Joshua, the Branch and the Crown

At the heart of the eight visions, a name is spoken that reaches beyond the present moment: the Branch. God announces it to Joshua the high priest, then has a crown set upon his head as a sign of what is to come. These two gestures, the oracle of chapter 3 and the crowning of chapter 6, frame the whole first part of the book and give it its summit. They no longer look only at the Temple of stone being rebuilt, but at a figure to come who will unite in himself what the history of Israel had always held apart: kingship and priesthood.

The announcement of the Branch

After taking from Joshua his soiled garments, God addresses to him a promise that reaches further than his own purification: “Listen, then, Joshua, high priest, you and your colleagues who sit before you, for they are men who serve as a sign: behold, I am about to bring my servant the Branch.” Zechariah 3:8. The name Branch is not new on the lips of the prophets. Before the exile, Jeremiah had announced under this same name a descendant of David: “Behold, the days are coming when I will raise up for David a just branch; he will reign as king and be wise, and he will do what is right and just in the land.” Jeremiah 23:5. By taking up this word, Zechariah revives the awaiting of a son of David: the dynasty seemed extinguished with the exile, yet from its felled stump a shoot will spring. And God names this figure “my servant,” a title that draws it close to the Servant whom Isaiah had sung. The high priest standing before the angel is not himself the Branch; he is the sign of the one who comes, the man through whom God points toward what is to be.

The stone with seven eyes

To the announcement of the Branch, God at once joins the image of a stone: “Behold the stone that I have set before Joshua; upon this single stone there are seven eyes; behold, I am about to engrave its engraving, and I will take away the iniquity of this land in a single day.” Zechariah 3:9. The stone is laid like the cornerstone of a building, the one that bears and holds the whole together, and the building it announces is the purified people. The eyes engraved upon it are those of God, his gaze that ranges over all the earth, as the vision of the lampstand will say of its seven lamps: “These seven lamps are the eyes of the Lord, which range over all the earth.” Zechariah 4:10. And the promise that goes with it: to take away the iniquity of the land “in a single day.” The pardon granted to Joshua had raised up one man; this word extends that cleansing to the whole land, by a single act of God. The verse closes on an image of peace: “On that day, you will invite one another, each under his vine and under his fig tree.” Zechariah 3:10. To sit each under his own vine and fig tree is, throughout the Bible, the picture of a people at peace, free of fear, in a land restored to blessing.

The crown for Joshua

Three chapters later, the oracle becomes a gesture. God commands the prophet to take the gold and silver brought by exiles returned from Babylon, and to make a crown of them: “You shall take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them upon the head of Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest.” Zechariah 6:11. The gesture is heavy with meaning, for the crown is the king’s emblem, yet it is set upon the head of the high priest. In Israel the two offices were strictly separate: the king came from the tribe of Judah and the house of David, the priest from the tribe of Levi and the house of Aaron, and no one could hold both at once. To crown the high priest is therefore a prophetic act, a sign: it does not make Joshua a king, it announces in him the one who will one day join the crown and the priesthood. The gold comes from Babylon, from the very place of exile, and it becomes the matter of a sign of hope: what the deportation had carried off returns to serve the proclamation of salvation.

The priest upon his throne

“Behold a man whose name is Branch; he shall spring up in his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord.” Zechariah 6:12. The Branch will build the Temple, not the one of stone that Zerubbabel is bringing to completion, but the true Temple of which the first is the figure. And the oracle says how he will reign: “He shall build the temple of the Lord, and shall be clothed with majesty; he shall sit as sovereign upon his throne, and he shall be priest upon his throne, and between the two there shall be a counsel of peace.” Zechariah 6:13. The sentence says “upon his throne” twice to underline the union: one and the same man is king and priest, seated upon a single throne. The closing phrase, “between the two there shall be a counsel of peace,” names the perfect accord of the two offices within a single person. Where kingship and priesthood had at times contended in the history of Israel, the Branch will hold them together in peace. The whole first part of the book moves toward this figure: God returns to his people, he purifies his priesthood, he rebuilds his house, and he announces the one who will be at once king, priest and builder of the true Temple.

The Branch fulfilled in Christ

This figure of the Branch awaits its fulfilment, and the Christian faith recognizes it in Christ. He is the son of David announced by Jeremiah, the shoot sprung from the felled stump when kingship seemed extinguished. He builds the true Temple, which is his own body, and he said so himself of his death and resurrection: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” John 2:19. He unites in himself the kingship and the priesthood that Joshua bore only as a sign: he is the king born of David, and he is the priest who offers himself, a priest not according to Aaron but according to a more ancient order, as the Letter to the Hebrews says: “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” Hebrews 7:17. In him the “counsel of peace” between throne and altar is fulfilled, for the one who reigns is the same who offers the sacrifice. And the promise to take away the iniquity of the land “in a single day” finds its meaning in the single day of the Cross, where the sin of the world is taken away by one act. The crown set upon the head of Joshua, made of the gold of the exile, announced from afar the one who would bear in truth the twofold dignity, king and priest upon a single throne.