Albert Barnes Commentary Zechariah 13:6

"And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds between thine arms? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends." — Zechariah 13:6 (ASV)

And one shall say to him, What are those wounds in your hands? - The words are simple; the meaning different, depending on how they are united with what immediately precedes, or the main subject, Him whom they pierced, for whom they were to mourn, and, on their mourning, to be cleansed, and of whom it is said in the next verse, Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd. Jerome and others explain it as the punishment inflicted by parents. “These wounds and bruises I received, condemned by the judgment of my parents, and of those who did not hate but loved me. And so will truth prevail, dissipating falsehood, that he too, who was punished for his own fault, will acknowledge that he suffered rightly.”

But wounds of chastisement are not inflicted on the hands, and the punishment of false prophecy was not such wounds, but death. Wounds in the hands were no punishment that parents would inflict. They were the special punishment of the cross, after sustaining which, only One lived. The most literal interpretation, then, of the wounds in the hands harmonizes with the piercing before, and the striking of the Good Shepherd which follows, of whom David too prophesied, They pierced My Hands and My Feet (Psalms 22:16). “What are those wounds on Your hands? How long, do you think, and how and by whom will this be said to Him?”

Forever and ever, unceasingly, and with unspeakable admiration it will be said, both by God the Father, to whom He was obedient to death, the death of the Cross (Philippians 2:8); it will be said also both by the holy angels who desire to look into Him (1 Peter 1:12), and by people whom He has redeemed. O great miracle, wonderful spectacle, especially in the Lord of all, to bear wounds in the midst of His Hands! And He will say: “With these I was wounded in the house of those who loved Me.” O great sacrilege, sacrilegious homicide, that such wounds were inflicted in the house of those who loved! He will not say, ‘with these I was wounded by those who loved Me,’ but ‘in the house of those who loved Me.’ For those who inflicted them did not love Him.

But they were the house of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and David, and the rest like them, who loved Me, and expected Me, who was promised to them. Yet saying this does not answer the question, ‘What are these wounds?’ For it is one thing to ask what these wounds are, and another to say where they were inflicted. Having said that they were inflicted in the house of those who loved Me, He says what they are: the cup which My Father has given Me to drink. For what He adds is the voice of the Father giving the cup. ‘Sword, awake, and so on’ is as if He said, ‘You ask, What are these wounds?’

I say, they are ‘the tokens of obedience, the signs of the Father’s will and command.’

The Lord of hosts, God the Father ‘has not spared’ Me, ‘His own Son, but has given’ Me ‘for’ you ‘all.’ And He said, Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, and against the Man cohering to Me, which means, ‘O Death, have power over My Son, My good Shepherd, the Man who coheres to Me, that is, who is joined in unity of Person with the Word who is consubstantial with Me!’ And then, as if the sword asked, ‘How or how far am I to arise against this Your Shepherd?’ He adds, Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered. Hence, the Shepherd Himself, when about to be struck, spoke, All of you will be offended because of Me this night. For it is written, I will smite the Shepherd and the sheep shall be scattered (Matthew 26:31).

So then to those who say, ‘What are those wounds in the midst of Your hands?’ is appropriately added the Voice of the Father, saying, ‘Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, and so on,’ meaning, ‘They are monuments of the Father’s love, the tokens of My Obedience, because He ‘spared not His own Son,’ and I ‘became obedient’ to Him for you all, ‘even to death, and that, the death of the Cross.’’