of hosts: Yet will nations come, and inhabitants of many cities. Zec 8:21. And the inhabitants of one (city) will go to another, and say, 'We will go, go away, to supplicate the face of Jehovah, and to seek Jehovah of hosts.' 'I will also go.' Zec 8:22. And many peoples and strong nations will come, to seek Jehovah of hosts in Jerusalem, and to supplicate the face of Jehovah.” These verses do not announce a further or second glorification, which God has designed for His people, but simply indicate the nature and magnitude of the salvation appointed for Israel, through which its fast-days will be turned into days of joy. Hitherto Israel had kept days of mourning and fasting on account of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple; but in the future the Lord will so glorify His city and His house, that not only will Israel keep joyful feasts there, but many and strong heathen nations will go to the house of God, to seek and worship the God of hosts. עד is used with emphasis, so that it resembles a sentence: “It will still come to pass, that,” etc. This is how אשׁר in Zec 8:21 and Zec 8:23 is to be taken, and not as the introduction to the saying preceded energetically by עד, for which Hitzig is wrong in referring to Mic 6:10. For the fact itself, compare Mic 4:1., Isa 2:2., Jer 16:19. In Zec 8:21 the thought is individualized. The inhabitants of one city call upon those of another. נלכה הלוך, “we will go to supplicate,” etc.; and the population of the other city responds to the summons by saying, “I also will go.” חלּות את־פּני, as in Zec 7:2.
Verse 23
Zec 8:23“Thus saith Jehovah of hosts: In those days ten men out of all languages of the nations take hold; they will take hold of the skirt of a Jewish man, saying, We will go with you; for we have heard God is with you.” Not only will the heathen then flow to Jerusalem to seek the God of Israel, but they will crowd together to Israel and Judah to be received into fellowship with them as a nation. Ten men from the heathen nations to one Jewish man: so great will be the pressure of the heathen. Ten is used as an indefinite number, denoting a great and complete multitude, as in Gen 31:7; Lev 26:26; Num 14:22, and 1Sa 1:8. For the figure, compare Isa 4:1. והחזיקוּ is a resumption of יחזיקוּ in the form of an apodosis. The unusual combination כּל לשׁנות הגּוים, “all the tongues of the nations,” is formed after Isa 66:18 (הגּוים והלּשׁנות, “all nations and tongues,” i.e., nations of all languages), and on the basis of Gen 10:20 and Gen 10:31. For נלכה עמּכם, compare Rth 1:16; and for אלהים עמּכם, 2Ch 15:9.
