primarily refer to those empires whose united successive course make up the " times of the Gentiles."
These four are the Babylonian, the Medo-Persian, the Grecian (or Graeco-Macedonian), and the Roman. " These are the horns (or Gentile powers) which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem" (chap. i. 19), and it is the overthrow and judgment of these, by means of invisible heavenly powers appointed of God as a necessary precursor to the establishment of Messiah's kingdom, and the blessing of Israel, which is symbolically set forth to the prophet in this last vision.
But these powers, though in vision and prophecy seen together, are, as a matter of fact, successive in time*
Now, when these visions were shown to Zechariah, Babylon had already been overthrown, and its world-empire taken away, visibly and apparently, by the Medo-Persians, behind whom, however (as the prophet beholds), there was the invisible chariot of God, with its red horses of blood and vengeance.
This act of judgment on the first great Gentile worldpower which had oppressed Israel and laid waste his land j being already an accomplished fact (though in the 3rd verse, for completeness sake, all the four are shown to the prophet together, as is the case in the vision of the four! jj horns, one of which had also been already overthrown), this first chariot is passed over by the Angel in the inter1 pretation, and is not seen among those who "go forth" in i ver. 6 its mission, as far as the Babylonian Empire is i, concerned, having already been fulfilled.
The black horses, significant probably of sorrow and; sij mourning in consequence of sore judgments to be inflicted, go forth toward the north country, and "after them," going forth in the same direction, are the white, symbolical of victory, triumph, and glory over Gentile world-power for both the Medo-Persian and Graeco-Macedonian Empires, being each in turn successors of the great Babylonian Empire, were the great hostile northern powers in relation to Palestine.
