I asked the angel who was speaking to me, "What are these?" He answered me, "These are the horns that scattered Judah, Israel and Jerusalem." – Zechariah 1:19

 Today's Scripture Reading (August 22, 2020): Zechariah 1

Mahatma Gandhi argued that "The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace." That day has never come. And the love of power is transient, passing from one empire to the next. It always has been that way. Every empire has been built on power, and every empire has eventually fallen. And that single fact should give the powers of this world reason to pause. The love of power can only lead to the temporary possession power. Power is almost an impossible thing on which to hold.

Traditionally, the use of a horn as a symbol was intended to bring about images of authority and strength, because the power of a bull or an ox was found in the animal's horn. If you dehorn a bull or an ox, you steal its power. We can imagine the "Running of the Bulls" If all of the bulls had been dehorned. The size of the beast would still make those who run afraid, but not nearly as scared as they would be if the bulls still had their horns.

Zechariah has a vision. And in the dream, he looks up and sees four, apparently disembodied, horns; at least, Zechariah makes no mention of any animal to which the horns might be connected. And he is confused. What is the intended meaning of the four horns? The angel replies that these are the horns or the powers that had scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem. The angel offers no other information. And neither does Zechariah.

This leaves us to guess at what powers the angel was meaning. Adding to the mystery is that the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible written for Greek-speaking Jews during the third and second centuries B.C.E., and the Bible that was adopted by the early Christian Church, omits "Israel." The omission of Israel makes some sense because Israel had long disappeared by the days of Zechariah. But that might have also been the point.

So, who were the powers? Opinion varies. If we include Israel and concentrate on the word scattered, then it would seem that Assyria, who drove Israel into exile, and Babylon, who took Judah into exile and destroyed the city of Jerusalem, should be included as two of the horns. We should probably also include Egypt, who, while not directly driving Israel into exile, accepted Judeans, who were fleeing from Babylon into a self-imposed exile—leaving the identity of the fourth horn. Some argue that the fourth horn represents the current Medo-Persian Empire, which reached its height during the reign of Darius the Great, who Zechariah mentions in verse 1. But the Medo-Persians didn't really scatter Judah. Other Scholars have added an element a prophecy by including Greece, who scattered through their influence and the Hellenization, or the promotion of Greek Culture, throughout the Middle East. Others have argued for the Romans, who scattered Israel by destroying Jerusalem and ending Judah as an independent nation.

But regardless of which empire we assign to the four horns, the reality is that all of them fell. Only the God of Israel remained as a constant. And only he was the one on whom Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem could rely.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Zechariah 2