Haggai 1:1–15

1:1 Haggai’s first oracle is dated precisely: “the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month” (August 29, 520 BC). Darius I ruled the Persian Empire from 522 to 486 BC. That Haggai dates the oracle with reference to a pagan king highlights the continuing absence of a Davidic king in Jerusalem. This oracle is addressed to two named individuals. The first is “Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah.” Shealtiel was the son of Jehoiachin, the Davidic king at the time of exile (cf. 1 Chron. 3:17). As a grandson of Jehoiachin, Zerubbabel was potentially the heir to the Davidic throne. Furthermore, he was the Persian-appointed governor of Judah. The second addressee is “Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest.” Jehozadak was high priest at the time of the exile (cf. 1 Chron. 6:15), and his son Joshua now filled that role in the postexilic community. This oracle is therefore addressed to the civic and religious leaders of the day, and through them to the community as a whole (cf. Hag. 1:12, where all three parties—Zerubbabel, Joshua, and the people—are explicitly named).

1:2 This oracle begins with a typical formula: “Thus says the LORD of hosts.” What follows, however, is atypical: the Lord speaks not his own words but what the people have been saying—that the “time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the LORD.” The temple was destroyed in 586 BC by the army of Nebuchadnezzar. It represented God’s dwelling place with his people and was where sacrifices were offered to remove the guilt of sin. At the time of this oracle, the people of God had been without the place of sacrifice and God’s dwelling for sixty-six years.

The reason for saying “the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the LORD” is not given. Perhaps the people believed their current circumstances were a sign of still being under the curse of God because their “seventy years” of judgment had not yet ended (cf. Jer. 25:11; Zech. 1:12). Perhaps they did not want to be like King David, who, seeing his own house of cedar, presumed to take the initiative to build a house for the Lord before being told to do so (cf. 2 Samuel 7). Or perhaps it was simply pragmatism. In circumstances where resources were scarce (cf. comment on Hag. 1:5–8), were they simply giving priority to their own material needs? On whatever basis the people might have justified not rebuilding the temple, it is clear from what follows in Haggai 1:4–7 that these were nothing more than excuses to devote themselves to their own prosperity.

1:3–4 The Lord’s response to their procrastination is introduced by the same “messenger” formula as verse 1. Through Haggai he asks, “Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?” The people had claimed that “the time has not yet come,” but they evidently had enough “time” to build their own paneled houses. They had forsaken work on God’s dwelling place to work on their own dwellings. Whatever justification the people relied on for not beginning work on the temple, this rhetorical question exposes their core problem: prioritizing self-interest ahead of God’s purposes.

1:5–8 In these verses the people are told twice to “consider your ways” (vv. 5, 7). First, they should consider their current “ways” and the resulting scarcity (v. 6). The second instruction to “consider your ways” (v. 7) offers a very different alternative.

Their current ways—prioritizing their own prosperity—has, ironically, led to the opposite outcome. Their agricultural endeavors have produced only meager returns—they have “sown much and harvested little.” This description echoes the curse pronounced in Deuteronomy 28:38, inviting the conclusion that their agricultural problems are God’s curse for disobeying the covenant. The next clause again echoes Deuteronomy to make the same point in reverse—to “eat and be full” is a sign of God’s blessing (cf. Deut. 11:15), so to eat but never have enough implies a curse. With respect to the necessities of life—food, drink, clothing—the people experience scarcity instead of abundance. Haggai 1:6 ends with a picture summarizing the futility of their present ways: working for wages that go into a bag that cannot hold them.

In light of the futility of their present ways, the people are again directed in verse 7 to “consider your ways” and walk differently in the future: “Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house.” Instead of gathering wood to panel their own houses, they should gather wood for the construction of the Lord’s house. The reason given for building the temple was perhaps not what Haggai’s audience expected, based on the implications of verse 6. Having seen how their current behavior had led to curse conditions, they might have expected a promise of blessing. Instead the Lord says they should build the house “that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified.” The reason for building the temple is not for their own blessing but for God’s pleasure and glory.

These dual reasons for rebuilding—God’s pleasure and glory—point to the twin functions of the temple. The verb translated “take pleasure” is typically associated with sacrifices acceptable to the Lord, in which he “takes pleasure.” Prior to Haggai, the last word the people had heard from the Lord’s prophets was that he “took no pleasure” in sacrifices offered at the temple (e.g., Jer. 14:12; Hos. 8:13; Amos 5:22). Haggai 1:8 offers the possibility of reversal: the Lord will again “take pleasure” in sacrifices offered at the temple. The phrase “in it” denotes the location where the Lord will take pleasure (i.e., in the temple), not the object of his pleasure. There is a similar possibility of reversal with respect to “glory.” The temple was where the glory of the Lord dwelt amid his people (cf. 1 Kings 8:11; Ps. 26:8). However, the last word prior to Haggai was that the Lord’s glory had departed the temple (Ezek. 10:18). By rebuilding the temple, the people could restore it both to where God takes pleasure in sacrifice and where he dwells in glory amid his people. Conversely, their neglect of the temple over the past two decades demonstrated their indifference to the Lord’s dwelling among them and to the issue of whether or not their sin offerings were acceptable.

1:9–11 What was implicit in verse 6 is now made explicit: the people “looked for much,” but “it came to little” because they were experiencing the Lord’s judgment. The Lord himself “blew away” their produce (presumably a reference to dry conditions) “because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house.” There is wordplay in Hebrew between the words for “ruins” in verse 9 (khareb) and “drought” in verse 11 (khoreb); because they left his house in ruins, the Lord ruined their crops. They had neglected God’s house because each person was (lit.) “rushing to his own house,” i.e., seeking his own interests.

Because of this, the Lord brought scarcity upon them. As in verse 6, this point is brought home by a double echo of covenant curses from Deuteronomy 11 and 28. Their recent experience—“The heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce”—is a covenant curse of Deuteronomy 11:17. Similarly, their “drought . . . on the grain, the new wine, the oil” and on “man and beast” reflects the destruction promised in Deuteronomy 28:51 for those who disobey the covenant. This fourfold repetition of covenant curses points to the magnitude of the error of Haggai’s generation. It is not merely a case of misplaced priorities. Rather, by pursuing their own houses, they have forsaken God’s covenant. Their failure is described in Deuteronomy 28: they have failed to “faithfully obey the voice of the LORD” (Deut. 28:1) or to “serve the LORD . . . with joyfulness and gladness of heart” (Deut. 28:47). They have been disobedient and self-serving.

1:12 This verse narrates the response of the community to the challenge of verses 2–11. The initial oracle about “these people” in verse 2 was addressed only to Zerubbabel and Joshua, but now the people are included explicitly,¹ and a change in description reflects a change in their relationship with God: “these people” have become “the remnant of the people.” The “remnant” describes those left after a time of judgment to become the focus of God’s ongoing purposes for his people. Their status has changed because of a twofold response. First, the whole community “obeyed the voice of the LORD their God” (cf. Deut. 28:1, quoted above). They heard this “voice” through Haggai the prophet, whom they accepted as one sent by the Lord. Second, the people “feared the LORD.” To fear the Lord does not mean to be terrified of him, but to give him the wholehearted reverence and respect he deserves as the one and only Lord (Deut. 6:12–15). Fearing the Lord and obeying his commands are how the covenant people of God should respond to him (e.g., Deut. 6:24; 10:12; 31:12). Through the preaching of Haggai, the Lord reorients the hearts of the people, who turn from indifference and disobedience to reverence and obedience. This change of heart leads to changed behavior.

1:13 Because of the people’s repentance as described in verse 12, the Lord speaks his next oracle through Haggai to the people. It is a very short oracle—two words in Hebrew, four in English—“I am with you.” Yet we should not underestimate the weight of this tiny oracle. The failed crops seemed to say, “The Lord is against us,” and the ruined temple seemed to say, “The Lord is absent from us.” But the Lord assures them that he is with them; this is an oracle of reassurance and hope. Notwithstanding that the dwelling again of God’s glory in the temple was still future (cf. comment on 1:5–8), this oracle declares that the Lord has already returned to his people and is with them. The same promise is repeated in 2:4, with a further word of explanation in the following verse: “My Spirit remains in your midst” (2:5).

1:14 Having stirred the hearts of the leaders and people to repentance (v. 12), and having given them a word of encouragement and hope (v. 13), the Lord stirs them to action. Almost twenty years earlier, the Lord had begun the work of restoring Jerusalem by “stirring up the spirit” of Cyrus to allow the temple to be rebuilt and “stirring up the spirit” of the exiles to return and build the house of the Lord (Ezra 1:1, 5). Now is another crucial moment of “stirr[ing] up the spirit” of Zerubbabel, Joshua, and the people. As a result, they “came and worked on the house of the LORD of hosts, their God.” The Lord is identified for the first time as “their God” in Hag. 1:12—because they obeyed the voice of “the LORD their God,” they now desire to build the house of “the LORD their God” (v. 14). This phrase reflects the covenant formula—“I will be their God” (cf. Jer. 31:33). The people’s response of obedience reflects their restored covenant relationship with God.

1:15 The people begin work on the temple on the 24th day of the sixth month, 23 days after Haggai’s first oracle. This date bookends the date in verse 1 and completes the first unit of Haggai, utilizing the same elements as verse 1 (year-month-day) but in reverse order (day-month-year). This literary reversal complements the theme of the chapter: the reversal of the people’s hearts.