On addressing a silent look of inquiry to his angelic instructor as to the meaning of this strange sight he is told, " This is the curse that goeth forth over the whole land," etc.
The r&o, megillah, " roll " or " scroll," as the emblem of a message or pronouncement of solemn import from God to man, is used in other scriptures. Thus, in Ezek. ii. 9, 10 we find a strikingly parallel passage: " And I looked, and behold an hand was put forth unto me; and, lo, a roll of a book (megillath sepher] was therein; and he spread it before me, and it was written within and without: and there was written therein lamentations, and mourning, and woe"
The megillah which Zechariah beheld was also " spread " out, or open, else its dimensions could not have been seen; and it also was written " within and without," as may be gathered from the words " on this side and on the other side, according to it" which I take to be the most satisfactory rendering of the Hebrew mizzeh kamoah, which is twice repeated in ver. 3.
The same was true of the tables of the law, of which the same words are used to describe the fact that " they were written on both sides: on the one side and on the other ( "W21 nnp, mizzeh-u-mizzeK) were they written " (Ex. xxxii. I 5).
What was written on this roll may be gathered from the words, " This is the curse" ha-alah (answering to the " lamentations and mourning and woe " of Ezekiel's megillali} which might refer to the awful catalogue of curses which Moses foretold would come upon Israel in case of their disobedience, recorded in Deut. xxviii. 15-68, and which in chap. xxx. I of the same book are spoken of in the singular as " the curse"
But it seems to me more satisfactory to regard the word as describing in a more general way the curse which the law as a whole contains within itself the sequel, so to say, to the breaking its commands expressed in a solemn sentence:
"Cursed be Jie tJiat confirmeth not the words of this law to do them."
