Note on the Prophecy of Haggai.

ZECHARIAH, although in one sense the cotemporary of Haggai (for they both began to prophesy in the second year of Darius*), yet was in reality his successor; for when Haggai ceased to prophesy in the ninth month of that year, Zechariah had only delivered one brief prophesy, viz., that recorded in the first six verses of the first chapter.

:

The first prophecy of Haggai was delivered on the first day of the sixth month of the second year of Darius. Fourteen years had now passed since Israel, disheartened and discouraged (see Ezra iv. 4.) began to yield to the pressure of their enemies, and ceased from the work of the house of God (Ezra iv. 24.)-a work which they had commenced, and for a season carried on with vigour and with joy. "Then stood Joshua with his sons and his brethren, Kadmiel and his sons, the sons of Judah, together, to set forward the workmen in the house of God the sons of Henadab, with their sons and their brethren the Levites. And when the builders laid the foundation of the Temple of the Lord, they set the priests in their apparel with trumpets, and the Levites the sons of Asaph with cymbals, to praise the Lord, after the ordinance of David king of Israel. And they sang together by course in praising and giving thanks unto the Lord; because he is good, for his mercy endureth for ever toward Israel. And all the people shouted with a great shout, when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid." (Ezra iii. 9-11).

So the work had commenced, but at the time of which we speak-the time when Haggai began to prophesy, it had been for nearly fourteen

That is, sixteen years after the decree first given by Cyrus; and fourteen years after the commencement of the opposition which caused them to abandon the further building of the Temple.

M

years abandoned. During the first of this period, indeed, the work was not quite suspended. It seems languidly to have been carried on. At last, however, it was altogether relinquished-how entirely so, may be seen from the expression used in Haggai i. 4, where the Lord's house is described as being a "waste;" and also from the fact that when they again commenced their labours, they laid the foundation afresh. See Haggai iii. 18. Their former labour, therefore, could not have been great nor long continued, seeing that every trace of it had so soon disappeared.

The sad condition of listlessness, and worse than listlessness, into which they had relapsed, is strikingly shown in the commencing prophecy of Haggai. It began abruptly thus: "This people say, The time is not come, the time for the house of Jehovah to be built." This was the whole of the first brief message. It showed at once the ground of the Lord's controversy with them, and called on them to search out and test the reasons that had caused them to settle down into such a conclusion. Another message quickly followed. "Then came the word of Jehovah by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your covered houses, and this house, waste? Now therefore saith Jehovah of hosts; consider your ways. Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages, earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes. Thus saith Jehovah of hosts; consider your ways. Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith Jehovah. Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why? saith Jehovah of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house. Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed from her fruit. And I called for a drought upon the

, literally covered or roofed. See 1 Kings, vi. 9. "So he built the house and finished it; and covered the house with beams and boards of cedar." Thus they had finished and covered in their houses, whilst the house of the Lord had been utterly neglected. The rebuke, therefore, was not directed against their having built splendid houses (it does not appear that they had done this), nor even against their having built houses, but against their having done this whilst they were utterly neglecting the Lord's house, which should have had the first place in their thoughts.

land, and upon the mountains, and upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil, and upon that which the ground bringeth forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, and upon all the labour of the hands."

This message of severe rebuke was not in vain. On the twentyfourth day of the same month the people began to labour. "And Jehovah stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of Jehovah of hosts, their God."

Shortly after this, on the one and twentieth day of the seventh month, a second message from the Lord was delivered through Haggai, not now in the language of upbraiding, but of encouragement and promise. It concluded thus: "For thus hath said Jehovah of hosts; yet a little while, and I will shake the heavens and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all the Gentiles, and the choicest* (i. e., the noblest and most select) of all the Gentiles shall come; and I will fill this house with glory, saith Jehovah of hosts. To me belongeth the silver, and to me the gold, saith Jehovah of hosts. Greater shall be the glory of this house the latter (glory) than the former (glory) saith Jehovah of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith Jehovah of hosts."†

Many have rendered these words, "the desire of all nations," and have applied them to the Messiah. It is true, indeed, that in the next dispensation Christ might fitly be called "the desire of all the Gentiles," for all will be gathered to Him then, in professed, if not real, obedience. "To him shall the gathering of the peoples be." But even if this prospective application of the words were admitted, there would be a difficulty from the word "come" being in the original in the plural number-The Septuagint, therefore, render it as above. ήξει τα εκλεκτα παντων των εθνών. See in Bengel. "Venient autem ad Christum vicissim omnes ü qui inter gentes sunt electi et desiderabiles." So also Cocceius, "accedent autem amati gentium,—desideratissimi gentium." A similar form of expression will be found in Is. xxii. 7, "the choice of thy valleys." See also Exod. xv. 4.

The whole passage refers to the yet future Advent of the Lord in glory. So it is quoted by the Apostle in Heb. xii. "But now hath he promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven." We have, therefore, the authority of the Apostle for saying that this verse in Haggai is unfulfilled.

↑ Such is the correct translation of this passage. The Temple, as being God's house, becomes thereby possessed of a characteristic oneness which would not be considered as lost if it were twenty times destroyed and rebuilt. It is always

This prophecy, however, of encouragement and promise, does not seem to have acted upon them with the same power as the previous message of rebuke. The people of God, not unfrequently, sink into a condition in which their conscience can be more easily acted on, than either their faith, or their hope. In such a state, rebuke and terror can arouse them when promise and encouragement seem to be in vain. Yet activities so aroused have not either the vigour or the stedfastness of the energies that flow from faith, and hope, and love. If this remnant of Israel had had faith to realize that God was as truly, though not so manifestly, with them in the day of their weakness as with their forefathers when they left the land of Egypt-if they had realised that the house of wood that they were called on to build, was virtually the same house that had been, and yet again would be filled with glory, and that far more abundantly—if they had recognised that the place where they were labouring was that where God would finally gather all nations to peace, and light, and joy, and blessing, how would they have been strengthened for toil! But, as I have said, faith and hope appear to have had little power in their

regarded as virtually one house, and therefore is called "my house," "this house," at any and every period of its history. See Ezekiel xliii. 1, 6, for the accomplishment of this promise in days yet to come. "Behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east; and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory... . . . . . . And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east. . . . . . . . and, behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house.

The Septuagint translate this verse correctly-μεγαλη εσται ἡ δόξα του οίκου τούτου ή εσχατη ύπερ την πρώτην. "Great shall be the glory of this house, the last glory beyond the first." The whole passage, therefore, is to be understood, like that just quoted from Ezekiel, of the future millennial glory of Israel's Temple. "To me belongeth the silver, &c.," that is, all the excellency and goodliness of the earth is mine. I can, if I please, exalt and dignify my people and my Truth, and in due season I will exalt them. "Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her all ye that love her... . . . . for thus saith the Lord, behold I will extend peace to her as a river, and the glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream." Is. xlvi. 10. "The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the pine tree and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary, and I will make the place of my feet glorious........ I will glorify the house of my glory."

But these things are future. The time for the triumph of Truth is not yet come. We have still to do with the house of wood, unadorned, inglorious, as in the days of Zerubbabel. But the words addressed to him, are not without their application "Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house, and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord."

to us.

hearts. After the encouraging prophecy of Haggai to which I have referred, more than two months elapsed without the foundation of the Lord's house having been laid. In this interval Haggai did not again prophesy; but Zechariah did. His first prophecy was delivered in the eighth month; we are not told on what day. Haggai had spoken last in the seventh month.

Zechariah's first prophecy was very brief, being comprised in five verses. Its tone was stern and severe, commencing thus, “Jehovah was sore displeased with your fathers." It seems, however, to have taken effect, for on the twenty-fourth day of the succeeding month, the foundation of the Lord's house was a second time laid. See Haggai iii. 18. On that day Haggai prophesied again, twice, and for the last time. The greater part of the first prophecy of Haggai on this day was taken up with reminding them respecting the tokens of Divine displeasure that had been among them, and of the defilement brought on themselves by their carelessness and worldliness during the time that they had ceased to labour for the Lord's house. They had acted as if they had thought that holy things, however irreverently or contemptuously handled, could by the mere fact of being brought into external contact with unclean things hallow them: whilst, on the other hand, they seem to have forgotten that they who are unclean must, whatsoever they handle, spread taint and defilement by their every touch-no unimportant warning to us if ever we are tempted to believe that the mere profession of truth sanctifies the world and its ways; or to imagine that any thing except defilement can follow upon the action of unsanctified hands.

But although the first part of Haggai's message on this day was, like Zechariah's, severe, yet it concluded with the words, "from this day will I bless you." They had become obedient. The foundations of the house of the Lord were laid: they had begun to labour for and under Him.

His second message on this day was the last he ever delivered. It contains only words of promise. "Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, I will shake the heavens and the earth; and I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms, and I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the Gentiles; and I will overthrow the chariots, and those that ride in them; and the horses and their riders shall come down, every one by the sword of his brother. In that day, saith Jehovah of hosts, will I take thee, O Zerubbabel, my servant, the son of Shealtiel, saith Jehovah, and will make thee as a signet: for I have