Day 1080: Postscript to Zechariah – Matthew 23 vs 29 - 36

29-30 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31-33 Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?

34 Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, 35 so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of innocent Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. 36 Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.” Matthew 23:29-36 English Standard Version

I've mentioned before that the messages of prophets like Zechariah are not always easy to understand. It can be difficult to decide whether some were to be taken in a literal way, or figuratively. To make things more difficult, there are a few places in the Bible (though not many) where it would seem there may've been, what we today call, 'a typo'. Verse 35 above is an example. Jesus spoke of a man named Zechariah, who was the son of Barachiah, who was murdered between the sanctuary and the altar.

The first chapter of Zechariah tells us that the prophet was the son of a man named Berechiah. The difficulty is that we don't know how this Zechariah died. But, in the last book of the Jewish Bible, there was a faithful priest named Jehoiada who had helped King Joash (who was only 7 when he began his reign) to reform the land according to God's commands. Sadly, we read that “after Jehoiada died, the leaders of Judah came and bowed before King Joash and persuaded him to listen to their advice. They decided to abandon the Temple of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, and worshipped Asherah poles and idols instead! Because of this sin, divine anger fell on Judah and Jerusalem. Yet the Lord sent prophets to bring them back to him. The prophets warned them, but still the people would not listen.” (2 Chronicles 24:17-19)

This led to the sadder incident that followed. “The Spirit of God came upon Zechariah, son of Jehoiada the priest. He stood before the people and said, 'This is what God says: Why do you disobey the Lord’s commands and keep yourselves from prospering? You have abandoned the Lord, and now he has abandoned you!' Then the leaders plotted to kill Zechariah. King Joash ordered that they stone him to death in the courtyard of the Lord’s Temple. That was how King Joash repaid Jehoiada for his loyalty - by killing his son. Zechariah’s last words as he died were, 'May the Lord see what they are doing and avenge my death!'” (2 Chronicles 24:20-22)

That incident certainly seems to tie in with what Jesus said as He warned the leaders of Jerusalem of how they were continuing on the path of their ancestors in killing the prophets God sent to turn them away from evil. And by referring to Abel also, it was as if Jesus was saying that from the start of their Bible, to it's conclusion, they had been murderers!

From the earliest years of the New Testament age, Bible teachers have tried to solve the difficulty. Was it a case of history repeating itself? Was Zechariah, whose book we have in the Bible, killed in a similar way that another Zechariah had been killed? Or was there an error when a manuscript was copied? We don't know for sure. What we can take to heart, however, is how rejecting God's messengers so saddened the heart of Jesus. This is how He concluded His warning that day: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not! See, your house is left to you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” (Matthew 23:37-39)