Zechariah 1:16

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

⁷On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, the month of Shebat, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo. ⁸I looked out into the night and saw a man riding on a red horse that stood among the myrtle trees in the hollow. Behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses. ⁹"What are these, my lord?" I asked. And the angel who was speaking with me replied, "I will show you what they are." ¹⁰Then the man standing among the myrtle trees explained, "They are the ones the LORD has sent to patrol the earth." ¹¹And the riders answered the Angel of the LORD who stood among the myrtle trees, "We have patrolled the earth, and behold, all the earth is at rest and tranquil." ¹²Then the Angel of the LORD said, "How long, O LORD of Hosts, will You withhold mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, with which You have been angry these seventy years?" ¹³So the LORD spoke kind and comforting words to the angel who was speaking with me. ¹⁴Then the angel who was speaking with me said, "Proclaim this word: This is what the LORD of Hosts says: 'I am very jealous for Jerusalem and Zion, ¹⁵but I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease. For I was a little angry, but they have increased the calamity.' ¹⁶Therefore, this is what the LORD says: 'I will return to Jerusalem with mercy, and there My house will be rebuilt, declares the LORD of Hosts, and a measuring line will be stretched out over Jerusalem.'

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

I am: Zechariah 2:10, Zechariah 2:11, Zechariah 8:3, Isaiah 12:1, Isaiah 54:8-10, Jeremiah 31:22-25, Jeremiah 33:10-12, Ezekiel 37:24-28, Ezekiel 39:25-29, Ezekiel 48:35

my house: Zechariah 4:9, Ezra 6:14, Ezra 6:15, Isaiah 44:26-28, Haggai 1:14

and: Zechariah 2:1, Zechariah 2:2, Job 38:5, Isaiah 34:11, Jeremiah 31:39, Jeremiah 31:40, Ezekiel 40:3, Ezekiel 47:3

Reciprocal: 1 Kings 8:49 - cause 2 Kings 21:13 - I will stretch 2 Chronicles 6:39 - cause Psalms 85:1 - Lord Psalms 90:13 - Return Proverbs 24:18 - and he Isaiah 21:2 - all the Isaiah 30:19 - dwell Jeremiah 30:18 - the palace Jeremiah 50:33 - and all Lamentations 3:35 - turn Hosea 3:1 - according Zechariah 2:8 - After Zechariah 12:6 - Jerusalem shall

Cross-References

Genesis 1:7
So God made the expanse and separated the waters beneath it from the waters above. And it was so.

Genesis 1:8
God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day.

Genesis 1:9
And God said, "Let the waters under the sky be gathered into one place, so that the dry land may appear." And it was so.

Genesis 1:12
The earth produced vegetation: seed-bearing plants according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

Genesis 1:14
And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to distinguish between the day and the night, and let them be signs to mark the seasons and days and years.

Deuteronomy 4:19
When you look to the heavens and see the sun and moon and stars-all the host of heaven-do not be enticed to bow down and worship what the LORD your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven.

Job 31:26
if I have regarded the sun in its radiance or the moon moving in splendor,

Job 38:7
while the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

Psalms 8:3
When I behold Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place-

Psalms 19:6
It rises at one end of the heavens and runs its circuit to the other; nothing is deprived of its warmth.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Therefore thus saith the Lord, I am returned to Jerusalem with mercies,.... Having returned the people of the Jews from their captivity to Jerusalem, in which he had shown abundant mercy to them:

my house shall be built in it, saith the Lord of hosts; meaning the temple where he dwelt and was worshipped; the foundation of which had been laid two months before this prophecy was delivered, Haggai 2:18 and which should be raised up and finished, notwithstanding all the opposition of the enemy, and the discouragements of the people:

and a line shall be stretched forth upon Jerusalem; to measure with it, and build by it, the wall, streets, and houses of Jerusalem. The meaning is, that not only the temple should be built, but the city likewise, and that in great order, and with great exactness and symmetry; see Zechariah 2:1. The Targum paraphrases it, "upon the building of the walls of Jerusalem".

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Therefore - This being so, since God was so jealous for His people, so displeased with their persecutors, “thus saith the Lord,” Dionysius, “I who “in wrath remember mercy, am returned” Habakkuk 3:2, not by change of place, who am uncircumscribed, not existing in place, to the people of Judah and Jerusalem in mercies, manifoldly benefiting them by various effects of My love.” The single benefits, the rebuilding of His House, and so the restoration of His public worship, and the rebuilding of Jerusalem, are but instances of that all-containing mercy, His restored presence in tender mercies. “I am returned,” God says, although the effects of His return were yet to come.

A line shall be stretched forth over Jerusalem - Before, when it stood, this had been done to destroy 2 Kings 21:13; Isaiah 34:11; now, when destroyed, to rebuild .

Osorius: “The temple was built then, when the foundations of the walls were not yet laid. In man’s sight it would have seemed more provident that the walls should be first builded, that then the temple might be builded more securely. To God, in whom alone is the most firm stay of our life and salvation, it seemed otherwise. For it cannot be that he, to whom nothing is dearer fhan zeal for the most holy religion, should be forsaken of His help.”

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 16. I am returned to Jerusalem with mercies — Before, he came to them in judgments; and the principal mercy is, the house of the Lord shall be rebuilt, and the ordinances of' the Lord re-established.

And a line shall be stretched forth — The circuit shall be determined, and the city built according to the line marked out.