Zechariah 12:1 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

The burden— משׂא massa, usually denotes a prophesy of a calamitous kind. But it does not always so; for sometimes it signifies simply a prophesy, or revelation of some matter of importance, as Proverbs 30:1. Here however it may be fairly taken in the first sense, and rendered a burden; for though the issue be favourable to Israel in the end, yet it is preceded at first by a cup of trembling; and to the enemies of Israel the whole is from beginning to end sufficiently onerous.