ZECHARIAH 2 — THE MAN WITH THE MEASURING LINE: A CITY WITHOUT WALLS AND THE LORD IN ITS MIDST

The third vision follows directly from the promise at the end of the first vision that a measuring line would be stretched over Jerusalem (1:16). Surveying was the first step in building or rebuilding a city, and the man with the line is going to measure the dimensions of the new Jerusalem. But the vision turns into a message about the nature of the restored city. It will not be defined by walls and measurements, but by the presence of God. The chapter contains the first of several promises that God will dwell in the midst of His people (2:5, 10–11; 8:3), and it presents some of the most striking statements about the sent one who speaks as the LORD and yet is sent by the LORD. The historical background is the condition of Jerusalem in 519 BC. The city was small and unwalled, a shadow of its former self. The walls had been destroyed in 586 BC and would not be rebuilt until the time of Nehemiah, about seventy-five years later (Nehemiah 2–6). For a city in that period, the absence of walls meant vulnerability, and a vision that said that the city would not need walls would have been startling. The vision answers the question of how a small, unprotected community could ever be secure. The chapter also contains an urgent call to Jews who were still in Babylon, many of whom had chosen to stay when the first exiles returned, to leave and rejoin the people of God in Jerusalem. In English Bibles, this is chapter 2, verses 1–13, and in the Hebrew Bible it is 2:5–17.

The situation described in this chapter fits the historical context of Jerusalem in the late sixth century BC. Archaeological work in the City of David and the surrounding area shows that Jerusalem was heavily destroyed in 586 BC and that the area was sparsely settled in the Persian period. The population of the province of Yehud was small, estimated at only tens of thousands, and the city of Jerusalem was a small settlement for much of the century. Excavations have uncovered the Babylonian destruction layer, including burned buildings and arrowheads, as well as the remains of the Persian-period settlement. The sight of a measuring line in the hands of a man heading to survey such a city would have been a hopeful sign. The call to flee from Babylon is consistent with the demographics of the period. Many Jews remained in Mesopotamia after the first return, and by the fifth century BC, a prosperous Jewish community existed there, as documented by the Murashu archive, a collection of cuneiform tablets from the city of Nippur that mentions many Jewish names, including people with names of the LORD. This evidence confirms that large numbers of Jews stayed in Babylonia, and that the call of the prophets to return was not obeyed by all. The existence of this community also helps explain the later development of Babylonian Judaism and the Babylonian Talmud. The concept of a divine figure who is sent by God and is also God has deep roots in the Old Testament, in the Angel of the LORD who appears to Abraham, Hagar, Moses, Gideon, and others. Early Christian writers such as Justin Martyr cited passages like this one as evidence of the Son's pre-incarnate activity. The opening of Zechariah's visions is also confirmed by the manuscript tradition, since the Twelve Prophets scroll from Qumran and the Greek scroll from Nahal Hever preserve this part of the book.