Zechariah 12:11

11 At that time the mourning in Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo.

Zechariah 12:11 Meaning and Commentary

Zechariah 12:11

In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem,
&c.] Great numbers being awakened, convinced, and converted, and brought to true repentance: as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon.
Lightfoot ^F9 thinks the prophet alludes to the two great and general lamentations of Israel; the one about the rock Rimmon, where a whole tribe was come to four hundred (it should be six hundred) men, ( Judges 20:47 ) and may be rendered, "the sad shout of Rimmon"; and the other in the valley of Megiddo, for the death of Josiah. Some take Hadadrimmon to be the name of a man, as Aben Ezra; and the Targum and Jarchi say who he was, and also make two mournings to be alluded to ^F11; paraphrasing the words thus,

``at that time mourning shall be multiplied in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Ahab the son of Omri, whom Hadadrimmon the son of Tabrimmon slew in Ramothgilead; and as the mourning of Josiah, the son of Amon, whom Pharaohnecho, or the lame, slew in the valley of Megiddo:''

and so the Syriac version renders it,

``as the mourning of the son of Amon in the valley of Megiddo.''

Of the first of these, see ( 1 Kings 22:31-37 ) and of the latter, ( 2 Kings 23:29 ) according to Jerom, it was the name of a place in the valley of Megiddo, near to Jezreel; and which, in his time, went by the name of Maximianopolis, called so in honour of the Emperor Maximian; it was seventeen miles from Caesarea in Palestine, and ten miles from Jezreel {l}; and mention is made by Jewish ^F13 writers of the valley of Rimmon, in which place the elders intercalated the year; though Jerom elsewhere

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FOOTNOTES:

F14 says, that Adadrimon was a king, the son of Tabrimmon, who reigned at Carchemish, whom Pharaohnecho slew at the same time he slew Josiah. Both words, Hadad, or Adad, and Rimmon, are names of idols with the Syrians.
F9 Works, vol. 1. p. 46.
F11 Vid. T. Bab. Megillah, fol. 3. 1. & Gloss. in ib. & Moed Katon, fol. 28. 2.
F12 Vid. Reland. Palestina Illustrata, tom. 2. p. 892.
F13 T. Hieros. Chagigah, fol. 78. 4.
F14 Trad. Heb. fol. 86. I.

Zechariah 12:11 In-Context

9 At that time I will destroy every nation that tries to attack Jerusalem.

10 "I will fill the descendants of David and the other people of Jerusalem with the spirit of mercy and the spirit of prayer. They will look at the one whom they stabbed to death, and they will mourn for him like those who mourn for an only child. They will mourn bitterly, like those who have lost their first-born son.

11 At that time the mourning in Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo.

12 Each family in the land will mourn by itself: the family descended from David, the family descended from Nathan, the family descended from Levi, the family descended from Shimei, and all the other families. Each family will mourn by itself, and the men of each family will mourn separately from the women.

Footnotes

• [a]. hadad rimmon: [Probably a name for Baal, the god of vegetation in Canaan and Syria. When the vegetation died each year, the worshipers thought that the god had died, and they mourned his death.]