Zechariah cc. 1–8 presents questions of structure quite different from those of the Book of Haggai. The kernel of the book is the series of eight ‘night visions’ together with the oracles which accompany five of them. Three dates appear to divide the book into three sections. The visions and accompanying oracles are introduced by a date in 1:7, and are apparently presented by the book as being received all in one night (cf. 4:1). A date introduces 1:1–6 and another, cc. 7f. There are major differences between the three sections formed by this means. All the visions are narrated in the first person by Zechariah, although with different descriptive formulae. The accompanying oracles, as Petersen has pointed out, fulfil the function of explaining or developing some aspect of the visions. Yet, in at least three instances, such ‘oracular’ expansions of the visions appear to be more ‘corrective’ than others and to exhibit sufficient resemblances to the tradition material which is the subject of this book to deserve attention here. These are 3:6–10, appended to the fourth vision of the cleansing of Joshua; 4:6b–10a, an oracle addressed to Zerubbabel; and 6:9–15, which appears to have little connection with the preceding final vision but to be designed to serve as an ‘appendix’ to the whole series.

In 1:1–6, however, we have an account of more traditional prophetic preaching by Zechariah, narrated in the third person, calling for repentance.