The Bible, Douay-Rheims Part 604

G.o.d shall protect his church against her persecutors. The mourning of Jerusalem.

12:1. The burden of the word of the Lord upon Israel. Thus saith the Lord, who stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundations of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man in him:

12:2. Behold I will make Jerusalem a lintel of surfeiting to all the people round about: and Juda also shall be in the siege against Jerusalem.

A lintel of surfeiting... That is, a door into which they shall seek to enter, to glut themselves with blood; but they shall stumble, and fall like men stupefied with wine. It seems to allude to the times of Antiochus, and to the victories of the Machabees.

12:3. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, that I will make Jerusalem a burdensome stone to all people: all that shall lift it up shall be rent and torn, and all the kingdoms of the earth shall be gathered together against her.

12:4. In that day, saith the Lord, I will strike every horse with astonishment, and his rider with madness: and I will open my eyes upon the house of Juda, and will strike every horse of the nations with blindness.

12:5. And the governors of Juda shall say in their heart: Let the inhabitants of Jerusalem be strengthened for me in the Lord of hosts, their G.o.d.

12:6. In that day I will make the governors of Juda like a furnace of fire amongst wood, and as a firebrand amongst hay: and they shall devour all the people round about, to the right hand, and to the left: and Jerusalem shall be inhabited again in her own place in Jerusalem.

12:7. And the Lord shall save the tabernacles of Jada, as in the beginning: that the house of David, and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, may not boast and magnify themselves against Juda.

12:8. In that day shall the Lord protect the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and he that hath offended among them in that day shall be as David: and the house of David, as that of G.o.d, as an angel of the Lord in their sight.

12:9. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

12:10. And I will pour out upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace, and of prayers: and they shall look upon me, whom they have pierced: and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for an only son, and they shall grieve over him, as the manner is to grieve for the death of the firstborn.

12:11. In that day there shall be a great lamentation in Jerusalem like the lamentation of Adadremmon in the plain of Mageddon.

Adadremmon... A place near Mageddon, where the good king Josias was slain, and much lamented by his people.

12:12. And the land shall mourn: families and families apart: the families of the house of David apart, and their women apart:

12:13. The families of the house of Nathan apart, and their women apart: the families of the house of Levi apart, and their women apart: the families of Semei apart, and their women apart.

12:14. All the rest of the families, families and families apart, and their women apart.

Zacharias Chapter 13

The fountain of Christ. Idols and false prophets shall be extirpated: Christ shall suffer: his people shall be tried by fire.

13:1. In that day there shall be a fountain open to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem: for the was.h.i.+ng of the sinner, and of the unclean woman.

13:2. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, saith the Lord of hosts, that I will destroy the names of idols out of the earth, and they shall be remembered no more: and I will take away the false prophets, and the unclean spirit out of the earth.

13:3. And it shall come to pa.s.s, that when any man shall prophesy any more, his father and his mother that brought him into the world, shall say to him: Thou shalt not live: because thou hast spoken a lie in the name of the Lord. And his father, and his mother, his parents, shall thrust him through, when he shall prophesy.

13:4. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, that the prophets shall be confounded, every one by his own vision, when he shall prophesy, neither shall they be clad with a garment of sackcloth, to deceive:

13:5. But he shall say: I am no prophet, I am a husbandman: for Adam is my example from my youth.

13:6. And they shall say to him: What are these wounds in the midst of thy hands? And he shall say: With these I was wounded in the house of them that loved me. 13:7. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that cleaveth to me, saith the Lord of hosts: strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered: and I will turn my hand to the little ones.

13:8. And there shall be in all the earth, saith the Lord, two parts in it shall be scattered, and shall perish: but the third part shall be left therein.

13:9. And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say: Thou art my people: and they shall say: The Lord is my G.o.d.

Zacharias Chapter 14

After the persecutions of the church shall follow great prosperity.

Persecutors shall be punished: so shall all that will not serve G.o.d in his church.

14:1. Behold the days of the Lord shall come, and thy spoils shall be divided in the midst of thee.

14:2. And I will gather all nations to Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken, and the houses shall be rifled, and the women shall be defiled: and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the rest of the people shall not be taken away out of the city.

I will gather, etc... This seems to be a prophecy of what was done by Antiochus.

14:3. Then the Lord shall go forth, and shall fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

14:4. And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is over against Jerusalem towards the east: and the mount of Olives shall be divided in the midst thereof to the east, and to the west with a very great opening, and half of the mountain shall be separated to the north, and half thereof to the south.

14:5. And you shall flee to the valley of those mountains, for the valley of the mountains shall be joined even to the next, and you shall flee as you fled from the face of the earthquake in the days of Ozias king of Juda: and the Lord my G.o.d shall come, and all the saints with him.

14:6. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, that there shall be no light, but cold and frost.

No light... Viz., in that dismal time of persecution of Antiochus, when it was neither day nor night: (ver. 7) because they neither had the comfortable light of the day, nor the repose of the night.

14:7. And there shall be one day, which is known to the Lord, not day nor night: and in the time of the evening there shall be light:

In the time of the evening there shall be light... An unexpected light shall arise by the means of the Machabees, when things shalll seem to be at the worst.

14:8. And it shall come to pa.s.s in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem: half of them to the east sea, and half of them to the last sea: they shall be in summer and in winter.

Living waters... Viz., the gospel of Christ.

14:9. And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day there shall be one Lord, and his name shall be one.

14:10. And all the land shall return even to the desert, from the hill to Remmon to the south of Jerusalem: and she shall be exalted, and shall dwell in her own place, from the gate of Benjamin even to the place of the former gate, and even to the gate of the corners: and from the tower of Hananeel even to the king's winepresses.

All the land shall return, etc... This, in some measure, was verified by the means of the Machabees: but is rather to be taken in a spiritual sense, as relating to the propagation of the church, and kingdom of Christ, the true Jerusalem, which alone shall never fall under the anathema of destruction, or G.o.d's curse.

14:11. And people shall dwell in it, and there shall be no more an anathema: but Jerusalem shall sit secure.

14:12. And this shall be the plague wherewith the Lord shall strike all nations that have fought against Jerusalem: the flesh of every one shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.

The flesh of every one shall consume, etc... Such judgments as these have often fallen upon the persecutors of G.o.d's church, as appears by many instances in history.

14:13. In that day there shall be a great tumult from the Lord among them: and a man shall take the hand of his neighbour, and his hand shall be clasped upon his neighbour's hand.

14:14. And even Juda shall fight against Jerusalem: and the riches of all nations round about shall be gathered together, gold, and silver, and garments in great abundance.

Even Juda, etc... The carnal Jews, and other false brothers, shall join in persecuting the church.