Zechariah 12:9-11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.… Not only an external grace and favour was promised to the Jews, but an internal light of faith, the author of which is the Spirit; for He it is who illuminates our minds to see the goodness of God, and it is He also who turns our hearts. As Zechariah declares that the Jews would at length "look to" God, it follows that the spirit of repentance and the light of faith are promised to them, so that they may know God as the author of their salvation, and feel so assured that they are already saved, as in future to devote themselves entirely to Him. "Whom they have pierced." Here also the prophet indirectly reproves the Jews for their great obstinacy, for God had restored them, and they had been as untameable as wild beasts: for this piercing is to be taken metaphorically for continual provocation, as though he had said that the Jews in their perverseness were prepared as it were for war, that they goaded and pierced God by their wickedness as by the weapons of their rebellion. As then they had been such, he says now that such a change would be wrought by God that they would become quite different, for they would learn to "look to Him whom" they had previously pierced. John says that this prophecy was fulfilled in Christ, when His side was pierced with a spear (John 19:37). And this is most true; for it was necessary that the visible symbol should be exhibited in the person of Christ, in order that the Jews might know that He was the God who had spoken by the prophets. The Jews then had crucified their God when they grieved His Spirit; but Christ also was, as to His flesh, pierced by them. And this is what John meant — that God by that visible symbol made it evident that He had not only been formerly provoked in a disgraceful manner by the Jews, but that at length, in the person of His only begotten Son, this great sin was added to their disgraceful impiety, that they pierced even the side of Christ. ( John Calvin.) Parallel Verses KJV: And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.WEB: It will happen in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. |
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