Zechariah 5
The Prophet’s Sixth and Seventh Visions: A Flying Scroll And A Woman in A Basket
Before the blessings of the previous visions could be fully realized, God would purge His people. He would announce judgment (Vision 6) and then remove wickedness (Vision 7).
The sixth and seventh visions deal with the removal of wickedness. This sixth one deals with the elimination of lawbreakers, and the next one with the removal of wickedness from the land. What God promised in the preceding two visions required the purging predicted in these two visions. - Thomas Constable
A Flying Scroll
Vs. 2 - “I see a flying scroll,” I replied, “thirty feet long and fifteen feet wide.”
The scroll in this vision is said to have contained at least two of God’s commandments, but these two likely represented the entirety of the Mosaic law. Zechariah’s law in the sky served as a proclamation of judgment on the unrepentant and unpunished in the “land” of Israel.
During the restoration period, the returnees demonstrated an increased interest in the Mosaic Law, which was written on scrolls (Nehemiah 8). No one could plead ignorance because the scroll in Zechariah’s vision was large enough for all to see and read.
Nehemiah 8:1 - All the people gathered together at the square in front of the Water Gate. They asked the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses that the Lord had given Israel.
In spite of the glorious promises of the future just revealed in the previous visions, the Israelites needed to realize that sin would still bring inevitable divine punishment on them. They needed to remain pure so they could avoid the Lord’s curses and enjoy His promised blessings. - Thomas Constable
A Woman in a Basket
Vs. 7-8 - Then a lead cover was lifted, and there was a woman sitting inside the basket. “This is Wickedness,” he said. He shoved her down into the basket and pushed the lead weight over its opening.
In Zechariah’s vision, idolatry is symbolized by a large container, inside which is a woman, probably a prostitute. - Don Fleming
Vs. 10 - So I asked the angel who was speaking with me, “Where are they taking the basket?”
Babylon
The container and its contents are then carried away to the distant land of Babylon. There the woman will be at home among the ungodly idol worshippers awaiting final punishment; but the land of Israel will at last be free of her defiling influence. - Don Fleming
Grace
The removal of Wickedness, like the removal of Joshua’s filthy garments (Zechariah 3:4), was an act of free grace on the part of the covenant-keeping God. - Baldwin
Warning
The imagery may also suggest that if the chosen people succumbed again to idolatry, they would be sent back into the captivity they had just escaped. - D. Brent Sandy
Near and Far
Like most of the prophets, Zechariah’s messages had applications in the present and future. These visions served to embolden and encourage the weary remnant under Zerubbabel’s leadership and also to give hope for a future day when God would completely remove wickedness from the land.
We understand the passage to speak of the heaping up of the full measure of Israel’s sins prior to the time of God’s separation of the wicked from the midst of the righteous remnant of the last days. - Feinberg, God Remembers
