Zechariah 11:12-17
EVERYONE is familiar with the story of Judas Iscariot, who for thirty pieces of silver delivered up his Master to the false shepherds of the Jews (Matthew 26:14-16, 47-50; 27:3-10). But here in Zechariah’s prophecy, that occasion is anticipated, and we hear the blessed One Himself expressing beforehand through the prophet the value or “hire” at which He was estimated by His people when His years of service as a man on earth were ended.
“If ye think good, give My hire, and if not, forbear. So they weighed for My hire thirty pieces of silver.”
This was the value of a slave (Exodus 21:32; see also Leviticus 27). What thoughts must have occupied the minds of those wicked priests and Judas as they together discussed the sum to be paid for the betrayal of the Son of God!
No mention of a betrayer is here; only the value set upon the Man that is Jehovah’s Fellow, and the pieces of silver are cast in the temple to the potter, thus showing what would be done with the sum received by Judas. Now the staff, “Bands”, was cut asunder; the way to the reunion of the twelve tribes of Israel was closed when Christ was betrayed into the hands of sinful men and crucified (See His solemn words in Matthew 23, culminating in verses 33-39).
In the day of His coming in power and glory, the twelve tribes will all be regathered; first the two, and then the ten, and allotted their places in the Millennial kingdom, but all will be worshipers then, the unbelieving having been removed from among them.
Next (verse 15) the prophet is directed to take a very different part: Now he is to represent or impersonate the man of sin, of 2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4, the antichrist of 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; the second beast of Revelation 13:11, called “the false prophet” in chapters 16:13-16, and 19:20. This dreadful person is also referred to in the Psalms. A man of wickedness who comes in his own name (John 5:43) he is evidently a Jew who by some means will become king of the restored (but largely unbelieving) nation in Palestine (See Daniel 11:36-39). He will reintroduce idolatry, the old sin of Israel and Judah (Matthew 12:43-45; Luke 11:24-26), and is here called the foolish shepherd, and the idol (or worthless) shepherd.
The Jews would not receive their own Messiah-King, and will receive a man. who is His very opposite in every quality —willful, characterized by sin, seeking his own honor, etc.; he will not visit those about to perish; nor seek that which is strayed away (so read “the young one” in verse 16); nor heal that which is wounded; nor feed that which is sound; but will have the characteristics of the wolf, though professing to be the shepherd of the flock. (See John 10). He deserts the flock afterward, and allies himself with the last Gentile empire (Rome) when the Jewish worship is caused to cease and idolatry is made compulsory. The end of this man of unsurpassed wickedness is pronounced here, but in Revelation 19:20 we are given to see him, in prospect, cast alive into hell.
ML 10/03/1937