Zechariah 8:17

These are the things that ye shall do; Speak ye every man the truth to his neighbour; execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates: -The promised blessings are connected with obedience-God's covenanted grace will lead those truly blessed by it to holiness, not licentiousness. SPEAK YE EVERY MAN THE TRUTH TO HIS NEIGHBOUR - not that the truth should not be spoken to foreigners too; but he makes it an aggravation of their sin that they spared not even their brethren. Besides and above all outward ordinances (; ), God requires truth and justice. EXECUTE THE JUDGMENT OF TRUTH AND PEACE. Equitable decisions tend to allay feuds and produce peace. IN YOUR GATES - the place where courts of judicature in the East were held....

He afterwards adds, _And think not evil every one against his friend_. Here the Prophet not only condemns open wrongs, but also the hidden purposes of evil. We hence learn, that the law was not only given to restrain men as it were by a bridle, and that it not only contains a rule of life as to outward duties, but that it also rules their hearts before God and angels. The law is indeed really spiritual; and extremely gross and foolish are they who think that they satisfy the law of Moses, when they abstain from murder and theft and other evil deeds; for we see that the Prophets everywhere required a right feeling in the hearts as Zechariah does in this place, who reminds the Jews, that they were not to devise evil against their friends, no, not in their hearts. He might have omitted the last words; but he meant to condemn those frauds which were wont to be covered by many and various dis...

9-17 Those only who lay their hands to the plough of duty, shall have them strengthened with the promises of mercy: those who avoid their fathers' faults have the curse turned into a blessing. Those who believed the promises, were to show their faith by their works, and to wait the fulfilment. When God is displeased, he can cause trade to decay, and set every man against his neighbour; but when he returns in mercy, all is happy and prosperous. Surely believers in Christ must not trifle with the exhortation to put away lying, and to speak every man peace with his neighbour, to hate what the Lord hates, and to love that wherein he delights....

FOR ALL THESE THINGS DO I HATE - Literally, emphatic, “For they are all these things which I hate.” This is the sum of what I hate; for they comprise in brief the breaches of the two tables, the love of God and of man....

EXPOSITION ZECHARIAH 8:1 § 4. _The Lord promises to show his love for Zion, to dwell among his people, and to fill Jerusalem with a happy lace._ ZECHARIAH 8:1 AGAIN; rather, _and_. This chapter contains the second half of the Lord's answer concerning fasting, merging into prophecy. ZECHARIAH 8:2 THUS SAITH THE LORD OF HOSTS. This formula occurs ten times in this chapter, thus enforcing the truth that all the promises made to Zion come from the Lord himself, and are therefore sure to be fulfilled. I WAS JEALOUS;—_I am jealous, _as...

AND LET NONE OF YOU IMAGINE EVIL IN YOUR HEARTS AGAINST HIS NEIGHBOUR,.... Zechariah 7:10 hatred without a cause was a governing vice under the second temple, and Jarchi says was the cause of the destruction of it; see John 15:25: AND LOVE NO FALSE OATH; whereby the character and property of a fellow creature are hurt; nor any vain one, which the Jews were addicted to, Matthew 5:34: FOR ALL THESE [ARE THINGS] THAT I HATE, SAITH THE LORD; as being contrary to his nature, and to his law; and is a reason why they should be hated and avoided by men....

Zechariah 8:1. _Again the word of the LORD of hosts came to me, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury._ Because they worshipped idols instead of the living God, Jehovah of hosts, who is a jealous God, was very angry with his ancient people, and allowed them to be carried away into captivity; and it is well for us, in these days, to recollect that we serve a jealous God, and that, if our hearts are not true to him, he will soon send us sharp afflictions, and make us feel the weight of his rod. It was Paul's anxious desire that he might be able to present the church at Corinth «as a chaste virgin to Christ;» and, certainly, our Lord Jesus Christ will not accept the professing church of these days on any other terms. Let thy heart be loyal and true to him, or else thou wilt stir up the holy jealou

CHAPTER 8 _ 1. The restoration announced (Zechariah 8:1) _ 2. The peace of Jerusalem (Zechariah 8:4) 3. The return to the land (Zechariah 8:6) 4. The blessing of the land and the people (Zechariah 8:9) Zechariah 8:1. The answer is now given to the question, and it is an answer which none of the petitioners expected. The answer is closely linked with the third night vision in chapter 2, for here is an enlarged prophecy concerning the restoration of Jerusalem. Jehovah was jealous for Jerusalem. The wrath

ZECHARIAH 8:4 F. A beautiful description of the result of the restoration of peace and safety. During the troublous past Jerusalem had been no place for feeble old age or for children. The sympathetic touch, playing in the streets thereof, is one of the very few indications in the OT of a love for children as such. Zechariah 8:7. with its refer. ence to the east and west looks like a later prophecy of the return from the Dispersion, Zechariah 8:10. is in agreement with Haggai 1:6; Haggai 2:16. It is noteworthy that the adversaries her

EVIL. Hebrew. _ra. '._ App-44 LOVE NO FALSE OATH. Reference to Pentateuch (Leviticus 6:3; Leviticus 19:12). all these are things that. hate. Some codices, with Septuagint and Syriac, read "all these things do. hate"....