Bible Synapse
Was the prophet Zechariah the son or the grandson of Iddo?
Hard question · Genealogies · raised by 1 of the lists sceptics circulate
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“Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem”.
Then the prophets, Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, even unto them.
The elders build and prosper “through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo”.
And the elders of the Jews builded, and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. And they builded, and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the commandment of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.
The word of the Lord comes “unto Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet”.
In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord unto Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet, saying,
In the days of the high priest Joiakim, the head of the priestly family of Iddo is Zechariah: “Of Iddo, Zechariah”.
Of Iddo, Zechariah; of Ginnethon, Meshullam;
The objection
Ezra 5:1 and 6:14 call the prophet “Zechariah the son of Iddo”. But his own book calls him “Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo” (Zechariah 1:1), which makes Iddo his grandfather. Critics ask which he was.
The answer
He was Iddo’s grandson. His own book gives the full descent, “the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo” (Zechariah 1:1, 7). Ezra gives the short form. The Aramaic word there, bar, like the Hebrew ben, means ‘son’ in the wider sense of ‘descendant’, and the Bible often names a man by his grandfather in this way, as when Jehu ‘the son of Jehoshaphat the son of Nimshi’ is also called ‘the son of Nimshi’ (2 Kings 9:2, 20).
There was good reason to name Zechariah after Iddo. Iddo was one of the chief priests who came back from Babylon with Zerubbabel (Nehemiah 12:1, 4), and the head of a priestly family. In the next generation, in the days of the high priest Joiakim, the head of that family was Zechariah (Nehemiah 12:12, 16), very probably the prophet himself. If so, Zechariah succeeded his grandfather, not his father. Barnes’ Notes concludes that Berechiah probably died young, which is why Zechariah was known in public as Iddo’s heir, while his own book records his full descent.
From the classic commentators
His father Berechiah probably died young, since, in Ezra, the prophet is called after his grandfather, "Zechariah the son of Iddo" Ezra 5:1; Ezra 6:14. He succeeded his grandfather in the office of "the priests, the chief of the fathers,"Barnes’ Notes on the Bible, Introduction to Zechariah