It will be seen from this catalogue of conclusions that the prevailing trend of recent criticism has been to assign “Zech.” ix.—xiv. to post-exilic times, and to a different author from chaps. i.—viii.; and that while a few critics maintain a date soon after the Return, the bulk are divided between the years following Alexander’s campaigns and the time of the Maccabean struggles.[1307]
There are, in fact, in recent years only two attempts to support the conservative position of Pusey and Hengstenberg that the whole book is a genuine work of Zechariah the son of Iddo. One of these is by C. H. H. Wright in his Bampton Lectures. The other is by George L. Robinson, now Professor at Toronto, in a reprint (1896) from the _American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures_, which offers a valuable history of the discussion of the whole question from the days of Mede, with a careful argument of all the evidence on both sides. The very original conclusion is reached that the chapters reflect the history of the years 518—516 B.C.
In discussing the question, for which our treatment of other prophets has left us too little space, we need not open that part of it which lies between a pre-exilic and a post-exilic date. Recent criticism of all schools and at both extremes has tended to establish the latter upon reasons which we have already stated,[1308] and for further details of which the student may be referred to Stade’s and Eckardt’s investigations in the _Zeitschrift für A. T. Wissenschaft_ and to Kirkpatrick’s impartial summary. There remain the questions of the unity of chaps. ix.—xiv.; their exact date or dates after the Exile, and as a consequence of this their relation to the authentic prophecies of Zechariah in chaps. i.—viii.
On the question of unity we take first chaps. ix.—xi., to which must be added (as by most critics since Ewald) xiii. 7-9, which has got out of its place as the natural continuation and conclusion of chap. xi.
Chap. ix. 1-8 predicts the overthrow of heathen neighbours of Israel, their possession by Jehovah and His safeguard of Jerusalem. Vv. 9-12 follow with a prediction of the Messianic King as the Prince of Peace; but then come vv. 13-17, with no mention of the King, but Jehovah appears alone as the hero of His people against the Greeks, and there is indeed sufficiency of war and blood. Chap. x. makes a new start: the people are warned to seek their blessings from Jehovah, and not from Teraphim and diviners, whom their false shepherds follow. Jehovah, visiting His flock, shall punish these, give proper rulers, make the people strong and gather in their exiles to fill Gilead and Lebanon. Chap. xi. opens with a burst of war on Lebanon and Bashan and the overthrow of the heathen (vv. 1-3), and follows with an allegory, in which the prophet first takes charge from Jehovah of the people as their shepherd, but is contemptuously treated by them (4-14), and then taking the guise of an evil shepherd represents what they must suffer from their next ruler (15-17). This tyrant, however, shall receive punishment, two-thirds of the nation shall be scattered, but the rest, further purified, shall be God’s own people (xiii. 7-9).
In the course of this prophesying there is no conclusive proof of a double authorship. The only passage which offers strong evidence for this is chap. ix. The verses predicting the peaceful coming of Messiah (9-12) do not accord in spirit with those which follow predicting the appearance of Jehovah with war and great shedding of blood. Nor is the difference altogether explained, as Stade thinks, by the similar order of events in chap. x., where Judah and Joseph are first represented as saved and brought back in ver. 6, and then we have the process of their redemption and return described in vv. 7 ff. Why did the same writer give statements of such very different temper as chap. ix. 9-12 and 13-17? Or, if these be from different hands, why were they ever put together? Otherwise there is no reason for breaking up chaps. ix.—xi., xiii. 7-9. Rubinkam, who separates ix. 1-10 by a hundred and fifty years from the rest; Bleek, who divides ix. from x.; and Staerk, who separates ix.—xi. 3 from the rest, have been answered by Robinson and others.[1309] On the ground of language, grammar and syntax, Eckardt has fully proved that ix.—xi. are from the same author of a late date, who, however, may have occasionally followed earlier models and even introduced their very phrases.[1310]