable – and they should be rejected in favor of the more difficult reading (lectio difficilior) of the MT.

tn Or “on me.”

8 tn The Hebrew term בְּכוֹר (bÿkhor, “firstborn”), translated usually in the LXX by πρωτότοκος (prwtotokos), has unmistakable messianic overtones as the use of the Greek term in the NT to describe Jesus makes clear (cf. Col 1:15, 18). Thus, the idea of God being pierced sets the stage for the fatal wounding of Jesus, the Messiah and the Son of God (cf. John 19:37; Rev 1:7). Note that some English translations supply “son” from the context (e.g., NIV, TEV, NLT).