Page:Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah (Baron, David).djvu/410



394 VISIONS AND PROPHECIES OF ZECHARIAH

The chief objection to this interpretation is that it can not be shown that " a day " is ever used in the prophetic Scriptures to represent seven years. His reference to Dan. ix. 24, in support of his theory, does not apply, for there the " seventy weeks " (or " seventy sevens ") are seventy weeks of years, i.e., 490 years, and on that principle the " one month " could only signify thirty years. " Moreover," as Wright observes, " it is not in accordance with fact, or with Daniel s prophecy in chap, viii., to view the death of Alexander as the destruction of the Macedonian empire, which continued to exist, though no longer as a united empire, under the rule of the Diadochi, or successors of Alexander."

Koehler, Kliefoth, and Keil also identify the three shepherds with the Babylonian, Medo-Persian, and Mace donian empires ; but, according to them, the only way in which the expression " in one month " can be symbolically interpreted is by dividing the month as a period of thirty days into three times ten days, according to the number of the shepherds, and taking each ten days as the time employed in the destruction of a shepherd. " Ten is the number of the completion or the perfection of any earthly act or occurrence. If, therefore, each shepherd were destroyed in ten days, and the destruction of the three was executed in a month, i.e., within a space of three times ten days following one another, the fact is indicated, on the one hand, that the destruction of each of these shepherds followed directly upon that of the other ; and, on the other hand, that this took place after the full time allotted for his rule had passed away." I agree with another writer that this explanation as to what is meant by the " one month " appears highly artificial.

Dr. Wright explains the " one month " on the year-day principle (" each day for a year," Ezek. iv. 6), and identifies the thirty years with the period "between B.C. 172, when Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated the Temple, and B.C. 141, when the three alien shepherds, Antiochus Epiphanes, Antiochus Eupator, and Demetrius I. were cut off, and the