Zechariah 13:4

"And it shall come to pass in that day, that the prophets shall be ashamed every one of his vision, when he prophesieth; neither shall they wear a hairy mantle to deceive."

This merely describes the utter banishment of pagan priests from any credibility in the days of the Messiah. The whole institution of the false prophets of paganism shall become so unpopular that all who were found connected with it would be despised and made ashamed.

We must reject absolutely the notion of Smith and others who would include the prophets of Jehovah as objects of this prophecy. "It is not merely false prophecy, but prophecy in general."[11] He "proved" this by stating that, "Amos refused to call himself a prophet";[12] but, of course, that is merely an example of one false interpretation being used to bolster another false interpretation. Amos did not refuse to call himself a prophet, affirming in the most uncertain words that God indeed gave him the message to Israel. He did say in Amos 7:14: "I was not a prophet; neither was I a prophet's son ..."; but what he was saying is not that, "I am not a prophet," but that I WAS not a prophet at the time I was called to the prophetic office. (See full comment on this in our series, Commentary on the Minor Prophets, vol. 1, p. 203.) In New Testament times, Agabus and others were true prophets of God; their word was trusted; and this shows that Zechariah was not here prophesying the cessation of true prophecy. That was a prophecy, which in time, Paul would declare in 1 Corinthians 13:8; and that apostle indicated that such a cessation was yet future from his own times. It is regrettable that Keil and others following him must be held in error on this particular interpretation, despite their usual dependability.