Zechariah 5:3

3 Then he said to me, This is the curse which goes out over the face of all the land: for long enough has every thief gone without punishment, and long enough has every taker of false oaths gone without punishment.

Zechariah 5:3 Meaning and Commentary

Zechariah 5:3

Then said he unto me, This [is] the curse
So the law of Moses is called, because it has curses written in it, ( Deuteronomy 27:15-26 ) ( 28:15-26 ) ( Deuteronomy 29:19 Deuteronomy 29:20 ) ( 30:19 ) which curse is not causeless, but is according to law and justice; it is from the Lord, and is no other than the wrath of the Almighty; and, wherever it lights, it will remain and continue for ever. Vitringa, on ( Isaiah 24:6 ) says, this is the curse which Isaiah there prophesies of, which had its accomplishment in the times of Antiochus; but there the prophet is speaking, not of the land of Judea, but of the antichristian states. That goeth forth over the face of the whole earth:
over the whole land of Judea, and the inhabitants of it, for their breach of the law, contempt of the Gospel, and the rejection of the Messiah; and which had its accomplishment when wrath came upon them to the uttermost, in the destruction of their nation, city, and temple; and is the curse God threatened to smite their land with, ( Malachi 4:6 ) and this curse also reaches to the whole world, and the inhabitants of it, who lie in wickedness; and to all sorts of sinners, particularly those next mentioned: for everyone that stealeth shall be cut off [as] on this side,
according to it;
as it is written and declared on one side of the roll: and everyone that sweareth shall be cut off [as] on that side
according to it;
as is written and declared on the other side of the roll; which two sins of theft and false swearing, the one being against the second, and the other the first table of the law, show that the curse of the law reaches to all sorts of sins and sinners; to all who do not keep it in every respect: and, indeed, to all but those who are redeemed from it by the blood of Christ; and that it is proportioned according to a man's sins: and those two are particularly mentioned, because they are sins which prevailed among the Jews at the time Christ was on earth. Theft did, both in a literal and figurative sense, ( Matthew 23:14 ) ( Romans 2:21 ) ( Luke 11:52 ) ( John 10:8 John 10:10 ) and so did vain swearing, ( Matthew 5:33-36 ) ( 23:16-22 ) .

Zechariah 5:3 In-Context

1 Then again lifting up my eyes I saw a roll in flight through the air.

2 And he said to me, What do you see? And I said, A roll going through the air; it is twenty cubits long and ten cubits wide.

3 Then he said to me, This is the curse which goes out over the face of all the land: for long enough has every thief gone without punishment, and long enough has every taker of false oaths gone without punishment.

4 And I will send it out, says the Lord of armies, and it will go into the house of the thief and into the house of him who takes a false oath by my name: and it will be in his house, causing its complete destruction, with its woodwork and its stones.

5 And the angel who was talking to me went out and said to me, Let your eyes be lifted up now, and see the ephah which is going out.