Zaccaria 12:3

La Nuova Diodati

In quel giorno avverr che io far di Gerusalemme una pietra pesante per tutti i popoli; tutti quelli che se la caricheranno addosso saranno interamente fatti a pezzi, anche se tutte le nazioni della terra fossero radunate contro di lei.

Parallel Translations

Riveduta Bibbia
E in quel giorno avverrà che io farò di Gerusalemme una pietra pesante per tutti i popoli; tutti quelli che se la caricheranno addosso ne saranno malamente feriti, e tutte le nazioni della terra s’aduneranno contro di lei.

Giovanni Diodati Bibbia
E avverrà in quel giorno che io farò che Gerusalemme sarà una pietra pesante a tutti i popoli; tutti coloro che se la caricheranno addosso saran del tutto lacerati. E tutte le nazioni della terra si raduneranno contro a lei.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

in that: Zechariah 12:4, Zechariah 12:6, Zechariah 12:8, Zechariah 12:9, Zechariah 12:11, Zechariah 2:8, Zechariah 2:9, Zechariah 10:3-5, Zechariah 13:1, Zechariah 14:2, Zechariah 14:3, Zechariah 14:4, Zechariah 14:6, Zechariah 14:8, Zechariah 14:9, Zechariah 14:13, Isaiah 60:12, Isaiah 66:14-16, Ezekiel 38:1 - Ezekiel 39:29, Joel 3:8-16, Obadiah 1:18, Micah 5:8, Micah 5:15, Micah 7:15-17, Habakkuk 2:17, Zephaniah 3:19, Haggai 2:22

a burdensome: Daniel 2:34, Daniel 2:35, Daniel 2:44, Daniel 2:45, Matthew 21:44, Luke 20:18

though: Zechariah 14:2, Zechariah 14:3, Micah 4:11-13, Revelation 16:14, Revelation 17:12-14, Revelation 19:19-21, Revelation 20:8, Revelation 20:9

Reciprocal: Deuteronomy 30:7 - General 1 Samuel 5:8 - What shall 1 Samuel 17:36 - seeing Ezra 7:23 - why should there be wrath Esther 6:13 - If Mordecai Psalms 118:10 - All nations Psalms 129:5 - be confounded Song of Solomon 6:4 - terrible Isaiah 29:7 - the multitude Isaiah 41:11 - all they Isaiah 49:25 - I will contend Isaiah 54:15 - shall fall Jeremiah 50:28 - to declare Jeremiah 51:11 - the vengeance Daniel 3:22 - slew Daniel 11:32 - shall be Daniel 12:1 - thy people Joel 3:2 - will plead Micah 2:13 - they have Micah 4:3 - and rebuke Zephaniah 3:15 - he hath

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people,.... The Targum renders it "a stone of offence"; at which they shall stumble and fall; but it seems to design the immovableness of the state and condition of Jerusalem, that those who attempt to remove her out of her place, or to make any alteration in her happy circumstances, will not be able to do it, Psalms 125:1. Jerom makes mention of a custom in the cities of Palestine, and which continued to his times throughout all Judea, that large, huge, round stones, used to be placed in the towns and villages, which the youths exercised themselves with, by trying to lift them up as high as they could, by which they showed their strength; and the same ancient writer observes that a like custom obtained in Greece; for he says he himself saw in the tower at Athens, by the image of Minerva, a globe of brass, of at very great weight, which he, through the weakness of his body, could not move; and asking the meaning of it, he was told that the strength of wrestlers was tried by it; and no man might be admitted a combatant, until it was known, by the lifting up of that weight, with whom he should be matched; and the throwing of the "discus" was an ancient military exercise, as old as the times of Homer, who speaks z of it; and is mentioned by Latin writers, as appears from some lines of Martial a; see the Apocrypha:

"In like manner also Judas gathered together all those things that were lost by reason of the war we had, and they remain with us,'' (2 Maccabees 2:14)

and this, as it tried the strength of men, so it was sometimes dangerous to themselves, or to bystanders, lest it should fall upon their heads: and as it was usual to defend themselves and oppress enemies by casting stones at them, so young men used to exercise themselves by lifting up and casting large stones; to which Virgil b sometimes refers; and it is well known that Abimelech was killed even by a woman casting a piece of a millstone upon his head, Judges 9:53 and such heavy stones, and the lifting of them up, in order to cast them, may he alluded to here:

all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces; all that attempt to unsettle and remove it shall be pressed down with the weight of it, and be utterly destroyed: or, "shall be torn to pieces" c; as men's hands are cut and torn with rough and heavy stones, The Targum is,

"all that injure her shall be consumed;''

which gives the sense of the passage:

though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it; so safe and secure will the people of God be; he being a wall of fire round about them, and the glory in the midst of them.

z Iliad. 2. 23. a "Splendida cum volitent Spartani pondera disci Este procul pueri sit se nel ille nocens." ---Epigr. l. 14. Ep. 157. b "Certabant Troes contra defendere saxis." ---Aeneid. l. 9. "Mijaculis, illi certent defendere saxis." --Aeneid. l. 10. --Vid. Lydium de Re Militari, l. 5. c. 2. p. 178, 179. Menochium de Republica Hebr. l. 6. col. 555, 556. c שרוט ישרטו "incidendo incidentur", Montanus, Burkius "lacerando lacerabuntur", Pagninus, Cocceius.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I will make Jerusalem a burdensome stone to all nations - What is “a stone to all nations?” It is not a rock or anything in its own nature immovable, but a “stone,” a thing rolled up and down, moved, lifted, displaced, piled on others, in every way at the service and command of people, to do with it what they willed. So they thought of that “stone cut out without hands” Daniel 2:45; that “tried stone and sure foundation, laid in Zion” Isaiah 28:16; that “stone” which, God said in Zechariah, “I have laid” Zechariah 3:9; of which our Lord says, “the stone, which the builders rejected, is become the head of the corner” Luke 20:17; “whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder” Matthew 21:44; Luke 20:18. The Church, built on the stone, seems a thing easily annihilated; ten persecutions in succession strove to efface it; Diocletian erected a monument, commemorating that the Christian name was blotted out . It survived; he perished.

The image may have been suggested by the custom, so widely prevailing in Judaea, of trying the relative strength of young men, by lifting round stones selected for that end .

Jerome: “The meaning then is, I will place, Jerusalem to all nations like a very heavy stone to be lifted up. They will lift it up, and according to their varied strength, will waste it; but it must needs be, that, while it is lifted, in the very strain of lifting the weight, that most heavy stone should leave some scission or rasure on the bodies of those who lift it. Of the Church it may be interpreted thus; that all persecutors, who fought against the house of the Lord, are inebriated with that cup, which Jeremiah gives to all nations, to drink and be inebriated and fall and vomit and be mad. Whosoever would uplift the stone shall lift it, and in the anger of the Lord, whereby He chastens sinners, will hold it in his hands; but he himself will not go unpunished, the sword of the Lord fighting against him.”

All that burden themselves with it will be cut to pieces - More exactly, “scarified, lacerated;” shall bear the scars. “Though” (rather, “and”) “all the people (peoples, nations) of the earth shall be gathered together against it.” The prophet marshals them all against Jerusalem, only to say how they should perish before it. So in Joel God says, “I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat” , speaking of that last closing strife of antichrist against God. Wars against Israel had either been petty, though anti-theistic, wars of neighboring petty nations, pitting their false gods against the True, or one, though world-empire wielded by a single will. The more God made Himself known, the fiercer the opposition. The Gospel claiming “obedience to the faith among all nations” Romans 1:5, provoked universal rebellion. Herod and Pontius Pilate became friends through rejection of Christ; the Roman Caesar and the Persian Sapor, Goths and Vandals, at war with one another, were one in persecuting Christ and the Church. Yet in vain.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Zechariah 12:3. A burdensome stone — Probably referring to that stone which was thrown on the breast of a culprit adjudged to lose his life by stoning, by which the whole region of the thorax, heart, lungs, liver, &c., was broken to pieces.