Tafsiran yang Mengutip untuk Zakharia 3:2

We have another Midrash (Tanchuma Vayikra 6) according to which the emphasis of the verse is on the words בשגגה, inadvertently. The Torah refers to what Solomon spoke about in Proverbs 19,2 “it is also not good for a person (נפש) to lack knowledge, he who rushes in with his feet sins.” This verse applies to two individuals, Achav ben Kulliah and Tzidkiyah ben Massiayh who were junior prophets (disciples of a school of prophets) at the time of the last King of Yehudah Tzidkiyah in Jerusalem, and who, according to tradition committed sins in Jerusalem and even after having been exiled continued sinning in Babylon. Their sin consisted in abusing their supposed prophetic powers to gain access to married women having in mind immoral and illegitimate relations with these women. They would obtain these women’s husbands permission to be alone with their wives by claiming that they had a message for them from G’d which was only for their ears. Once they had gained access to these women they told them that G’d wanted them to become the mothers of future prophets. They would therefore suggest that the woman in question have intercourse with their respective friend and partner in crime so that the lady would become pregnant. Seeing that they did not demand sexual satisfaction for themselves but for another their story sounded more plausible and they were not suspected of being corrupt. They made this kind of deceit their regular mode of operation. Although they were such exceedingly wicked men they established for themselves a reputation of being great prophets in Babylon. Seeing that they had such a reputation pregnant women would ask them if they were going to give birth to a male child or to a female child. They would tell the pregnant woman that she would have son, but at the same time tell her girlfriend that the woman in question would have a daughter. When the woman who had been told she would have a son found that she gave birth to a daughter, her girlfriend would tell her that she knew this all along as the prophet had told her in confidence. The reason he had not told this to the pregnant woman was in order to save her the distress over expecting a daughter and having to endure pregnancy with such a prospect all the time. Eventually, one of them approached the wife of King Nebuchadnezzar in a similar fashion, asking that she sleep with his friend if she wanted to become the mother of a prophet. The lady said that she would not agree unless her husband had agreed to this first. She told the King about what Tzidkiyah had proposed to her, i.e. that she sleep with Achav. The King called in both Achav and Tzidkiyah repeating what his wife told him, but adding that he was aware that the G’d of the Jews hated all manner of sexual licentiousness. He quoted the example of Zimri ben Salu who had been slain by Pinchas on account of sleeping with the princess of Midian, and how prior to Pinchas’ deed 24,000 Israelites had died by the plague because they committed the sin of sexual licentiousness. He challenged them to prove that they were not false prophets. He told them that once before he had wanted to know if Chananyah, Mishael and Azzaryah had been true prophets of the G’d in heaven and in order to know he heated a kiln for seven days, threw them into it bound hands and feet and they walked out unharmed. The King proposed that when examining Tzidkiyah and Achav he would heat up the same kiln for only one day. If G’d would save them he would recognise them as true prophets and would agree that his wife become pregnant by one of them. Thereupon these two fakers said that seeing Chananyah, Mishael and Azzaryah were three it was understandable that G’d extended Himself in order to save them. Seeing there were only the two of them, it was unlikely that G’d would perform a miracle on their account. Nebuchadnezzar countered that there was indeed a third man, a Jew who used to be the High Priest in Jerusalem. He, Nebuchadnezzar, would throw all three of them into the heated kiln and they would find out the result. The two false prophets were now encouraged by this, thinking that G’d would save them as He would not allow the High Priest to die such a death. They therefore agreed to the test. Nebuchadnezzar threw all three of them into the kiln; the two false prophets were burned whereas the High Priest Yehoshua was saved. This is the reason that Zecharyah 3,2 described this High Priest as “a brand who had been saved from the fire.”
The incidence of these two false prophets Achav and Tzidkiyah became so widely known during the exile of the Jews in Babylon that when people had occasion to curse someone they would curse them by saying: “may G’d treat you as the King of Babylon treated Achav and Tzidkiyah whom he consigned to the flames (Jeremiah 29,22).” When trying to determine what was the downfall of these two men, we are reminded of their eagerness to run and commit sins (Proverbs 19,2), something far worse than being unable to resist temptation when it comes one’s way.

Tails of smoking firebrands. The prophet compares these kings to the tails of firebrands—אודים firebrands comp. Zach. 3:2—because they are like the remnant of a firebrand that smokes, but cannot burn; and adds. In the fierce anger because it is by their fierce anger that they are like tails of firebrands.