The Four Oracles

The book consists of four messages, delivered within a few months, from the sixth to the ninth month of the same year. They move from reproach to promise: Haggai begins by shaking a people settled in their cares, then, once the work has resumed, he encourages them and announces God’s blessing. All tend toward the same thing: to put God in the first place.

Consider your ways

The first message falls on the first day of the sixth month. The people keep saying that the time has not come to rebuild the Temple, while they finish and adorn their own houses. Haggai turns the excuse back on them: “Is it time for you to dwell in ceiled houses, and this house lie desolate?” Haggai 1:4. Then he calls each one to examine his conduct, and repeats it from one message to the next: consider your ways. And he shows them where to look, for their work bears no fruit: “You have sowed much, and brought in little: you have eaten, but have not had enough: you have drunk, but have not been filled with drink: you have clothed yourselves, but have not been warmed: and he that hath earned wages, put them into a bag with holes.” Haggai 1:6. This scarcity has a cause: by neglecting the house of God for their own, they have deprived themselves of his blessing. The lesson runs through the whole book: to give God the first place, before one’s own interests.

The people set to work

This time, the people listen. Zorobabel, Joshua, and all the rest of the people hear the voice of the prophet; the Lord stirs up their zeal, and twenty-three days after the first message, they resume the work. To this people setting to work again, God gives a word of support: “I am with you, saith the Lord.” Haggai 1:13.

The glory to come

A month later, on the twenty-first day of the seventh month, comes the second message. The work advances, but the oldest, who had seen the Temple of Solomon before its ruin, are disappointed: beside the former, the new one seems to them quite poor. To these discouraged elders, God offers a consolation. He reminds them that the silver and the gold belong to him, and that he can therefore give this house its glory; then he promises more than what they have lost: “Great shall be the glory of this last house more than of the first, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place I will give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.” Haggai 2:10. The glory of this second Temple will surpass that of the first.

Purity and blessing

The third message comes on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month. Haggai questions the priests, the guardians of the rules of worship. In the law of Israel, certain things were holy, set apart for God, and others impure, kept away from worship, like the contact of a dead body. He asks two questions: if one carries consecrated meat in a fold of his garment, and that fold touches food, does the food become holy? The priests answer no. And if a man made impure by the contact of a dead body touches food, does it become impure? The priests answer yes. Holiness is not communicated from one thing to another by mere contact, but impurity gains everything it touches. Haggai applies the rule to the people: God had commanded them to rebuild his house, and as long as they left it in ruins, they disobeyed him; this disobedience kept them impure before him, and their fault spoiled even the offerings they presented, which could not draw down blessing upon them. Now that the work has resumed, God announces a reversal: “Hath the vine, and the fig tree, and the pomegranate, and the olive tree as yet flourished? From this day I will bless you.” Haggai 2:20.

The promise to Zorobabel

The same day comes a fourth message, addressed to Zorobabel alone. God announces that he will shake the kingdoms of the earth and overthrow their power, then he turns to the governor: “I will take thee, O Zorobabel, my servant, saith the Lord, and will make thee as a signet, for I have chosen thee, saith the Lord of hosts.” Haggai 2:24. The signet ring is the seal a king wore on his finger to mark his decrees, a sign of his authority and his trust. By making Zorobabel his signet, God marks him as his chosen one and renews, through him, the thread of the house of David.