Zechariah 5:6

Then the angel that talked with me went forth, and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes, and see what is this that goeth forth. Wickedness and idolatry removed from the Holy Land to Babylon, there to mingle with its kindred elements.-The ephah was the Hebrew dry measure containing about a bushel, or seven and a half gallons. Hereby the allusion is to the previous vision as to theft and perjury: the ephah which, by falsification of the measure, they made the instrument of defrauding, shall be made the instrument of their punishment (Grotius). Compare "this is their resemblance" (Zechariah 5:6) - i:e., this is a representation of what the Jews have done, and what they shall suffer. Their total dispersion ("the land of Shinar" being the emblem of the various Gentile lands of their present dispersion) is herein foretold, when the measure (to which the ephah a...

Then the angel answered, _This is the measure that goes forth, and this is their eye in all the earth_. By saying that the measure is their eye, he no doubt means that the ungodly could not thus be carried away at their own pleasure, but that God restrained them whenever it seemed good to him; for they could not escape his sight. For by their eyes he understands passively the power of seeing in God, by which he notices all the sins of the ungodly, that he may check them when he pleases, when they hurry on without restraint. (59) But that the meaning of the Prophet may be made more clear, let us first see what wickedness means, — whether it is to be taken for those sins which provoked God’s wrath against the Jews, — or whether for those wrongs which heathen enemies had done. The last is the view I prefer, though if we take it for the wickedness which had previously reigned in Judea, the m...

5-11 In this vision the prophet sees an ephah, something in the shape of a corn measure. This betokened the Jewish nation. They are filling the measure of their iniquity; and when it is full, they shall be delivered into the hands of those to whom God sold them for their sins. The woman sitting in the midst of the ephah represents the sinful church and nation of the Jews, in their latter and corrupt age. Guilt is upon the sinner as a weight of lead, to sink him to the lowest hell. This seems to mean the condemnation of the Jews, after they filled the measure of their iniquities by crucifying Christ and rejecting his gospel. Zechariah sees the ephah, with the woman thus pressed in it, carried away to some far country. This intimates that the Jews should be hurried out of their own land, and forced to dwell in far countries, as they had been in Babylon. There the ephah shall be firmly pla...

Verse Zechariah 5:6. _THIS_ IS _AN EPHAH THAT GOETH FORTH._] This, among the Jews, was the ordinary measure of grain. The _woman_ in the _ephah_ is supposed to represent _Judea_, which shall be visited for its sins; the _talent of lead_ on the _ephah_, within which the woman was enclosed, the _wrath_ of God, bending down this culprit nation, in the measure of its sins; for the angel said, "This is wickedness;" that is, the _woman_ represents the _mass of iniquity_ of this nation....

THIS IS THE EPHAH THAT GOETH FORTH - Theodoret: “We too are taught by this, that the Lord of all administers all things in weight and measure. So, foretelling to Abraham that his seed should be a sojourner and the cause thereof, He says, “for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full” Genesis 15:16, that is, they have not yet committed sins enough to merit entire destruction, wherefore I cannot yet endure to give them over to the slaughter, but will wait for the measure of their iniquity.” The relation then of this vision to the seventh is, that the seventh tells of God’s punishment on individual sinners; this, on the whole people, when the iniquity of the whole is full. This is their resemblance, as we say, their look, that is, the look, appearance, of the inhabitants “in all the land.” This then being the condition of t

EXPOSITION ZECHARIAH 5:1 § 8. _The sixth vision: the flying roll._ ZECHARIAH 5:1 THEN I TURNED, AND LIFTED UP MINE EYES; _i.e. _I lifted up mine eyes again, and saw the vision that follows. The prophet had seen, in the fourth vision, how in the new theocracy the priesthood should be pure and holy; in the fifth how the Church should be restored; he is now shown that sinners should be cut off, that no transgression should be left in the kingdom of God. A FLYING ROLL; _volumen volans _(Vulgate): comp. Ezekiel 2:9, Ezekiel 2:10

AND I SAID, WHAT [IS] IT?.... After he had lifted up his eyes and seen it, he desires to know both what it was, and what was the meaning of it: AND HE SAID, THIS [IS] AN EPHAH THAT GOETH FORTH; which was a measure much in use with the Jews, Exodus 16:36 it is the same with the "bath", and held above seven wine gallons. The Targum interprets this of such who dealt in false measures, whose sin is exposed, and their punishment set forth; but rather it designs the measure of iniquity filling up, either in Judea, particularly in the times of Christ, Matthew 23:32 or in the whole world, and especially in the antichristian states, Revelation 18:5: and He said moreover, this [is] their res

WHAT IS IT In the vision of the ephah local and prophetic elements are to be distinguished. The elements are: an ephah or measure; a woman in the ephah; a sealing weight upon the mouth of the ephah confining the woman, and the stork-winged women whose only function is to bear the ephah and woman away into Babylonia (Shinar). The thing thus symbolized was "through all the land" (Zechariah 5:6). Symbolically, a "measure" (or "cup") stands for something which has come to the full, so that God must judge it (2 Samuel 8:2); (Jeremiah 51:13); (Habakkuk 3:6); ...

CHAPTER 5 _ 1. The sixth vision (Zechariah 5:1) _ 2. The seventh vision (Zechariah 5:5) Zechariah 5:1. The three remaining night visions are of a different character. The first visions the prophet had were visions of comfort for Jerusalem and the dispersed nation, the overthrow of Babylon and all their enemies, divine forgiveness and the theocracy restored. Now follow the last three visions, and these are visions of judgment. Judgment precedes Israel's restoration, and is very prominently connected with it. The sixth night vision is the one of the flying roll. The prophet's eyes seem to have been closed after the fifth vision, for we read, “And I lifted up my eyes again.” The flying ro

THE TRANSFERENCE TO BABYLONIA OF JUDAH'S GUILT (_i.e._ the cause of calamity). For their resemblance (Zechariah 5:6) read with LXX their iniquity (_mg.)_ or rather their guilt. By the transference of Judah's guilt to Shinar (an intentional archaism for Babylon, see Genesis 11:1) Zechariah foretells both the deliverance of Judah and the ruin of the great empire. But he looks for the removal not only of the guilt, the cause of the calamity, but also of wickedness, the cause of the guilt. Wickedness, being feminine in Heb., is naturally symbolised by a woman. It is remarkable that Haggai and Zechariah make no mention of Persia, but only of Babylonia, probably because the Jews were still in captivity in the latter country....