Zechariah 9:11

Zechariah 9:11. As for thee also O Jerusalem, or church of God; for the prophet, speaking in the name of God, must be supposed to direct his discourse to her, the pronoun and the affixes, in the Hebrew, being in the feminine gender; by the blood of thy covenant By the blood of the Messiah, in which thy covenant is confirmed: for though it is God’s covenant as made by him, and Christ’s as made in and through him, it is Zion’s covenant as made for her. I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit, &c. By the prison here, Blayney thinks the land of Egypt is metaphorically intended, in which Israel were heretofore detained as in a prison, until God delivered them out of it, and at the same time entered into covenant with them. But it seems more probable the deliverance from Babylon, so lately experienced, is referred to. So most interpreters understand the passage. Bishop Hall paraphrases it thus: “As for thee, O Zion, whose covenant with me is made, and confirmed by the precious blood of the Messiah. I do herein give thee a type of thy future deliverance from all thy spiritual miseries, in that I have brought forth thy captives out of the miserable captivity at Babylon.” Deep, dry pits, says Capellus, were frequently prisons in the East. Or by the pit here may be meant the lowest part of the prison, called the dungeon, (see Isaiah 51:14,) as the Hebrew word בור is translated; Jeremiah 37:16; Jeremiah 38:6; Lamentations 3:53-55, where see the notes. Into one of these prisons Jeremiah was cast. But something further, and more interesting to the human race than the deliverance of God’s ancient people either from Egypt or Babylon, is evidently here intended to be signified, even the deliverance of mankind in general from the bondage of sin and guilt, and of depravity, weakness, and wretchedness, that miserable prison in which all are naturally detained, into the glorious liberty of the children of God, by virtue of the covenant sealed with the blood of Christ the Mediator: see Isaiah 61:1-3; Hebrews 13:20. Observe well, reader, a state of sin and guilt is a state of bondage; it is a spiritual prison; it is a pit, or a dungeon, in which there is no water, no comfort to be had: we are all by nature prisoners in this pit; the Scripture has concluded us all under sin, and bound us over to the justice of God. God has been pleased to deal with these prisoners upon new terms, to enter into another covenant with them; the blood of Christ is the blood of that covenant, having purchased it and all its benefits for us; and by that blood effectual provision is made for the sending forth of these prisoners upon easy and honourable terms: and a proclamation of liberty to the captives is issued from the court of heaven, followed by the opening of the prison to them that were bound, (like Cyrus’s proclamation to the Jews in Babylon,) which all those, whose spirits God stirreth up, ought to come and take the benefit of.