Scripture Daily

Context No. 1257 of 4322 · Zechariah

Context · Reflection

Zechariah 11:1-6: in context

1Open your doors, Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars. 2Wail, cypress tree, for the cedar has fallen, because the stately ones are destroyed. Wail, you oaks of Bashan, for the strong forest has come down. 3A voice of the wailing of the shepherds! For their glory is destroyed—a voice of the roaring of young lions! For the pride of the Jordan is ruined. 4The LORD my God says: “Feed the flock of slaughter. 5Their buyers slaughter them and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the LORD, for I am rich;’ and their own shepherds don’t pity them. 6For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land,” says the LORD; “but, behold, I will deliver every one of the men into his neighbor’s hand and into the hand of his king. They will strike the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.”

Zechariah pronounces a dark oracle. He calls the cedars of Lebanon and the oaks of Bashan to wail, for the great forest has come down, and the shepherds to howl, for their glory is ruined. Then God gives him a grim assignment: shepherd the flock doomed to slaughter. He describes the flock's plight: those who buy them slaughter them and go unpunished; those who sell them say, blessed be the LORD, I have become rich; and their own shepherds have no pity on them. And God declares that he will no longer pity the inhabitants of the land but hand them over.

The disturbing heart of this oracle is the flock doomed to slaughter, abused by everyone who should have cared for them. The buyers slaughter them without penalty; the sellers get rich off them and even bless God for their profit; and the shepherds, whose whole job is to protect the sheep, have no pity. The people who were supposed to care for the flock are instead exploiting it, treating the sheep as commodities to be sold and slaughtered for profit, while piously thanking God for the wealth their exploitation brings. It is one of scripture's pointed condemnations of leaders and traders who prey on the very people entrusted to them and dress up their greed in religious language, blessed be the LORD, I am rich. God takes the side of the abused flock against the shepherds who fatten themselves on it. And the grief in the passage is real; God is not indifferent to sheep sold and slaughtered by those who should protect them. It is a warning to anyone with responsibility over others, and a comfort to the exploited, that God sees the flock that is preyed upon, and he holds the merciless shepherds to account. The false shepherd's prayer of thanks over ill-gotten gain does not fool the God who pities the slaughtered flock.

If I have responsibility over others, am I a shepherd who protects the flock or one who exploits it for my own gain while thanking God for the profit, and do I trust that God sees and grieves over the abused?

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