5 And the angel who was talking to me went out and said to me, Let your eyes be lifted up now, and see the ephah which is going out. 6 And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah which is going out. And he said further, This is their evil-doing in all the land. 7 And I saw a round cover of lead lifted up; and a woman was seated in the middle of the ephah. 8 And he said, This is Sin; and pushing her down into the ephah, he put the weight of lead on the mouth of it. 9 And lifting up my eyes I saw two women coming out, and the wind was in their wings; and they had wings like the wings of a stork: and they took the ephah, lifting it up between earth and heaven. 10 And I said to the angel who was talking to me, Where are they taking the ephah? 11 And he said to me, To make a house for her in the land of Shinar: and they will make a place ready, and put her there in the place which is hers.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Zechariah 5:5-11
Commentary on Zechariah 5:5-11
(Read Zechariah 5:5-11)
In this vision the prophet sees an ephah, something in the shape of a corn measure. This betokened the Jewish nation. They are filling the measure of their iniquity; and when it is full, they shall be delivered into the hands of those to whom God sold them for their sins. The woman sitting in the midst of the ephah represents the sinful church and nation of the Jews, in their latter and corrupt age. Guilt is upon the sinner as a weight of lead, to sink him to the lowest hell. This seems to mean the condemnation of the Jews, after they filled the measure of their iniquities by crucifying Christ and rejecting his gospel. Zechariah sees the ephah, with the woman thus pressed in it, carried away to some far country. This intimates that the Jews should be hurried out of their own land, and forced to dwell in far countries, as they had been in Babylon. There the ephah shall be firmly placed, and their sufferings shall continue far longer than in their late captivity. Blindness is happened unto Israel, and they are settled upon their own unbelief. Let sinners fear to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath; for the more they multiply crimes, the faster the measure fills.