Zechariah 11:3

3 Listen to the wail of the shepherds; their rich pastures are destroyed! Listen to the roar of the lions; the lush thicket of the Jordan is ruined!

Zechariah 11:3 in Other Translations

3 There 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.

3 The sound of the wail of the shepherds, for their glory is ruined! The sound of the roar of the lions, for the thicket of the Jordan is ruined!

3 Listen to the wailing of the shepherds, for their rich pastures are destroyed. Hear the young lions roaring, for their thickets in the Jordan Valley are ruined.

3 Do you hear the wailing of shepherds? They've lost everything they once owned. Do you hear the outrage of the lions? The mighty jungle of the Jordan is wasted.

3 A voice of the wailing of the shepherds! for their glory is destroyed: a voice of the roaring of young lions! for the pride of the Jordan is laid waste.

3 Listen! The shepherds are crying, because their rich pastures are destroyed. Listen! The young lions are roaring, because the lush banks of the Jordan are destroyed.

3 Listen to the wail of the shepherds, for their glory is destroyed. Listen to the roar of young lions, for the thickets of the Jordan are destroyed.

3 Listen to the shepherds cry out! Their rich grasslands are destroyed. Listen to the lions roar! The trees and bushes along the Jordan River are gone.

Zechariah 11:3 Meaning and Commentary

Zechariah 11:3

[There is] a voice of the howling of the shepherds
Which may be understood either of the civil rulers among the Jews, who now lose their honour and their riches; and so the Targum, Jarchi, and Aben Ezra, interpret it of kings; or of the ecclesiastical rulers, the elders of the people, the Scribes and Pharisees: for their glory is spoiled;
their power and authority; their riches and wealth; their places of honour and profit; their offices, posts, and employments, whether in civil or religious matters, are taken from them, and they are deprived of them: a voice of the roaring of young lions;
of princes, comparable to them for their power, tyranny, and cruelty: the Targum is,

``their roaring is as the roaring of young lions:''

for the pride of Jordan is spoiled;
a place where lions and their young ones resorted, as Jarchi observes; (See Gill on Jeremiah 49:19). Jordan is here put for the whole land of Judea now wasted, and so its pride and glory gone; as if the waters of Jordan were dried up, the pride and glory of that, and which it showed when its waters swelled and overflowed; hence called by Pliny ^F24 "ambitiosus amnis", a haughty and ambitious swelling river.

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FOOTNOTES:

F24 Nat. Hist. l. 5. c. 15.

Zechariah 11:3 In-Context

1 Open your doors, Lebanon, so that fire may devour your cedars!

2 Wail, you juniper, for the cedar has fallen; the stately trees are ruined! Wail, oaks of Bashan; the dense forest has been cut down!

3 Listen to the wail of the shepherds; their rich pastures are destroyed! Listen to the roar of the lions; the lush thicket of the Jordan is ruined!

4 This is what the LORD my God says: “Shepherd the flock marked for slaughter.

5 Their buyers slaughter them and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, ‘Praise the LORD, I am rich!’ Their own shepherds do not spare them.

Cross References

• 1. S Isaiah 5:29
• 2. Jeremiah 2:15; Jeremiah 50:44; Ezekiel 19:9