1. four horns. Throughout biblical literature, horns are an image of power—in this instance, destructive power.

2. scattered. This verb, generally used for the winnowing of grain, is one of several somewhat odd choices of verb in this passage. It obviously refers to the exiling of the Judahites.

Judah, Israel. Three centuries have passed since the exile of the population of Israel, the northern kingdom, but Zechariah preserves, as do other prophets, a utopian hope for its restoration.

3. smiths. They are probably ironsmiths, who could fashion weapons to hack horns.

4. rattle. As in verse 2, this is an unusual word choice. The verb generally means “to shake” or “to strike with terror.” One might have expected a verb like “to cut down.”

to hurl down. This verb usually means “to cast stones.”

7. the messenger speaking to me was going out and another messenger was coming out to meet him. The apparatus of the vision becomes complicated: it seems that there are teams, or perhaps hierarchies, of divine messengers.

8. speak to that lad. The probable referent is Zechariah, the recipient of all these prophetic messages. “Lad” would not necessarily indicate his age but rather his (necessarily) subservient position in relation to the celestial messengers.

an unwalled city. Every important city in the ancient Near East had walls to protect it against enemies. Jerusalem, however, will have no walls because its spectacular expansion cannot be contained within walls. Instead, God will be a wall of fire all around it.

10. Away, away. The Hebrew hoy usually means “woe,” but here it has to be an interjection of urging. This is the solution of at least two modern translations.

flee. This imperative is prefixed by the particle that means “and.” Either that is a scribal error, or, as Kimchi proposes, a word such as “go out” was dropped.

11. Away, Zion, escape. One could also construe this as “to Zion escape,” with the particle for “to” omitted by ellipsis.

12. Whose glory sent me. The Masoretic Text reads, enigmatically, “after glory He sent me.” This translation adopts a frequently proposed emendation.

the apple of His eye. The Midrash Tanhuma lists this as a scribal euphemistic correction for “the apple of My eye,” introduced to avoid anthropomorphism. But if, as in several modern languages, “apple of the eye” is an idiom for what is most precious to a person, its use would not necessarily imply that God has an eye with a pupil.

13. sent me. The first person, which at the beginning of this verse was God, now refers to the prophet. Such unmarked transitions are common biblical usage.

14. will abide in your midst. This is in all likelihood a reference to the Temple, in the process of being rebuilt, for the Temple was conceived as God’s terrestrial abode, His “house.”

15. And many nations shall join the LORD on that day. The idea of a universal acceptance of YHWH as God strikes a new note in this passage. It is in keeping with a theme in Third Isaiah.

17. Hush, all flesh before the LORD. “All flesh” means “all humankind” and so continues the idea of a conversion of the nations introduced in verse 15.