The Prophecy of Zechariah – Part 7: A Christian Identity Prophet

The Prophecy of Zechariah – Part 7: A Christian Identity Prophet

Presenting Zechariah chapter 9, we concluded that the oracles in the opening verses of the chapter were actually a promise of rest for the captivity of “all the tribes of Israel” who would repent and look to their God, something which is fulfilled in Christ as Paul had asserted in Hebrews chapter 4 that “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.” We made this conclusion with the understanding that the message of the prophet is found in the meanings of the words, Hadrach, Damascus and Hamath, and not in the cities themselves. As the prophet wrote, Hamath and Hadrach had already been destroyed by the Babylonians, so the names must stand as allegories.

Following that, we saw oracles prophesying the demise of the once-great maritime cities of Palestine, namely the Tyrians and the chief cities of the Philistines. After these the Word of Yahweh said in verse 8 “And I will encamp about mine house because of the army, because of him that passeth by, and because of him that returneth: and no oppressor shall pass through them any more: for now have I seen with mine eyes.” On the surface, this appears to be talking about Jerusalem, which is the near vision, or immediate interpretation of the prophecy. However it is evident that the old city was indeed filled with oppressors by the time of the ministry of Christ, and for that reason it was destroyed in 70 AD. Rather, it is evident that it is describing Israel in captivity, that as the prophet had written in Zechariah chapter 2, Yahweh would be a “wall of fire” around His people Israel. In Christ, the camp of the saints is ultimately protected from the armies of bastards. Once again we see God Himself promise to be the fortress of His people, which is the meaning of the word Hamath in verse 2 of this same chapter.

Then there is yet another Messianic prophecy, one which saw a vividly literal fulfillment in the ministry of Christ, where it says “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass.” And with this, in verse 10 of the chapter, there is a promise of peace for Ephraim and Jerusalem, even though when Zechariah had written these words, in 518 BC, there were no identifiable people of the tribe of Ephraim in Jerusalem. So where it mentioned in verse 11 that “by the blood of thy covenant I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit wherein is no water”, it must be referring to the Israelites of the captivity, and the tribe of Ephraim and the other tribes of Israel had gone into the pit as prisoners when they were taken away into captivity two hundred years before Zechariah wrote these words. The pit represents their alienation from God. Verse 12 beckons these Israelites of the captivity to turn to their God where it says “Turn you to the strong hold, ye prisoners of hope”, and this also substantiates our assertion that the reference to Hamath in verse 2 is a reference to Yahweh God as the protector of Israel, as they are in captivity.

The scattered children of Israel are “prisoners of hope” enslaved to the world by their sin, yet they are promised liberty in Christ. The promise of peace to Ephraim is the ultimate Messianic purpose which is expressed in the prophecy. But that purpose cannot be fulfilled until the Second Advent of the Messiah. In the near term, the prophet only prophecies war, where in verse 13 it says: “When I have bent Judah for me, filled the bow with Ephraim, and raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece, and made thee as the sword of a mighty man.”

As we had explained, the reference to Greece in this passage is a reference to the Ionians, the tribe of Greeks which are called Javan elsewhere in Scripture, who were the principle tribe of the Greeks who inhabited Athens and the western coasts of Anatolia. It cannot be taken for granted that when he wrote the Hebrew form of Javan, that Zechariah meant to refer to all of the distinct tribes of the Greeks. Javan is mentioned in Ezekiel chapter 27, where the King James translators treated the term correctly and it mentions Dan and Javan in an oracle concerning ancient Tyre and the sea-faring merchants who frequented the city. Where it says “Dan also and Javan going to and fro occupied in thy fairs: bright iron, cassia, and calamus, were in thy market”, the reference is to Danaan Greeks and Ionian Greeks, who are Dan and Javan. The Makedonians primarily consisted of Danaan and Dorian Greeks, and also of Illyrians who descended from the Trojans, who in turn were a branch of the ancient Israelite tribe of Judah. The Romans were also descended from the Trojans. The Spartans and Corinthians were also descended primarily from the Dorians.

The disparate tribes of the Greeks were never a unified political entity when Zechariah wrote, and when they were finally unified, they were never unified under the rule of the Athenians. Therefore, with other tribes of Greeks identified even in Scripture, such as the Danaans in Ezekiel who wrote not long before the time of Zechariah, it is not correct to write Greece for Javan here, as if all the Greek tribes were meant. By the time of the Romans, the Athenians and other Ionians were greatly diminished from their former status, and even Byzantium considered itself to be a Roman empire, and never Ionian. So this is where Zechariah is a Christian Identity prophet. It may be claimed that the near vision of this prophecy is related to the struggles between the Greeks and the Judaeans of the 2nd century, where the Maccabees had thrown off the yoke of the Seleucids. However the Greek rulers of Syria were not truly Javan, or Ionians, and all they did was free themselves from Makedonian rule. But over the several centuries after Zechariah wrote, the Ionians, specifically the Athenians, were engaged with wars with the Spartans, and with the Makedonians, and then with the Romans.

Shortly after the time when Zechariah wrote, there was the failed Persian invasion of Greece, in which many Judaeans evidently participated. Describing the Persian forces, Herodotus wrote in Book 7 (7.89) of his Histories that “The Phoenicians, with the Syrians of Palestine, furnished three hundred vessels, the crews of which were thus accoutred: upon their heads they wore helmets made nearly in the Grecian manner; about their bodies they had breastplates of linen; they carried shields without rims; and were armed with javelins.” We may have quoted this passage in our presentation of Zechariah chapter 9 where we discussed the breaking of the naval power of the cities of Palestine, which was prophesied by Zechariah there.

As a digression, it can be demonstrated elsewhere in Herodotus’ Histories, that by saying “Syrians of Palestine” he is referring to Judaeans. This is especially evident in Book 2, chapter 104 of his Histories where he describes the practice of circumcision which was employed by “the Phoenicians and the Syrians of Palestine”. Again, in chapter 159 of that same book, he mentions the battle between the Egyptian Pharaoh Necho and King Josiah, where Josiah was killed, and he refers to the people of Judah as Syrians. There he says in part: “[2.159] Necos, when he gave up the construction of the canal, turned all his thoughts to war, and set to work to build a fleet of triremes, some intended for service in the northern sea, and some for the navigation of the Erythraean. These last were built in the Arabian Gulf where the dry docks in which they lay are still visible. These fleets he employed wherever he had occasion, while he also made war by land upon the Syrians and defeated them in a pitched battle at Magdolus, after which he made himself master of Cadytis, a large city of Syria.” The battle Herodotus describes is the one at Megiddo which occurred around 604 BC, where king Josiah was killed. This is described in 2 Chronicles chapter 35. The eventual defeat of Necho by the Babylonians is mentioned in Jeremiah chapter 46. So to the Greek historian Herodotus, the people of Judah are Syrians, and that word actually has the same origin as the word Tyrian, since the original Hebrew word for Tyre is transliterated into English as T-S-O-R, or Tsor. Other than their own application of names, the Greeks were indeed acquainted with much of the history of Palestine, as many of their notable men had evidently participated in the wars of the Assyrians and Babylonians as mercenaries, and as they had for a long time conducted trade with the cities of Phoenicia.

But the participation of Judaeans in the Persian war cannot be the fulfillment of Zechariah’s words here, which include Ephraim as well as Judah, even though there were certainly many men of the tribe of Ephraim and the other “lost” tribes who also participated in that war as Scythians, which they came to be called. The prophecy in Zechariah is a promise of victory and salvation for Judah and Ephraim, whereas the Scythians and Judaeans who participated in the Persian war against the Greeks were defeated.

However, after the failed Persian invasion, the Athenians and Spartans began to make war with one another for the primacy of Greece. The Peloponnesian Wars can be divided into a couple of smaller campaigns, but generally the two city-states engaged against one another in a war which lasted 27 years, from 431 to 404 BC, and nearly every Greek city from Anatolia to Makedonia to Sicily and Italy were involved, allied with either Sparta or Athens, most frequently along tribal lines. Thucydides and other writers described the war as a war between two political systems: the oligarchy of the Spartans opposed to the democracy of the Athenians. However the Dorians generally preferred oligarchy, and the Ionians their democracy. Eventually, Sparta prevailed. The Corinthians (who were also Dorians) and Thebans (who were descendants of the ancient Phoenicians, the northern tribes of Israel) wanted Athens to be destroyed completely, but the Spartans eventually had mercy and only took down its walls. Nevertheless, the prospects of the Ionians as a dominant power in the Mediterranean were forever destroyed. The Galatians and other Scythian tribes, the Israelites of the Assyrian captivity, also made war against the Ionians, invading and pillaging Athenian territory in the 3rd century BC. In the Hellenistic period, Athens and the other Ionian cities played lesser roles amongst confederate states in wars against the Macedonians and the Romans, but they never prevailed.

So where Yahweh said that His sons would make war against the sons of the Ionians, or Javan, it must be these wars which the prophet was foretelling. In the early years of the Maccabees, some time just before their own war with the Makedonians, the king of Sparta wrote a letter to the high priest at Jerusalem and he said, in part, “Areus, king of the Lacedemonians, to Onias, sends greetings. We have met with a certain writing, whereby we have discovered that both the Judaeans and the Lacedaemonians are of the same family, and are derived from the kindred of Abraham.” This letter is recorded both in Josephus’ Antiquities Book 12 and in I Maccabees chapter 12 in the Apocrypha. The Lacedaemonians being Dorian Greeks, had evidently originated from Dor in the land of Manasseh, a circumstance which is supported indirectly in the surviving Greek epic poets. We have discussed this more fully in a paper at Christogenea titled Classical Records of the Dorian & Danaan Israelite-Greeks. In another paper, we discussed the Classical Records of Trojan-Roman-Judah. Understanding the identity of the tribes who competed for the domination of early Europe we can see Israel in captivity, as we had explained earlier in this presentation, in part 4, that for many of the Israelites, that captivity had actually begun with the Exodus, as many Israelites had departed from the main body of Israel as early as the captivity of Egypt, and many others departed throughout the subsequent centuries. The Trojans and Danaans departed Israel from Egypt, and the Dorians from the Levant before the end of the 12th century BC, only about two hundred years after the conquest of Canaan.

So when we see the history of the people of Javan, that over the centuries following this prophecy they were at war with the Dorians and Danaans, in the form of Spartans and Makedonians, the Phoenicians of Thebes, and later the Romans, and if we have other evidence that all of these people descended from the ancient Israelites, then the words of the prophet here further confirm that other evidence. It was these tribes of the dispersions of ancient Israel who fought with Javan, the Ionians, until they were diminished, and no other people fulfilled that role in history.

But there is something else that is evident here which must be discussed. Paul of Tarsus certainly attested that the Athenians were children of God, in Acts chapter 17. Luke also informs us, in chapter 3 of his Gospel, that Adam was the son of God, and it is fully evident in history that the Ionians were indeed the descendants of Japheth the son of Noah. However here in Zechariah the Word of Yahweh contrasts His sons, the children of Israel, with those of Javan. In the Old Testament, of all of Adam’s children only the children of Israel are considered to be the children of Yahweh, which is evident in Deuteronomy chapter 14 and throughout the Psalms and the Prophets. So it is evident that while all of the legitimate sons of Adam can claim to be biological children of God, as Paul attests, nevertheless Yahweh has designated the position of children to the children of Israel. This position in Scripture is called sonship, the position of a son granted by the father, who in the ancient world was not bound to recognize all of his own biological children as his children. Paul informed us in Romans chapter 9 that this υἱοθεσία, which refers to the placing of a son or sonship, a word which the King James Version has poorly translated as adoption, was for the children of Israel. Here the words of the prophet also confirm that fact, as Yahweh contrasts the children of Javan to His Own children, the children of Israel.

In Zechariah chapter 10, the focus of the Word of Yahweh upon the so-called “lost” tribes of scattered Israel continues:

10:1 Ask ye of the LORD rain in the time of the latter rain; so the LORD shall make bright clouds, and give them showers of rain, to every one grass in the field.

This is actually also a Messianic promise. The subject has not changed since chapter 9, simply because men have made an artificial division in the text. Speaking of the coming King, the Messianic prophecy fulfilled in Yahshua Christ (9:9) with the blood of the covenant (9:11), the defense of the children of Israel in the prophesied wars against the Ionians (9:13), and the ultimate salvation of Israel as well as Judah (9:10, 16), this prophecy far transcends the subsequent history of the 70-weeks Kingdom. However as we have often explained, the purpose of the 70-weeks Kingdom was to produce the Christ and the blood of His covenant, in the ultimate salvation of all of the tribes of Israel. The time of the latter rain is mentioned only here in this passage of Zechariah, but it is described in the words of the former prophets.

Clifton Emahiser has a paper available on his website titled Early Rain vs. Latter Rain. Apparently there were two rainy seasons in ancient Judaea, and the entire Middle East was at one time much more fertile and temperate than it is today. The early rain occurred at just after the time of planting, and the latter rain shortly before the time of harvest. Clifton’s paper explains that in the prophecy of Joel, these two rainy periods are used as an allegory to describe the history of the Body of Christ, the ekklesia, in the Christian era, which is between the two advents of Christ: that which has been and that which is coming.

The early rain was represented by the Day of Pentecost which initiated the apostolic period, and the time of the latter rain is not yet manifest, but it is prophesied in Joel chapter 2: “23 Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the LORD your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month. 24 And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25 And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you. 26 And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise the name of the LORD your God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed. 27 And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the LORD your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed. 28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: 29 And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit. 30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come. 32 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the LORD hath said, and in the remnant whom the LORD shall call.”

Now it certainly seems as if we are in the day of consumption, the children of Israel being punished for their sins where the locust, the cankerworm, the caterpillar and the palmerworm are devouring the fields of wheat at the invitation of the tares (Revelation chapter 20). So the children of Israel await this latter rain, and then there shall come the harvest: the great and terrible Day of Yahweh. Awaiting the time of the latter rain, we can see once again that Zechariah’s prophecy is relevant to God’s children today, and not merely in his own time.

On the agricultural calendar of ancient Israel, the harvest followed shortly after the latter rain, so this is the time when all true Christians should be praying as Zechariah describes here, as the camp of the saints is surrounded with the armies of bastards, and the cankerworms and palmerworms, the locusts and caterpillars, are eating their fill. As Yahshua Christ Himself described, recorded in the Gospel in Matthew chapter 13: “38 The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; 39 The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. 40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.”

2 For the idols have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie, and have told false dreams; they comfort in vain: therefore they went their way as a flock, they were troubled, because there was no shepherd.

This reference is to the sin and then the scattering of the ancient Israelites, and especially their rulers, for which they were put away in captivity. Here the focus of the prophet is not upon the 70-weeks Kingdom, but upon “all the tribes of Israel”, which have been the subject of this prophecy from the beginning of chapter 9, and frequently in the earlier chapters. Ephraim as well as Judah are the subject through the end of chapter 9, and they remain so, and most of Judah was taken into captivity along with the ten northern tribes.

Here, in part, we will read from the Messianic prophecy of Isaiah chapter 53: “1 Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?…” And this of course is a prophecy of the Gospel of Christ, as Paul had cited it in relation to the Gospel in Romans chapter 10. We also saw such a prophecy at the end of Zechariah chapter 8, concerning the ten men who would take hold of a Judahite because they knew that God was with him, a prophecy of the apostles of the Gospel. Then, from verse 4 of Isaiah 53 we read: “4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all….” And this was the purpose of the ministry of Christ, to reconcile those sheep gone astray, as Zechariah describes them here, “who went their way as a flock”, to Yahweh their God, as He Himself stated that He came “but unto the lost sheep” of Israel.

Likewise, much like this short passage here in Zechariah, we read from Ezekiel chapter 34, in part: “2 Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD unto the shepherds; Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! should not the shepherds feed the flocks? 3 Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed: but ye feed not the flock. 4 The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them. 5 And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd: and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, when they were scattered. 6 My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill: yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them. 7 Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; 8 As I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely because my flock became a prey, and my flock became meat to every beast of the field, because there was no shepherd [just as Zechariah informs us here, the shepherds were not even shepherds], neither did my shepherds search for my flock, but the shepherds fed themselves, and fed not my flock; 9 Therefore, O ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; 10 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; for I will deliver my flock from their mouth, that they may not be meat for them. 11 For thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out. 12 As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.”

So we see that two hundred years after Isaiah, and nearly a hundred years after Ezekiel, the focus of the Word of Yahweh in Zechariah is still upon those same lost sheep described in that same manner by Isaiah and Ezekiel. The stated purpose of Christ, five hundred and fifty years after Zechariah wrote these words, is still upon those same lost sheep. The Judaized denominational churches do not bear this message. They would rather claim that God cast away his original people Israel in exchange for some ambiguous so-called ‘gentiles’. However here in Zechariah, where it says that Yahweh “raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Javan”, we can see the fulfillment of that prophecy in history and with that we also see the identity of the lost sheep revealed, to a great extent, here in Zechariah.

The prophet continues to discuss the sheep:

3 Mine anger was kindled against the shepherds, and I punished the goats: for the LORD of hosts hath visited his flock the house of Judah, and hath made them as his goodly horse in the battle.

As we saw in the corresponding passages in Isaiah and Ezekiel, the anger of Yahweh was kindled against the shepherds, the rulers of the people. The word translated as goats here, attuwd (Strong’s # 6260) is sometimes translated in the King James Version as rams, and sometimes as goats. According to James Strong it is derived from a verb (6259) which means prepared, and of animals it referred to one which was fully grown. Therefore allegorically in this context it refers to the leaders of the sheep, or people, as Strong’s definition also attests. So in regards to sheep, rams would have been a better translation here, as the word was also translated in Genesis 31:10, 12. This same word was translated likewise as chief ones in the King James Version at Isaiah 14:9. There are other words which mean goat specifically. So Yahweh did not punish the goats here, but rather He punished the rams of the sheep, which are representative of the leaders of the ancient children of Israel.

Here we see a reference to the house of Judah, and one may imagine that it refers to the remnant returned to Palestine, but that is not the case in the broader context of the chapter. While the remnant in Palestine is a part of the house of Judah and may be included, after this there is a reference to the house of Joseph, representing the tribes of the ten-tribed Kingdom of Israel. Therefore the reference must be to “all the tribes of Israel” in captivity, as we saw at the beginning of Zechariah chapter 9, which included most of the house of Judah that never returned to Jerusalem.

4 Out of him came forth the corner, out of him the nail, out of him the battle bow, out of him every oppressor together.

The word translated corner is ambiguous here, but it is the same word which is found in Isaiah 28:16 where it says: “Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.” That corner, from the word pinnah (Strong’s # 6438) certainly did come forth from Judah. The word pinnah is also the ultimate origin of the English word pinnacle, through the Latin word pinna which means a wing or a point.

The corner seems to refer to Christ, but it does not, as we shall see when we examine the other elements mentioned here. Rather, in this passage the corner more likely refers to the prophecy concerning Judah and earthly kings found in Genesis chapter 49, that “the sceptre shall not depart from Judah”. An examination of the other terms here shall prove this to be true.

The nail also seems to be related to those earthly kings of Judah, or at least to their office and administration. In another prophecy, in Isaiah chapter 22, we read: “17 Behold, the LORD will carry thee away with a mighty captivity, and will surely cover thee…. 19 And I will drive thee from thy station, and from thy state shall he pull thee down. 20 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will call my servant Eliakim (meaning God raises) the son of Hilkiah (meaning Yahweh is my portion): 21 And I will clothe him with thy robe, and strengthen him with thy girdle, and I will commit thy government into his hand: and he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Judah. 22 And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open. 23 And I will fasten him as a nail in a sure place; and he shall be for a glorious throne to his father's house. 24 And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house, the offspring and the issue, all vessels of small quantity, from the vessels of cups, even to all the vessels of flagons. 25 In that day, saith the LORD of hosts, shall the nail that is fastened in the sure place be removed, and be cut down, and fall; and the burden that was upon it shall be cut off: for the LORD hath spoken it.” As Clifton Emahiser explained in his August 2002 Watchman’s Teaching Letter, the nail is something – or in this case someone – who holds up the Key of David, so it is used of the administrators who support the king in the management of the kingdom.

The reference to the battle bow seems to be a reference to Judah as the foremost warrior tribe of Israel. In Judges chapter 1 we read “1 Now after the death of Joshua it came to pass, that the children of Israel asked the LORD, saying, Who shall go up for us against the Canaanites first, to fight against them? 2 And the LORD said, Judah shall go up: behold, I have delivered the land into his hand.” Likewise, in Genesis chapter 49: “8 Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise: thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall bow down before thee. 9 Judah is a lion's whelp: from the prey, my son, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion; who shall rouse him up? 10 The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.”

And that brings us to the word in this passage which the King James Version translates as oppressor. In Zechariah 9:13 Yahweh said “When I have bent Judah for me, filled the bow with Ephraim”, so Judah is the bow, and Ephraim the arrows, and as men fight wars for their kings so it is with the tribes of Israel. Earthly kings are indeed seen as oppressors, but Strong’s dictionary informs us that the Hebrew word, nagas (Strong’s # 5065), means to drive, and by implication to tax, harass or tyrannize. In the sense of harass, it surely gives us our English word nag. These are indeed the warnings that Yahweh gave to the children of Israel when they demanded an earthly king, and those kings were promised to be of the tribe of Judah. The New American Standard Bible renders this word nagas as ruler here in this very passage of Zechariah, and in this context we must agree. When the kings of Israel ruled over the people with Yahweh’s law, they were righteous. When they ruled over the people with their own laws, they were tyrants.

So all of these things mentioned here came from the tribe of Judah, but not concerning the remnant in Palestine, which for nearly all of its history was ruled over by foreign tyrants, and even Edomites. Rather, this prophecy concerns the history of the tribe of Judah in Europe, “all the tribes of Israel”, and many of the nations of Europe even in the earliest times did indeed get their kings from Judah, by way of the princes of the Trojans. And this is a prophecy not of Christ, but of the assurance of the promises of kings from David until the day that the nail falls, as it is prophesied in Isaiah chapter 22. That day seems to be imminent, if it has not already happened, and therefore we pray that the return of Christ is also imminent.

5 And they [Judah] shall be as mighty men, which tread down their enemies in the mire of the streets in the battle: and they shall fight, because the LORD is with them, and the riders on horses shall be confounded.

This too must concern the house of Judah in captivity. Although on the surface it has an apparent fulfillment in the days of the Maccabees, ultimately the Maccabees did not tread down their enemies, but actually converted them to Judaism and joined themselves to their enemies, by which their enemies came to rule over them, as it is described in Josephus’ Antiquities of the Judaeans. At first, the Maccabees over-powered the Edomites and other Canaanites, and then they converted them, so that the Edomites eventually became their kings and rulers.

However because the perspective of Zechariah here relates to the time of the latter rain, we see that there is another fulfillment of this passage to be expected, where the children of Israel hear the call to “Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass”, among other prophecies which we have discussed in relation to Zechariah chapter 9, especially at verses 15 and 16.

This interpretation is fully verified by the prophet in the passage which follows:

6 And I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them: and they shall be as though I had not cast them off: for I am the LORD their God, and will hear them. 7 And they of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart shall rejoice as through wine: yea, their children shall see it, and be glad; their heart shall rejoice in the LORD.

Modern-day denominational churches have no concept of the identity of the ancient children of Israel in the world today, which can indeed be traced through history into the nations of modern Europe. So they disregard these promises to Israel and Judah, who were cast off by Yahweh beginning from as early as the time of the Exodus and up to the destruction of Jerusalem circa 586 BC. None of those cast-off people were ever known as Jews or Judaeans, and they, not the Judaeans, are the subject of this Messianic prophecy of Zechariah. When Christ came to Judaea, His sheep were already long scattered. None of them were ever called or considered themselves to be Jews. When Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 AD, that was the diaspora of the bad figs, described by Jeremiah, the accursed enemies of God who could never be His people, as He told them.

The denominational Christians have accepted a lie, that Yahweh cast away His people, that the ancient Israelites have somehow vanished, and that now anyone can choose God. If we accept the Messianic prophecies concerning Christ, which are only a portion of the Biblical prophecies, then we must also accept the prophecies concerning the people of Yahweh for whom Christ came. We cannot cite a small portion of the prophets of God and neglect the balance. “For if the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.” And the prophets must be accepted in their entirety.

As Christ Himself had said, men do not choose God, but rather, God has chosen men. The Word of Yahweh says in Hosea chapter 5, as the children of Israel were being taken into captivity, that “3 I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hid from me...” Likewise it says in Isaiah, around that same time, in chapter 44 “Yet now hear, O Jacob my servant; and Israel, whom I have chosen”, and in chapter 45 “For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name...” This theme is consistent throughout Isaiah, and it says in chapter 49: “5 And now, saith the LORD that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the LORD, and my God shall be my strength. 6 And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Nations, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. 7 Thus saith the LORD, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, to him whom man despiseth, to him whom the nation abhorreth, to a servant of rulers, Kings shall see and arise, princes also shall worship, because of the LORD that is faithful, and the Holy One of Israel, and he shall choose thee.” They are also whom Christ has chosen, because He does the work of the Father and came to fulfill the prophets.

Where the Israelites are portrayed as having said to Yahweh in Isaiah “that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth”, we see that wherever the children of Israel have been scattered, God will save them. Israel is the subject of God’s salvation, and this promise was never extended to any other people. Here in Zechariah, this passage was written nearly two hundred years after Isaiah’s ministry was complete, and approximately two hundred and three years after the fall of Samaria to the Assyrians circa 721 BC. This was also approximately a hundred and seventy years after all Israel was carried off into captivity in fulfillment of the 65-year prophecy in Isaiah chapter 7. That prophecy was fulfilled around 676 BC where Yahweh had said through the prophet near the beginning of his ministry, around 741 BC, that “within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, that it be not a people.” But in their captivity, in the place where it was said to them that they would not be a people, there it is said to them that they are the sons of the living God, to paraphrase Hosea chapter 1: “10 Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. 11 Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land: for great shall be the day of Jezreel.” Paul of Tarsus cited this passage in relation to the scattered children of Israel in Romans chapter 9, and so did the apostle Peter in 1 Peter chapter 2. Both apostles understood when they were writing that their Gospel was for the scattered people of “all the tribes of Israel”, the subjects of salvation throughout these chapters of Zechariah as well as Isaiah and Hosea. Here Zechariah confirms Hosea, and so do the chief apostles of Christ.

Writing his first epistle, where the apostle Peter addressed the sojourners scattered throughout Anatolia, which by his time was populated primarily with Dorian and Macedonian Greeks and the Galatae, he said in part: “9 But you are an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, so that you should proclaim the virtues for which from out of darkness [the pit where the prisoners of hope are found, Zechariah 9:11-12] you have been called into the wonder of His light, 10 who at one time were ‘not a people’ but now are the people of Yahweh, those who ‘have not been shown mercy’ but are now shown mercy.” It can be demonstrated from the context of his two epistles that Peter wrote them both to these same people, who were Christians and not Jews. And Peter was making a direct reference to the chosen status of the ancient children of Israel in relation to these people, and citing that same passage from Hosea chapter 1 which we have just cited here, and which can only relate to the ancient children of Israel. It can be demonstrated through ancient history, that the Dorians, Danaans, and Galatae, along with some of the other ancient people of Anatolia, did indeed descend from the scattered Israelites. Paul had told the Galatians that Christ came to “redeem them who were under the law”, as their ancestors certainly had been under the law.

Paul of Tarsus also quoted that passage from Hosea, in Romans chapter 9, where we may read “22 Moreover, if Yahweh wishes to display wrath, and to make known His power, with much patience having bore vessels of wrath furnished for destruction [in reference to the children of Esau which he had described earlier]; 23 and so that He will make known the wealth of His honor upon vessels of mercy, which He previously prepared for honor [in reference to the children of Jacob which he had described earlier]; 24 whom also He has called, us not only from among the Judaeans, but also from out of the Nations? 25 And as He says in Hosea, ‘I will call that which is not My people, My people; and that which is not beloved, beloved.’ 26 ‘And it shall be, in the place where it was said to them, you are not My people, there they shall be called sons of Yahweh who is living.’” There Paul is not saying that any nations could be called. Rather, he is informing us that Yahweh called the children of Israel out from among the nations where they were scattered, as well as the children of Israel out from among the Judaeans where there were also many Edomites. So Paul cited that same passage concerning Israel and their reconciliation to God found in Hosea chapter 1 which Peter had cited in that same context, the Old Testament context of the scattering and gathering of Israel found in Hosea and all the prophets.

We witness that once again here in Zechariah, that as it says here, Yahweh would “strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them: and they shall be as though I had not cast them off.” Two hundred years after the house of Joseph and most of Judah were taken into Assyrian captivity, never to be known by their original names again, Zechariah assures us that the focus of the promises of God are still upon those same people. In the writings of the apostles, another five hundred years later, that focus had still not changed. Zechariah, the prophet of the second temple period, is the “missing link” between Hosea, Isaiah, and the purpose of Christ in the 70-weeks Kingdom, attesting and proving that Yahweh has not cast away His original people, and therefore Zechariah is our Christian Identity prophet. In that manner he continues:

8 I will hiss for them, and gather them; for I have redeemed them: and they shall increase as they have increased.

In Isaiah chapter 62 the Word of Yahweh speaks of the children of Israel and says “11 Behold, the LORD hath proclaimed unto the end of the world, Say ye to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him. 12 And they shall call them, The holy people, The redeemed of the LORD: and thou shalt be called, Sought out, A city not forsaken.” Here, two hundred years after they were taken off into captivity, we have another assurance that they are not forsaken. Earlier, in Isaiah chapter 52, we read: “3 For thus saith the LORD, Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed without money. 4 For thus saith the Lord GOD, My people went down aforetime into Egypt to sojourn there; and the Assyrian oppressed them without cause.” This is a concept we will repeat here in regard to verses 10 and 11 in this chapter: many of the references to Egypt and Assyria in the words of the prophets have little to do with the countries themselves. Rather, they are references to the two captivities of Israel, the first in Egypt, and the second in Assyria. For their sins they went into captivity, and therefore they had to be redeemed. Redemption in Christ is this redemption without money, and it only pertains to these ancient children of Israel. Anyone else who thinks he can be redeemed in Christ is a fool, because none of this has anything to do with anyone other than the children of Israel. Outside of the children of Israel, the Biblical concept of redemption is absolutely meaningless.

9 And I will sow them among the people: and they shall remember me in far countries; and they shall live with their children, and turn again.

The people in far countries who turned to Christ with the announcement of the Gospel by the apostles of Christ had fulfilled this very passage. The fact that their descendants consider the scripture today proves that the God of the Bible is true. The fact that men consider the words of this God over 2,500 years after this passage was written proves the veracity of the God who inspired these words. Just as Christ was recorded as having said in Matthew chapter 24: “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations...” and again in Luke chapter 24: “46… Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: 47 And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48 And ye are witnesses of these things.” But of course this does not remove the context of these words from their purpose for the scattered children of Israel, especially since the words of Christ pertain to repentance and remission of sins, things which only pertain to the ancient children of Israel.

In fact, where it says here in Zechariah that “they shall remember Me in far countries”, where Scripture speaks of the Assyrian captivity it also informs us where the children of the Assyrian captivity would be sent, in Isaiah chapter 66: “19 And I will set a sign among them, and I will send those that escape of them unto the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, that draw the bow, to Tubal, and Javan, to the isles afar off, that have not heard my fame, neither have seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the Nations.” The children of Israel were not sown among alien peoples, but as Isaiah attests, they were sown among the other Genesis 10 tribes of the related Adamic nations. As we witnessed in Zechariah chapter 9, a bastard remains a curse, and bastards cannot be considered in these prophecies of redemption, as they are violations of the laws of God. In Revelation chapter 2 we see that the law remains, as Christ had said to the allegorical Jezebel that for her fornication, He would kill her children.

It can certainly be demonstrated in ancient history, that all of these places are in Mesopotamia, Anatolia, around the shores of the Black Sea, and in Europe extended all the way to the Iberian peninsula. That is precisely the path that the Kimmerians and Scythians followed within three centuries of the time when Isaiah had written those words, and they appeared in all of those very places. But technically, any Israelites who departed from Egypt rather than follow Moses and join themselves to Yahweh at Mount Sinai remain in the captivity of Israel from Egypt. That is apparently why both captivities are mentioned in these prophecies. The Trojans, the Danaan Greeks, and others departed from Egypt and founded states in the islands of the Mediterranean and in Europe and were also found in many of those same places that the Israelites of the Assyrian captivity were sent. So Paul described the children of Israel who were with Moses as cultivated olives, and the Romans, who descended from the Trojans, as wild olives. However they were all olives, and they were all Israelites.

Where Yahweh says here in Zechariah that “they shall remember me in far countries; and they shall live with their children, and turn again”, he is prophesying that Israelites in far-off nations shall return to Yahweh, which only happened in Christ. Similarly, we read in Micah chapter 4: “5 For all people will walk every one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever. 6 In that day, saith the LORD, will I assemble her that halteth, and I will gather her that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted; 7 And I will make her that halted a remnant, and her that was cast far off a strong nation: and the LORD shall reign over them in mount Zion from henceforth, even for ever.” The people cast far off but who became strong nations indeed turned to Christ.

Where it says of all the people who walk in the names of their gods, as we are told elsewhere, the gods of the nations are vain idols. They do not really exist, and it promises in Obadiah that those people “shall be as though they had not been.”

10 I will bring them again also out of the land of Egypt, and gather them out of Assyria; and I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon; and place shall not be found for them.

Both Egypt and Assyria are references to the scattering of Israel in their captivities. Gilead describes a rocky, rough region, and Lebanon means whiteness. Being on the northern border of ancient Israel it is symbolic of the wintery northern climates. As we read of the variously colored horses of Zechariah chapter 6, horses which represented the children of Israel in captivity, “Behold, these that go toward the north country have quieted my spirit in the north country.”

11 And he shall pass through the sea with affliction, and shall smite the waves in the sea, and all the deeps of the river shall dry up: and the pride of Assyria shall be brought down, and the sceptre of Egypt shall depart away.

Here once again our interpretation is vindicated by the words of the prophet. Assyria was already brought down by the time Zechariah wrote this passage in 518 BC. All of the great cities of Assyria were utterly destroyed by a coalition of the Scythians (including the Kimmerians), Medes, Persians and Babylonians by 612 BC, 94 years before these words were written. Therefore the references to Assyria must be allegorical, and also the references to Egypt, standing for the captivity of Israel and not to the countries themselves.

[Late addition to our commentary:] Where it says in verse 10 that “place shall not be found for them”, perhaps this is why in these last days White Europeans have no true homeland of their own, and will not have one without Christ and until His return. However the Septuagint version offers encouragement instead, as it reads that “there shall not even one of them be left behind.” The reading of the Masoretic Text, upon which the popular English versions are based, is supported by the Latin Vulgate. This verse and most of this chapter are wanting in the surviving manuscripts of Zechariah found among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The references to the waves of the sea and the deep rivers are references to other races, whether they are Adamic or not. The children of Israel in their captivity were sown among these other peoples, the Assyrians, Persians, Medes and other tribes inhabiting Anatolia and Mesopotamia. Later, as Romans, Parthians, Greeks, Kimmerians, and Scythians, they did smite all of those other nations.

However as we had discussed in our last presentation of Zechariah, in relation to chapter 9, the camp of the saints is indeed surrounded by many other races, and this passage of Zechariah is still within the context of the tine of the latter rain, set at the beginning of the chapter. So this prophecy will not be completely fulfilled until the fall of Babylon and the call to the children of Israel to “Arise and thresh”. Christ spoke on these terms where He was also referring to people, and He said of the Day of His Coming, as it is recorded in Luke chapter 21: “25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring...” The sea and the waves are the world’s masses of people, and they are roaring indeed, at every Black Lives Matter demonstration and every La Raza rally. But in the end, they shall be as though they had not been.

In the end, in Revelation chapter 21 and after all of the enemies of Christ are destroyed, the apostle John describes the City of God come down from heaven, bearing the names of the twelve tribes of Israel on its gates, and he says “1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.” There will be no more waves to roar. There will also be no more flood of the serpent, the rivers of the races of bastards, as it says in Obadiah “15 For the day of the LORD is near upon all the heathen: as thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head. 16 For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, so shall all the heathen drink continually, yea, they shall drink, and they shall swallow down, and they shall be as though they had not been. 17 But upon mount Zion shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness; and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions.”

12 And I will strengthen them in the LORD; and they shall walk up and down in his name, saith the LORD.

Once again, it said in Micah of both remnant nations near to Palestine and strong nations of the children of Israel cast far off, that “we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever.” To walk in the name of our God is to walk in the name of Christ, and Zechariah was a Messianic prophet as well as a Christian Identity prophet. So to find the fulfillment of these words for the house of Judah and the house of Joseph, we must look to Christian Europe, and that is where all of these words of Yahweh our God are found to be truth.