Zechariah 11:8

Three shepherds also I cut off in one month,.... Not Moses, Aaron, and Miriam, as is suggested in the Talmud (e); nor David, Adonijah, and Joab, who died in the space of a month; nor the three kings,

Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.

Three, put for many, a definite for an indefinite number. Shepherds, negligent or greatly faulty. I cut off; put out of office, or, by discovering their faults, made them lie hid and conceal themselves. In one month; in a little time. My soul loathed them; hated their treachery and idleness. Their soul also abhorred me: disgraced and turned out, they hated him; in which these shepherds had too many of the Jews that sided with them, and that bore a hatred to the true Shepherd and to his impartial executing severity on the wicked shepherds.

Zechariah 11:8 Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.Ver. 8. Three shepherds also I cut off in one month] That is, in a short time I took away and displaced, even by the heathen princes, many proud princes and priests; such as were Menelaus, Jason, the Aristobuli, Hircani, Annas, Caiaphas, and others: or, I removed those three sorts of shepherds of the old law, viz. princes, prophets, and priests. Thus Theodoret and Vatablus. Diodati understands the text of the three chief empires that had tyrannized over the people, Zechariah 11:6; Zechariah 11:3; Zechariah 11:12; Zechariah 11:10. Namely, the Chaldean, Persian, and Grecian empire, which were destroyed by the Son of God, Daniel 2:45. But they do best, in mine opinion, that by these three shepherds understand those three sects among the Jews at Christ’ s coming in the flesh, viz. Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes; whereof, though the Pharisees were the best, and most exact for the outward observation of the law, yet are they in the Gospel, for their putid hypocrisy, first sharply taxed by our Saviour (after the Baptist), and then plainly rejected, and even sent to hell by a chain shot of eight links of woes, Matthew 23:13-16; Matthew 23:23; Matthew 23:25; Matthew 23:27; Matthew 23:29 And my soul loathed them] Or, was taken off from them, or, was straitened for them; because I saw that they received my grace in vain, and considered not my care for their good. Theodotion and Symmachus render it, Anima mea exanimata est, I am dispirited, as it were, and even disheartened to do any more for them. And their soul also abhorred me] And so they became God haters (θεοστυγεις), as Romans 1:30, and therefore hateful to God (στυγητοι), Titus 3:3, hateful as hell (so the word imports), yea, more and worse, for hell is but an effect of God’ s justice, but wickedness is a breach of his law. The prophet here seemeth to allude to those murmurers in the wilderness, that disdainfully cried out, Our soul loatheth this light bread, Numbers 21:5. Let God’ s servants take heed how they hang loose toward him; and lest, by disuse and discontinuance of a duty, there grow upon them an alienation of affection, a secret disrelishing and nauseating at that which we ought most deeply to affect and duly to perform. Surely, as loathing of meat and difficulty of breathing are two symptoms of a sick body, so are carelessness of hearing and irksomeness of praying two sure signs of a sick soul.

(8) The effect of the prophet’s (i.e., God’s) feeding the flock is that He “cut off three shepherds in one month.” As in Ezekiel and Daniel (Ezekiel 4:4-6; Daniel 9:24-27, &c.), the space of time mentioned here seems to be symbolical; and taking a day for a year, one month will mean about thirty years. Some take “one month” to mean “a short time.” This interpretation will also agree with our view of the case. Some, again, take each day to represent seven years—so that thirty days would be two hundred and ten years—and explain the three shepherds as the Babylonian, Medo-Persian, and Macedonian Empires, which lasted two hundred and fifteen years, from the captivity to Babylon up to the death of Alexander the Great. But no instance can be cited in which a prophetic day is equivalent to seven years. “The three shepherds” may be, then (according to the view which we have adopted with regard to the expression “one month”), the Syro-Grecian kings (B.C. 172-141)—Antiochus Epiphanes (who died miserably in Persia), Antiochus Eupator (put to death by Demetrius I.), and Demetrius I. (overthrown by Alexander Balus). As specimens of attempts to find for the passage an historical reference, taking the expression “one month” literally, the following may be cited:—Cyril considers that kings, priests, and prophets are meant; and Pusey, “priests, judges, and lawyers,” who, having “delivered to the cross the Saviour, were all taken away in one month, Nisan, A.D. 33.” But the rejection of the good shepherd is spoken of by the prophet as posterior to the cutting off of the shepherds. Maurer would interpret the three shepherds of Zechariah (son of Jeroboam II.), his murderer, Shallum, who reigned but a month, and of a third unknown usurper, whose downfall speedily took place. But Shallum was certainly murdered by Menahem (2 Kings 15:10-14), and there is no room for a third unknown usurper. Hitzig would avoid the difficulty by rendering “I removed the three shepherds which were in one month” (in support of which construction he refers, and rightly, to such passages as Exodus 34:31; Isaiah 23:17; Ezekiel 26:20), and takes them to be the kings Zechariah, Shallum, and Menahem, who in about the space of one month sat upon the throne of Israel. But the difficulty is really not so obviated. Shallum reigned actually “a month of days” (2 Kings 15:13), and the events referred to occupied much longer. Them.—The sheep, not the shepherds. In spite of what He did for them, they abhorred Him. Though, at first sight, it would seem more natural to refer the pronoun to “the shepherds,” we are precluded from so doing by the consideration that the fact that God loathed the shepherds, and they abhorred Him—shepherds whom He had cut off for the good of His flock—would be no reason for His refusing any more to feed the flock (Zechariah 11:9); whereas the flock’s disregard of all His loving-kindness towards them would afford good cause for His so doing.

Verse 8. Three shepherds also I cut off in one month] Taking this literally, some think the three shepherds mean the three Maccabees, Judas, Jonathan, and Simon; others, the three wicked high priests, Jason, Alcimus, and Menelaus; others, the three last princes of the Asmonean race, Alexander, Hyrcanus, and Antigonus. Perhaps three orders may be intended: 1. The priesthood. 2. The dictatorship, including the Scribes, Pharisees, &c. 3. The magistracy, the great sanhedrin, and the smaller councils. These were all annihilated by the Roman conquest.

8. Three shepherds … in one month] This has been understood to refer either to three historical persons, e.g. Zachariah, Shallum (2 Kings 15:8; 2 Kings 15:13) and some third usurper, not mentioned in the history, of the same time, or Antiochus Epiphanes, Antiochus Eupator and Demetrius I., in the time of the Maccabees (though it is difficult to believe that these could have been called shepherds of Israel); or else to the three offices of king, priest and prophet. But all these references break down, and it is better to take the words generally, as describing the prompt and vigorous action of Jehovah’s shepherd in dealing with the evil shepherds (Zechariah 10:3), as well as in feeding the flock. “Mensis unus hic capitur pro exiguo tempore: tres autem pastores significant multos indefinite.” Calv. and my soul lothed them] or, but, &c.: for, R. V. At this point the prophet begins to describe the failure of his good offices towards the flock, and the mutual antipathy that sprang up between him and them.

And I cut off three shepherds in one month - Jerome: “I have read in some one’s commentary, that the shepherds, cut off in the indignation of the Lord, are to be understood of priests and false

8. In the carrying out of his commission the shepherd met opposition, but he overcame it. Three shepherds… I cut off — R.V., “the three shepherds.” Who are these shepherds? Are they foreigners or native rulers?