In this article, we will be examining a prophecy from the book of the prophet Zechariah which demonstrates that the Messiah (mashiach) is YHWH in human flesh, namely Zechariah 13:7.
Zechariah 13:7 is a messianic prophecy which speaks of the death of the Messiah:
“Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me,” declares the LORD of hosts. “Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered; I will turn my hand against the little ones." (Zechariah 13:7, cited in Matthew 26:31 and Mark 14:27)
Christian theologians and commentators have interpreted this to be referring to the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ:
"Awake, O sword, against my shepherd,.... Not Judas Maccabeus, slain in battle by Bacchis w, as Grotius fancies; but Christ, Jehovah's Shepherd; for these are the words of Jehovah the Father, concerning his Son, whom he calls "my Shepherd"; because he has a property in him, as well as in the flock; and he was chosen, called, set up, and sent as such by him; on whom he laid the straying of all the sheep; and who as such died and rose again, and is accountable to his divine Father for the flock committed to him: by "the sword" awoke against him are meant either the sorrows and afflictions of Christ, which, like a sword, pierced through his soul; or the violent death he was put to, being stricken and cut off for the transgressions of his people; or the Jews, who were the instruments of it; so wicked men are called, Psalms 17:13 or rather the glittering sword of justice, which was drawn against him, and sheathed in him; which is called upon to "awake", it seeming as though it was asleep; it having been a long time since the first sin of Adam was committed, in which all his posterity was concerned, and for which satisfaction to divine justice must be made; and longer still since Christ became a surety, and engaged to do it; moreover, it was a great while since it was promised that he should come, and be smitten and wounded for sin; and, after he was come into the world, it was some time before the orders were given to this sword to awake against him: even against the man [that is] my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts; the human nature of Christ is signified by "the man"; not that he was really man before his incarnation, only in the purpose and covenant of God; and he often appearing in a human form; and the Scripture speaking of things future as present; though here it regards him in the days of his flesh, and as suffering: his divine nature is expressed by being "the fellow" of the Lord of hosts; not only being near to him in place and affection, but his equal, being truly a divine Person; of the same nature, glory, and majesty, with him x, though distinct from him; and so fit to be the Shepherd of the flock:" (John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible)
"The person against whom it is commissioned, ' my' shepherd, and the man that is my fellow" This shepherd can be no other than Christ, who is often in scripture stiled " a Shepherd, yea, the chief Shepherd, the Prince of pastors." (The Works of John Flavel, Vol 1, pg. 344)
"And this is the meaning which it has in the passage before us, where the construct state expresses the relation of apposition, as for example in אישׁ חסידך (Deuteronomy 33:8; cf. Ewald, 287, e), the man who is my nearest one. The shepherd of Jehovah, whom Jehovah describes as a man who is His next one (neighbour), cannot of course be a bad shepherd, who is displeasing to Jehovah, and destroys the flock, or the foolish shepherd mentioned in Zechariah 11:15-17, as Grotius, Umbr., Ebrard, Ewald, Hitzig, and others suppose; for the expression "man who is my nearest one" implies much more than unity or community of vocation, or that he had to feed the flock like Jehovah. No owner of a flock or lord of a flock would call a hired or purchased shepherd his ‛âmı̄th. And so God would not apply this epithet to any godly or ungodly man whom He might have appointed shepherd over a nation. The idea of nearest one (or fellow) involves not only similarity in vocation, but community of physical or spiritual descent, according to which he whom God calls His neighbour cannot be a mere man, but can only be one who participates in the divine nature, or is essentially divine. The shepherd of Jehovah, whom the sword is to smite, is therefore no other than the Messiah, who is also identified with Jehovah in Zechariah 12:10; or the good shepherd, who says of Himself, "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30). " (Keil and Delitzsch OT Commentary)
"My fellow, or my equal, who was ever with me, and my delights, Proverbs 8:30. Man my fellow speaks Christ man with us and God with his Father, God-man in one person. Smite the shepherd; this great and good Shepherd shall be smitten, i.e. die for my sheep, and before he dieth shall suffer much for them." (Matthew Poole's Commentary)
"The word rendered "man" means rather "mighty man;" that rendered "fellow" occurs often in Leviticus, but nowhere else (Leviticus 5:21; 6:2; 19:11, 15, 17, etc.), and is usually translated "neighbour;" it implies one united to another by the possession of common nature, rights, and privileges. God could speak only of One thus associated with himself, that is, of him who could say, "I and my Father are One" (John 10:30)." (Pulpit Commentary)
Below is a citation from Rabbi David Kimchi's commentary on Zechariah 13:7:
“Smite the shepherd.”–The wicked prince. But the wise man, R. Abraham Ibn Ezra, has interpreted this prophecy of the great wars which shall be in all the world in the days of the Messiah, the son of Joseph. And the meaning of “my shepherd” is, Every king of the Gentiles whom God has caused to rule over the earth, and he thinks himself to be as God, therefore he says, “Against the man my fellow;” i.e., who thinks of himself that he is my fellow. (The Rev. A. M‘Caul, A.M., Rabbi David Kimchi's Commentary Upon The Prophecies Of Zechariah Translated From the Hebrew With Notes And Observations On The Passages Relating To The Messiah, pp. 167-168)
Many of the Jewish rabbis thought the "shepherd" was a proud and wicked Gentile king. A. M'Caul explains why this cannot be true:
“Such is the conclusion to which an examination of the passage itself, and a comparison of the language with that of the prophets, would lead, and this conclusion is rendered absolutely certain, by comparing Zechariah with himself. In the xith chapter we have seen the same figure employed. The people of Israel are compared to sheep committed to the care of a good shepherd, and when he ceases to perform the office, calamity and ruin are the consequence. The identity of the symbols and the things symbolized, in both visions, shows that they refer to the same persons and the same events. It is true that in the xith chapter, Zechariah does not mention the death of the Messiah, but he does in the xiith. ‘They shall look upon me whom they pierced’; and in both intimates that the Messiah is a divine person, as God here calls him, ‘The man that is my fellow.’ In xi. 13, we read ‘The LORD YHWH said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prized at of them,’ where the Lord identifies himself with the shepherd. In xii. 10, He who pours out the Spirit of grace and supplication, identifies himself with Him that is pierced, so that the words under consideration, ‘The man that is my fellow,’ exactly agree with the character of Messiah, as previously given by Zechariah. That ‘amiti, ‘my fellow,’ implies that He of whom it is spoken is a divine person, is plainly acknowledged by those rabbies who oppose Christianity. R. Isaac says, ‘He calls him “The man, my fellow,” and companion, because in the pride and haughtiness of his heart, he thinks himself as it were God.’ And Abarbanel, who endeavors to interpret the words in a bad sense of our Lord, acknowledges still more plainly that these words signify one of the same substance. ‘The words, “The man my fellow,” are spoken of Jesus the Nazarene, for, according to the sentiments of the children of Edom, and their faith, he was the Son of God, and of the same substance, and therefore he is called, according to their words, “The man that is my fellow.”’ He here plainly and positively asserts, that these words express the Christian doctrine of the Deity of the Messiah, and thinks that they were selected on that account. These two testimonies of two controversialists, writing professedly against Christianity, are of the greatest value. They show that the grammatical sense assigned to the passage by Christians, and on which Christians rest their interpretation, is obvious, and so necessarily true, that the most acute adversaries are compelled to admit it; and can only escape from it by saying that the words are ironical. This concession is rendered doubly valuable by the consideration that they had before them another explanation, proposed by a rabbi of great renown, and that they rejected it. Rashi, as quoted by Kimchi in the Commentary, page 167, says that kings are called God’s fellows, because they are associated with him in feeding his sheep, but R. Isaac and Abarbanel preferred expounding ‘amiti ‘My fellow,’ of a similarity in nature and substance; and, no doubt, their reason for this preference was the fact that, in all the other passages where it occurs, it can have no other meaning” (Ibid., pgs. 172-174)
It is an interesting fact that the famous anti-Christian Rabbi Tovia Singer never addresses Zechariah 13:7 in his 2-volume book series Let's Get Biblical! even though he addresses Zechariah 13:1-6 and 8-9. I wonder why?
The Hebrew word amith ("fellow" or "associate") is used in the book of Leviticus and is closely related to ah ("brother") in verses like Lev. 19:17, for example. OT scholar Walter Kaiser says the following in his book The Messiah in the Old Testament:
“But who is this shepherd? Certainly he is no ordinary herder of sheep and goats, for he is called ‘my shepherd’ by the Lord (v. 7). Moreover, he is ‘the man who is close to me’ (v. 7b) (Heb. geber ‘amiti, ‘the man with me,’) or ‘the man who is my companion’). Surely this is high praise, for the term 'companion' or 'associate' refers to a close neighbor or close companion in Leviticus 6:2; 7:21; 18:20; 19:15; 24:19. Thus, the shepherd is one who is side by side with Yahweh; that is, he is his equal. Once again, this messianic prophecy is speaking about a human being (‘the man’ who is also divine (he is ‘close to me,’ or is ‘my associate’).” (Walter C. Kaiser, The Messiah in the Old Testament, pgs. 226-227)
Let us revisit the question of who exactly the shepherd is. Many interpreters view the shepherd here in 13:7 as the "pierced one" of Zechariah 12:10. The fact that YHWH uses amithi in reference to the shepherd in 13:7 shows him as distinct from the evil shepherd of Zec. 11:17. NT scholar Joachim Jeremias actually puts forward the view that the shepherd described in 13:7 is the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53:
“The smitten Shepherd is the Servant of the Lord. God vicariously lays on him the judgment which should have smitten the whole flock.” (Joachim Jeremias, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1966], Vol. 6, pg. 493)
The idea of the Messiah as a shepherd (as here in Zec. 13:7) was an idea that was present in the OT (Ezekiel 34) and also in other Jewish literature. The Psalms of Solomon 17:21-22 are a common example of this.
All of this evidence combined together provides a strong case for Zechariah 13:7 as being both a Messianic prophecy as well as a confirmation of the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Messiah according to both the Bible and the Qur'an.
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