19 And I said unto the angel that talked with me, What be these? And he answered me, These are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem.
(Verse 18, 19.) And I lifted up my eyes and saw: and behold four horns, and I said to the angel who spoke with me: What are these? And he said to me: These are the horns that have scattered Judah, and Israel, and Jerusalem. And the Lord showed me four craftsmen, and I said: What are these coming to do? And he said, saying: These are the horns that have scattered Judah, each one by his own man, and none of them has lifted up his head, and these have come to terrify them, to cast down the horns of the nations that have lifted up their horn over the land of Judah, to scatter it. LXX: And I lifted up my eyes and saw, and behold four horns. And I said to the angel who talked with me, 'What are these, Lord?' And he said to me, 'These are the horns that have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem.' Then the Lord showed me four craftsmen, and I said, 'What are these coming to do?' And he said, 'These are the horns that have scattered Judah, so that no one raised his head. And these have come to terrify them, to cast down the horns of the nations who lifted up their horns against the land of Judah to scatter it.' Four horns, the nations that lifted up a horn over the land of the Lord to scatter it. Four horns that scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem, to be four nations, the Babylonians, Medes and Persians, and Macedonians, and Romans, and now the Lord, questioned by the prophet, explains, and Daniel fully repeats. He, in the vision of the image, had a golden head, and a silver chest, and a bronze belly, and legs and feet of iron and clay, these four nations he interpreted (Dan. II). And again, in another vision, four beasts, a lion and a bear, and a leopard, and another horrible beast, whose name was not given, showed the same nations under a different appearance. And let no one doubt that the Medes and Persians are one kingdom after the victory of Cyrus, who has read both secular and sacred letters. And he rightly placed horns for kingdoms, the Holy Scripture having this custom of always interpreting kingdom as horns, as in this passage: And He has exalted the horn of His Christ (Psalm 148:14). And in another place: And he raised up the horn of salvation for us, in the house of David his servant (Luke 1:69). And ten horns will reign in the end, as the prophet Daniel also testifies (Daniel 7). At that time when this vision was seen, the kingdom of the Babylonians had already passed, the Persians and Medes were pressing in, the Greeks or rather the Macedonians were to come, and then the Romans. What the Babylonians, the Medes and Persians, the Greeks or rather the Macedonians did to the Jews, Israel, and Jerusalem, a learned man knows, especially during the time of Antiochus, surnamed Epiphanes, under whom the history of the Maccabees is recorded. After the arrival of the Lord and Savior, when Jerusalem was surrounded and the Israelites endured, as the Gospel before tells (Luke 19), and as the Jewish historian Josephus explains in great detail. These horns scattered and dispersed Judah, almost every single man, so that none of them, burdened by the weight of great tribulation, could raise their head. The prophet himself did not see the four craftsmen or artisans whom the Greeks call τέκτονες, but the Lord showed and explained to him who these craftsmen are, whom we understand to be obedient to the Lord's authority, to rebuild what the nations destroyed. But this, for which we have been interpreted from the Hebrew: They came to destroy these things, namely, kingdoms, interpreted by the Seventy: They came to sharpen these things, in their hands. But to sharpen these things means to understand them. Or certainly, to destroy, so that all may submit their necks under the yoke of Christ, and not (as some have interpreted) when they have been sharpened, become worse. For if the angels come for this purpose, to make the wicked worse, they should not be called craftsmen, that is, destroyers of evil, and builders of good; but they themselves should be understood as wicked and destroyers. And it should be noted that these four horns of the nations, one opposed to the people of God, raised a horn; for they did not reign equally and at the same time oppress Israel, but they succeeded each other, Babylonians, Medes, and Persians. The kingdom of the Persians, the kingdom of the Macedonians; the kingdom of the Macedonians, the empire of the Romans. We have mentioned these following the order of history. But what the prophet says, that he lifted up his eyes, must be understood in a spiritual sense: I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help shall come to me (Ps. 120:1). And: Lift up your eyes and behold the regions, for they are already white for harvesting (John 4:35). And that which we read in Isaiah: The holy one said, Lift up your eyes and see who has shown all these things (Isaiah 51:6). Therefore, it is necessary to lift up our eyes and have spiritual understanding, so that we may see the opposing forces that have exalted their horn against us, and concerning which the Apostle speaks: For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against the spiritual wickedness in the heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12). These four adversaries, who always fought against the Saints, were crushed by Christ when He came. And concerning them, the Psalmist says: You shall tread upon the asp and the basilisk, and you shall trample the lion and the dragon (Psalm 90:13). We can understand four horns, which reigned against the people of God, and four passions, which the learned do not express word for word with envy, but interpret as disturbances, the affliction of the soul and joy: two present, and two future, fear and desire, of which even the illustrious poet signifies (Aeneid VI).
From here they fear, desire, grieve, and rejoice. Against these [virtues], four craftsmen, and (so to speak) doctors, and good artisans, are not perceived by the prophet, for without the revelation of God he could not yet see them on his own, but they are revealed to him by the Lord, namely the four virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance, about which Cicero extensively argues in his book On Duties, also writing a separate book about the four virtues. Therefore, those who destroy vices and build virtues, and all the saints who continually restore the Church possessing these remedies, are to be called craftsmen. Hence, the Apostle spoke: Like a skilled builder, I laid the foundation (1 Corinthians 3:10). And the angry Lord said that He would remove the architect and wise man from Jerusalem (Isaiah 3). And the Lord Himself, the Son of God Almighty and Creator of all, is called the son of a craftsman. I read in someone's Commentaries that the four blacksmiths are the four Evangelists, who, by understanding the oppressed Israel, namely, seeing God, and confessing the Lord Judah, and the vision of peace in Jerusalem, restore them to their former seat, and who the sinful nations had dispersed from the Church, they brought back to salvation through the preaching of the Gospel.
[AD 420] Jerome on Zechariah 1:18-19
From here they fear, desire, grieve, and rejoice. Against these [virtues], four craftsmen, and (so to speak) doctors, and good artisans, are not perceived by the prophet, for without the revelation of God he could not yet see them on his own, but they are revealed to him by the Lord, namely the four virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance, about which Cicero extensively argues in his book On Duties, also writing a separate book about the four virtues. Therefore, those who destroy vices and build virtues, and all the saints who continually restore the Church possessing these remedies, are to be called craftsmen. Hence, the Apostle spoke: Like a skilled builder, I laid the foundation (1 Corinthians 3:10). And the angry Lord said that He would remove the architect and wise man from Jerusalem (Isaiah 3). And the Lord Himself, the Son of God Almighty and Creator of all, is called the son of a craftsman. I read in someone's Commentaries that the four blacksmiths are the four Evangelists, who, by understanding the oppressed Israel, namely, seeing God, and confessing the Lord Judah, and the vision of peace in Jerusalem, restore them to their former seat, and who the sinful nations had dispersed from the Church, they brought back to salvation through the preaching of the Gospel.