In Zechariah’s day the majestic mountains of Lebanon were clothed with forests of its world-famous “cedars of Lebanon” and other fragrant evergreen trees. How sad to think of such forests being ravaged by an inextinguishable conflagration! It is enough to make one howl. A suchlike howling by the world must yet come, for, almost like a sequel to chapter ten of Zechariah’s prophecy, chapter eleven opens up with the divine command to give vent to such howling.

Howl, O juniper tree, for the cedar has fallen; because the majestic ones themselves have been despoiled! Howl, you massive trees of Bashan, for the impenetrable forest has come down!

Even the tremendous cedars of Lebanon must fall before the divinely kindled flames, and that is why the associated juniper tree needs to howl. The massiveness of the tree does not make it fire resistant. That is why there must be a howling on the part of the impenetrable forests of massive trees on the highlands of Bashan to the east of the Jordan River and the Sea of Galilee. These too must burn down in the world conflagration during the coming “great tribulation,” the tribulation of all tribulations for mankind. This will be a time of howling for shepherd rulers.

6. Why will the shepherd rulers howl because of the consuming of symbolic “trees,” and also roar like lions of the Jordan thickets?

⁶ If we listen in by faith to the clear-sounding message of Bible prophecy we can hear the howling of those worldly shepherd rulers. In the “war of the great day of God the Almighty” at the battleground of Har–Magedon, they will be despoiled of their majesty of appearance and of office. (Revelation 16:14-16) They themselves are pictured by those majestic trees of Lebanon and massive trees of Bashan.