Zechariah 11King James Version
A strange chapter. Zechariah is told to become a shepherd, to take two staves named Beauty and Bands. He asks for his wages. They weigh him out thirty pieces of silver. The Lord tells him to throw them to the potter, a goodly price. Matthew quotes this at Judas's betrayal.
A lament over Lebanon's fall opens the chapter before God instructs Zechariah to act out a prophetic drama: shepherd the flock of slaughter, the people exploited by their leaders. He feeds them with two staffs called Beauty and Bands, cuts off three bad shepherds, and is paid thirty pieces of silver when he asks the people to weigh his wage. God tells him to throw the money to the potter, a contemptuous gesture. He then breaks both staves, dissolving the covenant with the nations and the unity between Judah and Israel, and takes up the instruments of a worthless shepherd as a final warning.
When God's shepherd is rejected and cheaply valued, the covenant that held the community together is the thing that breaks.
"And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD." (11:13) Matthew 27:9-10 cites this precise act when Judas throws back the thirty pieces of silver that are then used to buy the potter's field, making the verse one of Scripture's most forensically specific messianic predictions.
God tells Zechariah to take a shepherd's crook and feed a flock that its owners are selling while praising God for the profit. Zechariah manages them, removes three bad leaders, then grows sick of the arrangement as the flock grows sick of him. He asks for his wages. They count out thirty silver coins, the standard payment for a slave killed by negligence. God tells him to throw it to the potter. He does. The staffs break. The bonds dissolve. And a coming worthless shepherd is introduced whose arm will wither and whose eye will go dark.
Zechariah acts as the shepherd figure in the prophetic drama, representing the divine shepherd. The three shepherds he cuts off in a month are unnamed, likely representing corrupt priestly or political leaders. The flock of slaughter is the exploited community of Israel. The worthless shepherd in the final verses represents a coming false leader whose failure will be catastrophic.
Zechariah 11 is the dark center of the book's second half. The two staffs named Beauty and Bands represent the two great gifts of the Mosaic covenant: favorable relationship with the nations and internal unity between the tribes. Both are broken because the people rejected the true shepherd for thirty silver pieces, the price paid for a gored slave under Mosaic law. The NT writers saw Judas's act as the precise reenactment of this scene.
This is the most grieved chapter in Zechariah. The prophet himself shares in the rejection; he personally takes up the shepherd's role and is personally dismissed with insulting pay. The breaking of the staffs is not triumphant but sorrowful.
1Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars.
2Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is fallen; because the mighty are spoiled: howl, O ye oaks of Bashan; for the forest of the vintage is come down.
3There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: a voice of the roaring of young lions; for the pride of Jordan is spoiled.
4Thus saith the LORD my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter;
5Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty: and they that sell them say, Blessed be the LORD; for I am rich: and their own shepherds pity them not.
6For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the LORD: but, lo, I will deliver the men every one into his neighbour's hand, and into the hand of his king: and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them.
7And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock. And I took unto me two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bands; and I fed the flock.
8Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul lothed them, and their soul also abhorred me.
9Then said I, I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another.
10And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it asunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people.
11And it was broken in that day: and so the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was the word of the LORD.
12And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.
13And the LORD said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the LORD.
14Then I cut asunder mine other staff, even Bands, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel.
15And the LORD said unto me, Take unto thee yet the instruments of a foolish shepherd.
16For, lo, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, which shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces.
17Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.