What comes after being saved? (Zechariah 5)
Zech 5:1-11
I read a quote somewhere a while back that marriage was invented to solve the problems you never even had before you were married, and the unexpected perspective made me smile. Many of us come to marriage as the culmination of our hopes for a happy life with someone who loves us. Yet, marriage is not the end point but the beginning of something new that involves two people learning to live together as they come to know each other better with all the adjustments that the becoming-one process requires. It takes years of different experiences, working out difficulties together, supporting one another for the initial connection and affection to develop into a deep bond. The Bible often compares the relationship with God to marriage and many Christians likewise think of their salvation and coming to faith as having arrived when they have only just begun the journey. The process of deepening the bond with the Lord involves discipleship, learning His ways and adjusting our step to His.[1]
Ongoing sin in the community
The exiles have been given a new start and promised the removal of their sin (Zech 3:4, 9), but such restoration is incompatible with living for themselves, defrauding others and with being unfaithful to the Lord. Zechariah’s next two visions address such issues. The postexilic community struggled with economic hardship, drought and meagre harvests (Hag 1:6, 10-11), so stealing, perhaps by using false weights in commercial trading, or swearing a false oath in court to cover up fraud must have been tempting. The ‘curse’ (or literally ‘covenant oath’, Zech 5:3) reminds the exiles of the commitment to the Lord. The same word for ‘oath’ is used in Deut 29:12 (Heb. v.11) to describe the covenant Israel made under Moses’ leadership before entering the Promised Land when they called on themselves God’s covenant curses if they disobeyed (e.g. Deut 27:9-26; 28:15-68). The giant size of the scroll (30 x 15 ft or about 9 x 4.5m) suggests perhaps that judgment cannot be evaded and the fact that it is flying of its own accord and finds the culprits suggest God’s swift and direct retribution without human agency.[2]
God removes sin
The second vision shows a woman in a measuring basket (an ephah is about 22 litres), that is identified as the iniquity of the land (Zech 5:6-7).[3] While the measuring basket recalls the issue of commercial weighing and therefore the problem of stealing raised earlier, the overall image suggests idolatry as a key aspect. The Hebrew for the woman’s name is ha-rish ‘ah (the wickedness; Zech 5:8),[4] which plays on the name of Asherah, the fertility goddess worshipped widely before the exile.[5] Here, the allusion is likely to recall idolatry in general rather than the particular worship of this goddess in the postexilic period. The fact that she is carried to Babylon (Zech 5:11) to be placed on a pedestal in a house (i.e. temple) affirms the association of idolatry here. It also creates a counterpoint to the ‘house’ (as the Hebrew refers to the temple) built for God. The women taking her have stork’s wings (Zech 5:9), which would have been appropriately large for flying. More importantly, storks were unclean birds in Israel’s system (Lev 11:13, 19), so these women make fitting carriers for the impurity associated with sins and idolatry. Further, Shinar is the ancient name of Babylon (Gen 11:2), which evokes the tower of Babel with its pride and rebellion against the rule of God.
God on our side
Zechariah’s visions warn that those who have been saved from exile should not carry on in sin as before. Covenant faithfulness matters, not so that the Jews might earn their salvation, but because they have already been saved, cleansed and belong to Him. For those suffering the injustice of others’ sin, the hope that God will not let such things go on indefinitely would have been comforting. Moreover, the promise of removing the people’s sins from the land and purging it from the uncleanness of idolatry and other transgressions must have filled the exiles with hope. The Lord was on their side! As we face our own temptations, we may take encouragement that God wants to see us free from sin. May His love for us open our hearts to love Him back in faithfulness.
[1] This is not a one-sided process, however, where we must make all the adjustments while God stands by for us to jump through hoops. The Lord has already made the enormous adjustment of becoming a human being and bearing our sin. Moreover, He patiently bears with us when we sin, forgives us when we repent, and loves us even when we do not deserve it.
[2] The symbolism of the flying scroll is opaque in its detail though the main message is not in doubt. The reference to two commandments from the Decalogue suggests to some that these two are meant to stand for the whole of the Ten Commandments and the two sides correspond to the two tablets of stone (stealing as a sin against neighbour, false oaths/taking God’s name in vain as a sin against God). My impression is that the two issues are quite specific and more likely to refer to particular problems in the postexilic community. The size of the scroll corresponds to the size of the temple portico (1 Kings 6:3; the likely place where the law was periodically read out; 2 Kings 23:2), but whether this is significant is uncertain. Scrolls could be quite long (the longest extant one from the Bible is the Great Isaiah Scroll at 7.3m). However, they were no more than a foot high (30cm), so the height of the scroll in the vision at 15 ft (4.5m) is enormous and seems more like a giant banner. The annihilation of the culprits’ houses implicitly includes the people living in it, but the destruction of property may also be appropriate if these were built from the proceeds of stealing.
[3] The Hebrew in v.6 reads ‘this is their eye in all the land’, which makes no sense. It is likely that it was meant to be ‘their iniquity’. The difference is one consonant (ו [vav] instead of י [yod]). The ancient Greek translation (Septuagint) and the Latin Vulgate both take this as ‘their iniquity’.
[4] Modern readers may feel uncomfortable with wickedness and sin portrayed as a woman, but this is not a slur on women in general. The Bible presents a variety of immoral and wise women, as well as a mixture of wicked and godly men. Proverbs also routinely presents both folly and wisdom as women (e.g. Prov 9:1-6, 13-17) and who does not recall the wise woman’s description in Proverbs 31:10-31? The noun for wickedness is feminine in Hebrew and the allusion to Asherah also makes a female figure fitting here.
[5] Anthony R. Petterson, Haggai, Zechariah & Malachi, AOTC 25 (Nottingham: Apollos, 2015), 169.
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