Raamatun kohta:
Seitsemäs näky: nainen viljaruukussa
5 Enkeli, joka selitti minulle näkyni, tuli luokseni ja sanoi: "Katso, mitä nyt saat nähdä." 6 Minä kysyin: "Mikä se on?" Hän vastasi: "Se on viljaruukku, eefa-mitta", ja jatkoi: "Se tarkoittaa koko maan asukkaiden syntivelkaa." 7 Yhtäkkiä ruukun lyijykansi avautui, ja ruukussa istui nainen. 8 Enkeli sanoi: "Tämä nainen tarkoittaa jumalattomuutta." Sitten hän työnsi naisen takaisin eefa-mittaan ja pani jälleen lyijypunnuksen kanneksi sen päälle.
9 Sen jälkeen minä näin kahden naisen lähestyvän. Heillä oli siivet kuin haikaran siivet, ja tuuli kuljetti heitä. He nostivat eefa-mitan korkealle ilmaan. 10 Minä kysyin enkeliltä, joka puhui kanssani: "Mihin he vievät ruukun?" 11 Hän vastasi: "Sinearin maahan. Siellä he rakentavat naiselle temppelin, ja kun se on valmis, he asettavat eefa- mitan korokkeelle."
Sak.5
Ja tässä Lutherin teksti, olen vahventanut muutamia kohtia.
[Zechariah 5:]7-8. And behold, the leaden weight was lifted, and there was a woman sitting in the ephah! And he [the
angel] said: This is Wickedness. ...the false teachers are not only greedy but also wicked and...they mislead the people.
Therefore the woman is here sitting in the ephah and has the name Impietas, that is, godless teaching. For the sitting
refers to the office of teaching, Ps. 1:1; Matt. 23:2: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat.” But she is sitting
in the ephah, that is, she is ruling among the greedy hypocrites; they are listening to her and clinging to her wicked
teaching. ... And it is a woman. Why not a man? Because her teaching teaches what is neither human nor godly – for
“man is the image of God,” says St. Paul (1 Cor. 11:7) – but teaches according to fine tender reason: how that thinks
and judges, so the teaching must be; let God’s Word stay where it will! Now reason is indeed fine to look at, even as a
woman is when compared with a man; but it is not good for teaching or having authority, even as a woman is forbidden
to teach or have authority, 1 Tim. 2:12. Yet it teaches and has authority here in a hypocrite’s life. For the woman is sitting
in the ephah and is a fine doll to look at when compared with pure teaching, which offers the serious face of a man –
one that is shaggy about its mouth and has a bristling beard; for it is not hypocritical but serious. Women, however, have
smooth mouths, and the hypocritical preachers do, too. 8. And he thrust her back into the ephah... The angel thrusts the
woman into the ephah... This means: through the Gospel hypocrisy is dethroned and brought to shame – for the angel
represents Christ and all the teachers of the Gospel... 9. Then I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, two women coming
forward! ... The wicked are indeed separated from the people of God, so that their ephah and their woman, that is, their
teaching and life, no longer are tolerated among the godly, as Ps. 1:5 says: “The wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.” Nevertheless, they do not stop their teaching but at all times find
teachers and students to further and carry on their error and deceit. ... The two women represent the office of preaching,
or office of teaching, or all teachers and preachers, even as the two cherubim on the ark of Moses represent that also
(Ex. 25:18). The fact, however, that there are two cherubim and two women, means that in all preaching or teaching,
be it right or wrong, these two parts are regularly to be found, mine et promissio, “threat and promise,” which we call Law
and Gospel. For even the wicked could not maintain their teaching if they did not present a false law, that is, if they did
not compel and incite the consciences with false terror and threats; and again, if they did not present a false gospel, that
is, did not attract and occupy the hearts with false comfort and promises. For every teaching must be so constituted that
it frightens and comforts the consciences by pretending that God commands and demands this or that and that He
promises His grace and reward as a comfort to those who act in accordance with this teaching. Now in the true office
of teaching and over the ark there are two cherubim in the image of men; but here in the false office of teaching there
are images of two women on the ephah. For as I have said above, reason is a beautiful woman, but she is not to teach;
she may indeed make a fine appearance, but she is not fit to preach. Man’s image, however, is God’s image and teaches
properly, that is, God’s Word is to do the teaching. There is, then, in the false office of teaching nothing but reason and
whatever is in keeping with reason: it is the master and doctor and applies God’s Word in accordance with its own
conceit and pleasure. The two women, however, are they who teach nothing but reason or a law and a gospel of the
flesh and not the law of the Spirit or of God and the true Gospel. ...this vision of the ephah is completely formed and
fashioned after the vision of Moses which he saw on Mount Sinai, when he was to fashion the ark after this vision (Ex.
25:9), even as godless hypocrisy at all times tries to imitate pure teaching and truth and be like them. There we find the
golden ark, here an ephah; on that we find a mercy seat, on this a leaden weight; there God is sitting on the ark and
mercy seat, here a woman is sitting in the ephah, and she is wicked; there we find two angels with wings, here we find
two women with wings; there the ark is standing at Jerusalem, here the ephah is moving to Babel. Everything is imitated
and yet is different in the extreme. For the wicked wish to appear holy and also do have that appearance. But it is only
an accursed and condemned thing; for they have no ark with the bread from heaven and the tables of Moses; in their
consciences they have neither the true Law nor the true Gospel but only their own inventions – for the sake of their
bellies. Again, not Christ is sitting there with His mercy, but the wicked woman; nor is the true office of preaching there,
the golden cherubim, but rather a self-chosen office and way of teaching. (Martin Luther, “Lectures on Zechariah” [1527],
Luther’s Works, Vol. 20 [Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1973], pp. 242-44, 246)