Then he said to him: ‘Run, speak to the young man over there, saying, “‘As open rural country Jerusalem will be inhabited, because of the multitude of men and domestic animals in the midst of her.

Zechariah 2:3-5.

22. From what took place in the days of Governor Nehemiah and also after Jerusalem’s destruction in 70 C.E., are we to understand this information to the young man to be in a literal way?

²² Was Jehovah of armies there talking about the literal earthly Jerusalem of Zechariah’s days? The later facts indicate plainly that He was not doing so. Why not? Because Jerusalem ceased to be inhabited “as open rural country.” Sixty-four years later the walls of Jerusalem were completely rebuilt under the leadership of Governor Nehemiah, in 455 B.C.E. Also, those rebuilt walls had twelve gates, as reported by Governor Nehemiah. (Nehemiah 2:3 to 6:15; 7:1) There were the Valley Gate, the Gate of the Ash-heaps and the Fountain Gate on the south; the Water Gate, the Horse Gate and the Inspection Gate on the east; the Gate of the Guard, the Sheep Gate and the Fish Gate on the north; the Gate of the Old City, the Gate of Ephraim and the Corner Gate on the west. (Nehemiah 2:13, 14; 3:26, 28, 31; 12:39; 3:32, 3, 6; 2 Chronicles 25:23) That city was destroyed by the Roman legions in the year 70 C.E. (Luke 21:20-24) The third Jerusalem, which is standing in this year 1972, is also walled and has gates on all four sides. But a modern Jerusalem has been built alongside it and its population is reported to be 275,000 as a whole.

23. (a) How is it apparent that Zechariah 2:4, 5 is not fulfilled in modern-day Jerusalem? (b) Where, then, should we look for the prophecy’s fulfillment?

²³ Even though the Jerusalem of today has expanded far out beyond the old walled city even into “open rural country,” no informed observer will argue, not even the Israelis themselves, that Jehovah of armies has become to her “a wall of fire all around” and a “glory . . . in the midst of her.” For protection the Jerusalem of the Republic of Israel is trusting in the United Nations, of which it has been a member since 1949, also in the military aid supplied to the Republic of Israel by friendly nations such as the mostly Gentile United States of America. All this obliges us to look to the spiritual Jerusalem for the fulfillment of the divine prophecy of Zechariah 2:4, 5. The prophecy has to do with the remnant of the spiritual Israelites, who are yet to become part of the heavenly New Jerusalem under the Greater Governor Zerubbabel, Jesus Christ, the capital organization of Jehovah’s universal organization.