That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom you slew between the temple and the altar.
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Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
That upon you may come, &c, righteous blood. That Isaiah , of the righteous men who have exhorted others to live justly and holily, both by word and example. Whence S. Luke has, the blood of the Prophets; for a Prophet in Scripture frequently denotes a just and holy man. S. Austin gives the reason for what Christ says in this verse, "Because the imitation of wicked men causes people to obtain not only their own deserts, but the deserts of those whom they imitate." Moreover S. Chrysostom says, "Even as the rewards which all the preceding generations deserved were bestowed upon those who received Christ, so what their wicked ancestors merited came upon the latest Jews."
Which was shed, &c. Because, although Cain, who slew his brother Abel, was not a Jew by race, yet by his wickedness in killing righteous Abel he afforded an example to the Jews, who were most prone to follow it, in killing the holy Prophets. Thus Cain the fratricide was not the natural, but the symbolical father of the J...
From the blood of Abel Not that the Jews, to whom Christ spoke, should be punished for crimes which they themselves did not commit nor be more severely punished than they themselves deserved; but he speaks of the Jewish people which, by putting to death their Messias, should shortly fill up the number of their sins; so that God would destroy their whole nation, as if the blood of Abel, and of the prophets unjustly murdered came upon them at once. See Maldonatus.
Of Zacharias, the son of Barachias. Some think this was Zachary, numbered among the lesser prophets, whose father's name was Barachias; but we do not read of his being murdered in this manner. The more common opinion is, that here is meant Zachary, who, preaching to the people, (2 Paralipomenon xxiv. 20,) was stoned to death in the very place where Christ was now speaking. But there he is called the son of Joiada, and not of Barachias. Some conjecture his father might have had both names; and St. Jerome tells us, that in an an...
Because we read about so many Zechariahs in Scripture, we need to inquire into the identity of this particular Zechariah, the son of Barachiah. Lest we mistake him for another, the Gospel specifies “whom you killed between the sanctuary and the altar.” Yet there remains a variety of diverse opinions on this question, each of which ought to be considered. Some say that this Zechariah the son of Barachiah is the eleventh of the twelve minor prophets. Although their fathers share the same name, however, they cannot be the same persons because the prophet Zechariah was never said to have been killed between the sanctuary and the altar and especially because the temple had just recently been destroyed in the prophet’s time. Others want us to believe that this Zechariah is the father of John the Baptist, killed because he proclaimed the advent of the Savior on the basis of something he had dreamed. Because this theory doesn’t have the authority of Scripture, however, it can be disproven as e...
