III. A collection of four oracles delivered at various times in the fourth year of Darius, and partly occasioned by a request of the nation to be divinely informed, whether, now on their happy return to their fatherland, the month of Jerusalem's overthrow should be registered in their sacred calendar as a season of fasting and humiliation. The prophet declares that these times should in future ages be observed as festive solemnities.
IV. The 9th, loth, and it th chapters contain a variety of prophecies unfolding the fortunes of the people, their safety in the midst of Alexander's expedition, and their victories under the Macca bman chieftains, including the fate of many of the surrounding- nations, IIadrach, Damascus, Tyre, and Philistia (see Hengstenberg's Christologie).
V. The remaining three chapters graphically portray the future condition of the people, espe cially in Messianic times, and contain allusions to a , siege of the city, the means of escape by the cleav ing of the Mount of Olives on the descent of Jeho ' vah, with a symbol of twilight breaking into day, and living waters issuing from Jerusalem, and concluding with a blissful vision of the enlarged prosperity and holiness of the theocmtic metropolis, , when upon the bells of the horses shall be inscribed holiness unto the Lord.' Integrity.—The genuineness of the latter portion of Zechariah, from ch. ix. to xiv., has been dis puted. Among the first to suggest doubt on this subject was Joseph Mede, who referred chaps. ix. x. and xi. to an earlier date, and ascribed them to Jeremiah. Remarking on Matt. xxvii. 9, i0, he says : It may seem the evangelist would inform us that those latter chapters ascribed to Zachary— namely, the ninth, tenth, eleventh, etc.—are indeed the prophecies of Jeremy, and that the Jews had not rightly attributed them. Certainly, if a man weigh the contents of some of them, they should in likelihood be of an elder date than the time of Zachary—namely, before the captivity ; for the sub jects of some of them were scarce in being after that time. . . . As for their being joined to the prophecies of Zachary, that proves no more they are his than the like adjoining of Agur's proverbs to Solomon's proves that they are therefore Solo mon's, or that all the psalms are David's because joined in one volume with David's psalms' (Epist. xxxi.) His opinion was adopted in England by Hammond, Kidder, Bridge, Newcome, Whiston, and Seeker, by Pye Smith and Davidson, and has been followed, with variations, on the continent by Fliigge (Die Wei ssagung. Zach. iibersetzt,etc.,1784) ; by I3ertholdt (Einleit. p. 1701); by Rosenmiiller in his Scholia, though in the first edition lie defended the genuineness of these chapters ; by Eichhorn (Einleit. sec. 6o5) ; Corrodi (Beleuchtung des Bibelcanons, i.• Io7) ; De Wette, in the earlier editions of his .Ein/eitung ; Credner (7oel, 67); Knobel (Der Prophetismus, etc., Th. s. 234) ; Forberg (Conment. in Zach. Vaticin., pars i.) ; as also by Maurer, Hitzig, Ewald, Ortenberg (Die Bestandsteile a'es E. Sacharja); Bleek (Einkll.
p. 553) ; Herzfeld (Gesch. p. 2S6) ; Bunsen (Gott in (ler p. 449, etc.) ; and E. Meier (Gesch. d. poet. Lit. der Hebraer, p. 306).
On the other hand, the integrity of this portion of Zechariah has been defended by Jahn (Introduc tion, pt. ii. sec. 161), Carpzov (Critica Sacra, p. 848), Beckhaus (Integritat d. Proph. Schriften, p.
337), Koester (11Ieletemata Crit. et Exeset. in Zack. part. post. p. to), Hengstenberg (d. Integritai d. Sackarjah, in his Beitrage,i. 361), Burger (Etudes Exe'g. et crit. sur Proph. Zech. p. iiS), Thenius, Herbot, Schegg, Hofmann, Kliefoth, Ebrard, vernich, Henderson, De \Vette, Keil (Einleit. see. io3), St Uhelin (Spec elle E Welt. p. 32 , etc. ), Moore (Prophets 121 the Restoration, p. 209, New York 1856), Neumann (Die IVeirsag. d. Sakharjah ausgel. IS6o), and Kohler (d. IVez'ssag. Sacharfas erkl. t863). The theory of Mede was suggested by the difficulty arising from the quotation in Mat thew, and, rejecting other hypotheses, he says : It is certain that Jeremiah's prophecies are digested in no order, but only as it seems they came to light in the scribes' hands. Hence sometimes all is ended with Zedekiab, then we are brought back to Je hoiakiin, then to Zedekiah again, etc. Whereby it seems they came not to light to be enrolled secundu m ordinem temporis, nor all together, but as it happened in so distracted a time. And why might not some not be found till the return from captivity, and be approved by Zechariah, and so put to his volume according to the time of their finding and approbation by him, and after that some other prophecies yet added to his ?' (Epist. lxi .) The others who deny the genuineness of these chapters are by no means agreed as to the real authorship of them. Eichhorn ascribes one por tion to the thne of Alexander, and the other sections to a period before the exile ; while Corrodi places the fourteenth chapter as low as the age of Antiochus Epiphanes. Bertholdt, Gesenius, Maurer, and Knobel suppose the ninth, tenth, and eleventh chapters to be the production of Zechariah, the son of Jeberechiah, referred to in Is. viii. 2, and the remaining three to be the composition of an anony mous author who lived under Josiah, and of course before the captivity. Rosenmiiller is of opinion that the whole second part is the work of one author who lived under Uzziah. Fliigg,e arbitrarily divides it into no less than nine sections, referring them to different times and authors, but yet ascribing the ninth chapter to the Zechariah spoken of in 2 Chron. xxvi. 5. Ewald adds xiii. 7-9 to the first section —ix.- xi. Bunsen ascribes the second section— xii.-xiv.—to Urijah, the son of Shemaiah of Kir jath-jearim' (Jer. xxvi. 20). Newcorne places the first three chapters, as to date of authorship, before the overthrow of Israel, and the last three before tbe captivity of Judah. Hitzig and Credner carry back the period of their authorship to the age of Ahaz, or before it.