THE GOLDEN LAMPSTAND After revealing the priestly role of the Lord Christ and His salvation work, he shows the role of His Holy Spirit in the enlightenment of His church. In the last chapter he encouraged Joshua the high priest to work; while here, He supports Zerubbabel the governor to work by the Spirit of God, and not by a human arm. 1- Wakening the prophet up 1 - 6 2- The golden lampstand 2 - 7 3- The consummation of the work 8 – 14 1- WAKENING THE PROPHET UP: “Now the angel who talked with me came back and wakened me, as a man who is wakened out of his sleep” (1) The sleep of the prophet Zechariah probably reveals the anguish of Zerubbabel who faced a fierce opposition from outside and inside; and, unable to help him, the prophet Zechariah went to sleep; the way the disciples of the Lord did in the garden, when, not able to endure to hear about the coming events; on which the Lord admonished them by saying to the apostle Peter: “Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation” (Mark 14: 37, 38). 2- THE GOLDEN LAMPSTAND: While the house of the Lord was rebuilt on the hand of Zerubbabel, the minds of the prophet and of all the faithful ministers of the Lord, soared up in the glory of the old house, and what it included of furniture, particularly the golden ones which God commanded Moses to prepare, like the golden lampstand with seven lamps. In this vision God drew the heart of the prophet to see the return of the golden lampstand, that represents the enlightenment of the temple with the oil of the divine grace, and the work of the Holy Spirit. But the new lampstand differed in certain details from the old one (See Exodus 37: 17 – 24); in that it is surrounded by two olive trees; one at the right of the bowl, and the other at its left. In this lampstand it is noticed: (1) The lampstand is golden ; namely, heavenly and spiritual; symbolizing the church (Revelation 1: 20). It bears the heavenly feature; and needs her heavenly Groom Himself, to help and to keep it. According to St. Dedymus the blind: {Saying that the lampstand is of sold gold (2), reveals to us that it, as a whole, is a spiritual and not a material lampstand. This golden lampstand represents the dwelling place and the temple of God, as it is written in the book of Revelation: “The mystery of the seven stars which you saw in My right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches; and the seven lampstands which you saw are the seven churches” (Revelation 1: 20). (2) He says: “With a bowl on top of it” (2). It is as though this lampstand represents the church enlightened by the Holy Spirit, likened by the Lord Christ to the five wise virgins who took oil in their vessels, and went out to receive the Groom (Matthew 25). According to St. Augustine, [this oil represents the love of God and of the neighbor, which the Holy Spirit pours into us with abundance. Whoever has the love of God, bears the divine light and enjoys the kingdom; whereas he who loses it, will be in darkness, unable to see God]. (3) “And on the stand, seven lamps with seven pipes to the seven lamps” (2).According to St. Dedymus the blind: [The bowl, as well as the seven lamps are over the lampstand, to give light seven-fold. For, as the perfect enlightening knowledge was likened to seven eyes (10); and as the seven pillars carry the dwelling place of the wisdom “Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn out her seven pillars” (Proverb 1: 9); so the lampstand carries seven lamps. Being of solid gold, the lampstand represents the Savior Lord, who “committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth” (1 Peter 2: 22).; and “The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him; the Spirit of wisdom and understanding; the Spirit of counsel and might; the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord” Isaiah 11: 2) The church, as well, carrying the features of her Groom, and enjoying His righteousness, will come to be a golden lampstand, having no spot nor wrinkle (Ephesians 5: 27), her light is not her own, but is her Groom’s “the Sun of righteousness”, who perpetually shines; He who sent to her His Holy Spirit to give her light in this world. The seven tubes are the means of salvation through which the Holy Spirit works in the church, particularly in the seven sacraments. The essence of the vision is therefore: The confirmation of the work of the Holy Spirit in the church; saying: “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit; says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountains? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain” (6, 7). On a historical aspect, the opposition against Zerubbabel so represented a great mountain that no human arm could move; that Zerubbabel started to have doubt in the possibility of consummating the work; but the Lord confirmed to him that he will Himself do it. God transformed that great mountain to a plain. But on a spiritual aspect; as the disciples of the Lord Christ, were as well in need of the Holy Spirit to transform the great mountain of preaching into a plain; The Lord said to them: “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem and in all Judah and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1: 4, 8). If we would dare to say that preaching Christ crucified, to the Jews is a stumbling block and to the Gentiles foolishness (I Corinthians 1: 23), as though a great mountain, yet by the Holy Spirit, this mountain became before the apostles and the disciples a plain. Hence the Lord goes on to say: “And He shall bring forth the capstone with shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it’” (7). The work of the Holy Spirit is to testify to the Lord Christ, the ‘Capstone’ or the ‘Cornerstone’, who bound the Jews to the Gentiles together, that all shout “Grace, grace to it”. Repeating the word twice refers to the people of two origins: the Jews and the Gentiles; as well as to the nature of love in the new people; for, according to St. Augustine, the figure 2 referring to love. No one could testify to the crucified and glorify Him, unless he bears in himself this loving nature. According to St. Dedymus the blind: [Beside the interpretation we gave, there is another view that the mountain symbolizes the Virgin Mary, and the Stone coming out of it symbolizes the Christ she begat without human seed. The prophet Daniel teaches us these secrets by saying: “You watched while a stone was cut out without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces” (Daniel 2: 34).He says that the stone that struck the diverse nations and the image they formed, was cut off from the mountain without hands (without marriage)…Only Christ was born by a virgin; so, before Zerubbabel, the stone was cut off the mountain without hands]. If that great mountain is the Virgin St. Mary who conceived the Lord Christ without a human seed, something that seemed impossible, yet was realized; it refers, likewise, to the soul that spiritually bears inside it the Lord Christ; for, according to St. Cyril the Great: [Through the Spirit, Christ is conformed in us, and print His features on us; by which the beauty of His divinity becomes alive anew in man]. (4) “Two olive trees are by it, one at the right of the bowl and the other at its left” (3). These two olive trees probably refer to Zerubbabel and Joshua, being “the anointed ones” to rebuild the temple (14); one for the material role, and the other for the spiritual one, with no duplication, each of them support and consummate the work of the other. If the oil refers to the work of the Holy Spirit that enlightens the soul with the true knowledge; the olive tree on the right hand, according to St. Dedymus the blind, refers to the Theological knowledge; while the one on the left refers to the study of the world, its order and God’s ordinance of it. St. Dedymus also believe that the two olive trees may refer to Moses and Elijah who appeared on the right and left hand of the Lord during His transfiguration (Luke 9: 30), the law and the prophets, both being spiritual; and both testify to the glory and Divinity of the Lord….. They probably refer, as well, to the Holy Book with its two Testaments, used by the Holy Spirit to enlighten our hearts with the light of knowledge, and the transfiguration of the Lord inside us. 3- THE CONSUMMATION OF THE WORK: This vision came to give Zerubbabel assurance concerning the following: (1) That the work is done, not by a human arm but by the Spirit of God (6, 7) (2) God confirms that the work will be consummated by the hand of Zerubbabel, even if it is delayed because of the opposition (9) (3) God rejoices in the work, despised by many, when compared to the earlier temple, and counted in their eyes as “small things” or even “nothing” (Haggai 2: 3). But God rejoices to see it by His eyes which scan to and fro throughout the whole earth, not to criticize and condemn, but “to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him” (2 Chronicles 16: 9). The eyes of the Lord see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel (10); namely see him holding the tool to measure the uprightness of the building.
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