Haggai 1

"The rejoicings of the Lord are in their throats, and two-edged swords in their hands to execute vengeance upon the nations, chastisements among the people." We must observe how beautiful, how useful these differing expressions are. Earlier he said that the saints rejoice in their beds; now he says that the Lord's rejoicings are set in their throats, the sense being that they never cease to praise, whether in thought or in tongue, him from whom they obtain eternal gifts. He also moves on to explain the power that they wield, with the words "and two-edged swords in their hands." The two-edged sword is the word of the Lord Savior, of which Christ himself says in the Gospel: "I have come not to send peace to the earth but a sword." It is a two-edged sword because it contains two Testaments. First it separated Jews from Gentiles; subsequently it segregated and cut off Christians from the enticements of the whole world. There is one sword but two ways of cutting that he grants to the chosen peoples at various selected moments of time. So the prophet says that these swords are in their hands, in other words, in the power of the saints, as Scripture has it: "The word of the Lord came to the hand of Haggai the prophet." So the blessed ones will assume this power and pass judgment in company with the Lord. As Scripture says, "You shall sit on twelve seats, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." For note what follows: "To execute vengeance upon the nations, chastisements among the people." This truly takes place when they shall judge in company with the Lord.

While you are reflecting upon this thought, meditate upon the mystery that is hidden within it. If we lift up our hands, Jesus triumphs. If we lift up our hands in good works, through our good works, Christ overcomes the devil. Hands, moreover, connote good works, whereupon it is written: "The word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai"; "the word that came by the hand of Jeremiah the prophet." To be sure, the word of the Lord does not come by the hand but by the mouth, but grasp the mysticism of the Scripture. God does not come because of words but because of good works.

That in the second year of Darius, king of the Persians, son of Hystaspes, the seventieth year of the desolation of the temple, which Jeremiah had prophesied, was completed, the prophet Zechariah is also a witness: for when he had set at the head of his vision the title, in the second year of the same king, in the eleventh month, Shebat, on the twenty-fourth day, he added, saying: O Lord of hosts, how long will you not have mercy on Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, with which you are angry? This is the seventieth year. And Ezra too, when only the altar had been built and the foundations of the temple laid, relates that the work was forbidden by the letters of King Artaxerxes: Then the work of the house of God in Jerusalem was interrupted, and it was not done until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of the Persians. And at once he added: But Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo prophesied, prophesying to the Jews who were in Judea and Jerusalem, in the name of the Lord of Israel: then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Joshua the son of Jehozadak rose up and began to build the temple of God in Jerusalem, and with them the prophets of God, helping them. At that time Tarquinius Superbus, the seventh from Romulus, was reigning among the Romans, in the twenty-seventh year of his rule; eight years later he was driven out by Brutus; and thereafter consuls administered the commonwealth for four hundred and sixty-four years, down to Julius Caesar. We have said this, O Paula and Eustochium, so that from the very title you may at once recognize in what age Haggai the prophet sang. And it must be known meanwhile that, according to the letter, both Haggai and Zechariah were prophets of great spirit, in that, against the edict of King Artaxerxes, and against the Samaritans and all the nations round about, who were hindering the building of the temple, they ordered the temple to be built; and that Zerubbabel too, and Joshua the son of Jehozadak, and the people who were with them, were of no less faith, in that they listened rather to the prophets who commanded than to the order of the king who forbade.

In the second year of King Darius, in the sixth month, on day one of the month, the word of the Lord came in the hand of Haggai the prophet. Because the people, who seemed to themselves to have returned from captivity, had not yet built the temple nor raised the walls of the city, nor had it the glory of the former Jerusalem, but dwelt in hollow houses, and, as it is said more expressively in Greek, κοιλοστάθμοις, that is, set low down and sunk in a valley; for that reason the word of God comes to them not under King Hezekiah, or Amon, or Josiah, who had ruled the people of God as long as Jerusalem stood, but under King Darius, prince of the Persians, of whom Daniel too speaks mystically in his volume. Now Darius sounds in our language 'generations made', or 'which have been', which in Greek is said γενεαὶ γενομέναι; and a people without a temple and dwelling low down did not deserve to have any other king than one who was a slave to generations, and loved the flesh, and kept the first sentence given to man while he was still untaught and cast out of paradise: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth. Therefore, because Darius was a lover of intercourse and a companion of the dragon, whose whole strength is in his loins, for that reason the vision is seen by the people in the second year, in an unclean number, which, after the unity of virginity and the nakedness of paradise, signifies the tunics of skin. Indeed in Genesis, although on the first day, and on the third, and on the fourth, and on the fifth, and on the sixth, after the completion of each work, it is said: And God saw that it was good, on the second it is not found according to the Hebrew, and Aquila, and Symmachus, and Theodotion. For the second day, which makes the number that divides from unity, could not be approved by the sentence of God as being good. The sixth month too is assigned, which does not have the solemnities of God, as the seventh month does, but is neighbor to the six days in which the world was made; in which there is toil, and bread is eaten in the sweat of the face; and the earth brings forth for us thistles and thorns, and when it has received a sowing of wheat, it is more fruitful in darnel and wild oats. But because the altar had already been built, and they had wished to build the temple against the enemies who resisted them, and had not built it, on day one of the sixth month the word of the Lord came in the hand of Haggai the prophet, so that the people, forsaking the second year of King Darius, which divides from unity, and the sixth month, which had passed, a number that is assigned to toil, might return to the unity of God, and follow the odd and single number, which even a pagan poet knew to be clean, saying: ... God delights in an odd number. And the word of the Lord, seeking someone to come to and to teach, comes about in the hand of Haggai the prophet, who had good works, and in whose deeds the word of God could rest. But where hands are full of blood, and Jesus is killed, and the people dare to say: His blood be upon us and upon our children, there the word of God does not come about. To this day carnal Israel, having unclean hands, stretches them out to the Lord; but because they are full of blood, the Lord speaks to them through the prophet: If you stretch out your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you; for your hands are full of blood. The word of the Lord does not come about in their hands, because they are unclean; the word of God does not come to them, because they killed the word of God in themselves. Nor is it to be thought that the word of the Lord came about only in the hand of Haggai the prophet; but because Haggai means festive, everyone who can celebrate feasts, not in the old leaven of malice and wickedness, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, can receive the word of God. Let us too have clean hands and be called ἑορτάζοντες, that is, celebrating feasts, and the word of God will come to us. Let us set before our eyes, since the law is spiritual, spiritual solemnities, of which it is written: Three times in the year you shall celebrate feasts for me. You shall keep the solemnity of unleavened bread; for seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the time of the month of new things; for in it you came out of Egypt. You shall not appear in my sight empty; and the solemnity of the harvest of the firstfruits of your works, whatever you have sown in the field; and the solemnity of the consummation at the end of the year, at the gathering of your works from the field. If we wish the word of the Lord to come to be in us, let us be Haggais, that is, celebrating feasts, and let us not appear in the sight of God empty; and sowing in the spirit, let us reap from the spirit eternal life, so that we may celebrate the solemnity of the consummation at the end of the year, that is, the gathering of our works from the field, and the solemnity of the firstfruits of our works, whatever we have sown in the field which the Lord has blessed. Let us also be Haggais, and through our whole life, until the consummation of the year, that is, until our departure from this world, let us celebrate feasts in our works, which have sprung up for us in our field. There are many things, and not for this occasion, which might be said about the solemnity, to which the diligent reader can fit a spiritual understanding from all of Scripture.

To Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the great priest, saying. We read in Chronicles that Shealtiel was the son of Jeconiah, who was led away into Babylon, and that from him Zerubbabel was born. Matthew too, enumerating the generation of the Savior, says this: And after the transmigration of Babylon, Jeconiah begot Shealtiel; and Shealtiel begot Zerubbabel; and Zerubbabel begot Abiud. This Zerubbabel, of the tribe of Judah, that is, descending from the stock of David, is a type of the Savior, who truly built the destroyed temple, that is, the Church, and led the people back from captivity. And he built the Church both from the stones of the old temple and from new ones, which had previously been unhewn; that is, he raised a tabernacle to God the Father both from the remnants of the Jewish people and from the multitude of the nations. And according to the manifold accents of the Hebrew language, the name is interpreted either ῥεῦσις παρακειμένη, that is, a flux lying near, set out, or 'born in Babylon', or 'prince from Babylon'. Contrary to the first interpretation is that flux which is signified in the name Jezebel, that is, vain flux, or the flux of a menstruous woman, which certainly sounds plainly of uncleanness. And Zebulun too is expressed as flux of the night. Leaving, then, the vain and sordid and dark flux of this world, let us follow the flux of Jesus, which is set out for us to drink, and offers itself in a most abundant fountain, according to what is said in the Gospel: Jesus stood in the temple and cried out, saying: If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. And we shall then be able to drink right here, when we have asked it of God the Father, according to what we read: Ask, and it shall be given to you. For Shealtiel means petition of God. And no one comes to Jesus unless the Father has drawn him. A flux, then, will be born to us, set out through supplication to God, and it will be of the tribe of Judah, the royal tribe, that is, and the one that confesses or praises the Lord, because Judah means both. Moreover, 'born in Babylon' is truly said of Zerubbabel according to the history, because he was born there. But according to a higher understanding too, it sounds of our Lord Jesus, because he too was born in the confusion of this world, and was near the most grievous river Chebar, and saw that great vision which Ezekiel, under his type, beholds at the beginning of his volume. But when I said that Zerubbabel is interpreted 'prince from Babylon', I did not say it because 'prince' is truly its meaning: for among the Hebrews his name is reported to be composed of three whole words: zo means 'this'; rob, 'master' or 'greater'; Babel properly sounds 'Babylonian'; and the name Zerubbabel is formed, this master from Babylon. But for brevity of understanding, in place of the minutiae given above, I chose to interpret it 'prince from Babylon', or 'in Babylon'. So that, just as Joshua son of Nun, who was himself also a type of the Savior, led the people from the wilderness into the land of promise, so this man too was born in Babylon for this purpose: to lead back those who were in Babylon into the land of promise, from which they had been carried off captive, and to say to those who were in chains: Come out, and to those who sat in darkness: Be enlightened. The word of the Lord, however, which came in the hand of Haggai, is directed not only to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, of whom we have already spoken, but also to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the great priest. As far as the history is concerned, Zerubbabel of the royal tribe is one person, and Joshua of the priestly tribe another. But as far as spiritual understanding is concerned, our Lord and Savior is one and the same, king and great priest; the type of him, according as he was king, Zerubbabel bore; but according as he was high priest, it was borne by his namesake Joshua (Jesus), which means Iao salvation, that is, salvation of the Lord; and he is the son of Jehozadak, which itself also is rendered in our language Iao just, that is, just one of the Lord. For God the Father is just and holy, and God the Son, and there is no iniquity in him. Against Marcion and the other heretics, who assert that the Lord Savior is the son of another, good God, I know not which, and not of the Creator, whom they call just. And truly Jesus is the great priest, compared with whom all the prelates of God are small and nothing. For if he is called the great priest, it is surely said to distinguish him from those who are lesser. And all who are outside him and after him are lesser, so that, just as he is the firstborn of all creation, and the firstborn from the dead, so he is the prince and the great one among all priests.

Thus says the Lord of hosts, saying: This people says: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built. Note carefully that it is not Zerubbabel or Joshua who say: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built, but the people, which, still placed under King Darius, had not yet shaken off the yoke of servitude. And always those who are held in captivity, and have gone out of Jerusalem, put off and delay building the temple of God, and say: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built. And you, when you see someone who has gone out of the Church, who had been delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit might be saved, thinking and planning to build through chastity the temple which he had before destroyed through lust, and yet putting it off from day to day, say to him: Truly you too are of the people of the captives; you too say: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built. For him who has once resolved to restore the temple of God, every time is fit for building; neither the devil as king can hinder him, nor the enemies round about, nor the feigned affection of parents, kinsmen, children. As soon as you turn and call on the name of the Lord, he too will say: Here I am.

And the word of the Lord came in the hand of Haggai the prophet, saying: Is it a time for you to dwell in panelled houses — or, as the LXX translated: Κοιλοστάθμοις, that is, hollow —, and this house deserted? On the same day as above, this vision is seen again. And as the works of the prophet advance, the gifts of prophecy also grow; and after a little silence, to what the people had said: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built, the Lord's response, as if thought over, is brought forth, and it is said to them: Is it then time for you to dwell in houses set low down and placed in a valley, and shall my house, which is on the mountain, be deserted? Or, as it stands in the Hebrew: That you should dwell in panelled houses, that is, adorned and well arranged, and which serve not so much for use as for delight; and shall my dwelling, in which were the holy of holies, and the Cherubim, and the table of the showbread, be drenched by the rains, lie squalid in desolation, be scorched by the sun? Moreover, according to anagogy: every time in which a dwelling in the valley is chosen, or we serve pleasures, is unseasonable. Hence the Stoics too, who take care to define single words, said that time is the time of correction or of accomplishment, which is said more expressively in Greek χρόνον εἶναι κατορθώσεως. For every time in which we devote ourselves not to virtues but to vices perishes, and is reckoned as nothing, as if it had not been. If, then, any of us either dwells in a valley, or panels his house in worldly pleasure and luxury, he does not build a temple to God, nor does the Lord have in him where to lay his head; and while he builds a house with the foxes, he suffers what was once the dwelling of God to be deserted.

And now thus says the Lord of hosts: Set your hearts upon your ways. Let there not be one time for speaking and another for doing; turn my precepts at once into deeds. For it is the Lord Almighty who commands, and surely the command of God Almighty is no light thing. Until now you have had hearts that served vices, without order, without a teacher, going wherever your desires dragged them. But now the Lord commands you to set charity in order toward him, and to set your hearts upon your ways, so that you do nothing without judgment and consideration, but the lamp of the law always goes before your feet, and you say: Your law is a lamp to my feet and a light to my paths. Or certainly thus: Because you say, it is not the time for building the house of the Lord, and you yourselves dwell in dwellings sunk in the depths, while my house is deserted, consider, at my command, the Lord's, and call back to your memory what you have done and what you have suffered.

Generally speaking, riches that are not under complete control are the citadels of evil. If the ordinary people look on them covetously, they will never enter the kingdom of heaven, because they are letting themselves become contaminated by the things of this world and are living above themselves in self-indulgence. Those concerned for their salvation should take this as their first principle, that, although the whole of creation is ours to use, the universe is made for the sake of self-sufficiency, which anyone can acquire by a few things. They who rejoice in the holdings in their storehouses are foolish in their greed. "He that earned wages," Scripture reminds us, "put them into a bag with holes." Such is the man who gathers and stores up his harvest, for by not sharing his wealth with anyone he becomes worse off.

And yet, for the most part, such people carefully weigh what is the amount that they give but neglect to consider how much they seize. They count it as a sort of requital but refuse to consider their sins. Let them, therefore, hear what is written: "He that has earned wages put them into a bag with holes." When a bag has holes, the money is indeed seen when it is put in, but it is not seen when it is being lost. They, then, who keep an eye on how much they give, but not on how much they steal, put their wages into a bag with holes because, while piling up [riches], they look to them in the hope that they will be secure but lose them when they are not looking.

You have sown much, and brought in little; you have eaten, and have not been satisfied; you have drunk, and have not been inebriated; you have covered yourselves, and have not been warmed. And he who gathered wages put them into a bag with holes. All your labor, you who built your own houses and neglected the house of God, has had no result. For you sowed more, and gathered much less than had been sown; nor can you say that famine followed because the farmer ceased from working the land. You ate too, lest perhaps any of you should say that the fast had been voluntary; and you were not filled, because you had gathered small fruits into your barns. You drank wine from the vineyards, but not so much that your heart was gladdened and it could be said of you: And wine gladdens the heart of man. You had a cloak, but one that would neither keep off the cold nor keep in the warmth. Whoever of you, too, gathered wages, whether by trade or by hired hand, spent his labor in vain, without the price of the labor. For all the money flowed away, as if someone were putting it into a bag with holes. But according to spiritual understanding too, those who have returned from Babylon and have not yet built the temple of God, but, putting off its building from day to day, have said: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built, are neither captives nor yet endowed with full freedom, but are placed as it were in a kind of middle ground: they have sown much, and brought in little; they have eaten, and have not been satisfied; they have drunk, and have not been inebriated; they have covered themselves, and have not been warmed; they have gathered wages, and have lost them, as if they were putting them into a purse with holes. If you ever see someone, among many works of sin, doing some things that are just, God is not so unjust as to forget a few good deeds on account of many evils; but he will make him reap only those things which he has sown in good earth, and gather them into his barns. But whoever is wholly an ἀποστάτης (apostate) will not eat at all, but will perish of hunger. Moreover, he who sows much and brings in little eats little, and not to satiety, according to what the Lord threatens among the curses of Leviticus: And you shall eat and shall not be filled. But he who is holy will eat to satiety, and in him will be fulfilled what is written: The just man, eating, fills his soul. Likewise, whoever does not drink at all will perish of thirst; as also in Judith, if one is willing to accept the woman's book: And the little ones perished of thirst. But he who drinks little does indeed drink, but not to inebriation. Moreover, there is he who can say to the Lord: Your cup that inebriates, how glorious it is. And he is inebriated with Noah; and although placed in Egypt, yet at the banquet of Joseph, with the patriarchs and brothers, he is drenched with wine.

This man, for the greatness of his joy and his daily gladness, transported with the apostles into ecstasy, will be called full of new wine. But how the fact that the sons of Jonadab son of Rechab did not drink wine, and are praised by the Lord, is not contrary to this exposition will be discussed more fittingly in Jeremiah. After this it is said to those who neglected to build the temple of the Lord: You have covered yourselves, and have not been warmed. This we understand from Psalm 103 (104), in which it is said of God: The abyss, like a garment, is his clothing. For although according to the Hebrew truth it is referred to the lands, which are encircled by the Ocean, yet according to the LXX translators, who said Τὸ περιβόλαιον αὐτοῦ (his garment), in the masculine gender, and not αὐτῆς (her), in the feminine, we are compelled to understand what was said of God, because his wisdom is unsearchable, and the Lord makes darkness his hiding place, and his mysteries are not betrayed to any who are unworthy. Hence the just man too rejoices and says: In my heart I have hidden your words, that I may not sin against you. This cloak, woven of the senses and words of manifold wisdom, does not allow those who are fervent in spirit to grow cold, nor the warmth of love to freeze when the north wind blows. But he who is in the middle has a cloak indeed, but one with which he is not wholly covered; just as he carried little into the barns, and eats, but not to satiety, and drinks, but not to inebriation, so he will indeed be covered with the cloak of his senses and works, but will not be warmed. But he who, because of the excessive poverty of his soul, has no cloak, has none for this reason: because iniquity has multiplied, charity has grown cold in him. Hence also concerning a man of this kind, whose cloak is held by another, it is commanded in the law: You shall give his garment back to him before the sun sets, since he is poor and has his hope in it. And this too befell those who dwelt in valleys, or in panelled houses, and said: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built: that they gathered wages into a bag with holes. If any of us does good works, worthy also of a wage — which the Lord will render to us, of whom it is said: Behold the Lord, and his wage is in his hands, to render to each according to his works, and that other saying of the Apostle: If anyone's work which he has built upon remains, he will receive a wage —, he gathers wages to be kept and to endure, and, always joining virtues to virtues, heaps up money in a bag without holes. But he who after good works sins not once or twice but frequently, and darkens and soils his past charity with the vices that follow, gathers money into a bag with holes. And all these things befell those who said: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built, and who, while they themselves dwelt in valleys, suffered the house of the Lord to be deserted.

Thus the priestly ministry is a trade. Hence the prophet says to the children of Israel, "Your innkeepers mix water with their wine." For holy Isaiah is not speaking about the innkeepers who, in the course of their publican ministrations, deceptively mix pure wine with a measure of water. It could hardly be a matter of concern to the blessed man, as if he were a civil judge, that people would dilute tavern vessels to make a less inebriating drink. He is speaking rather about the innkeepers who reside not over taverns but churches. They offer thirsty people a goblet not of wanton desire but of virtue. They do not minister the cup of drunkenness but the Savior's cup. Those innkeepers he censures and rebukes, and he complains that they mix water with wine. This he blames in them—that although they are set over divine functions, they have become followers after human things, as the prophet himself says: "Each of you follows his own house." For if any priest has abandoned the priestly office and delights in worldly pleasures, he mixes water with wine; that is to say, he mingles vile and cold things with holy and warm things.

Thus says the Lord of hosts: Set your hearts upon your ways; go up into the mountain, bring wood, and build the house; and it shall be acceptable to me, and I shall be glorified, says the Lord. LXX: Thus says the Lord Almighty: Set your hearts on your ways; go up upon the mountain and cut down wood. The rest likewise. Again I, the Lord, command you, I who had also ordered it before, that you set your hearts upon your ways, and consider all that you do, and, leaving off your zeal for your own lowly houses, go up into the mountain, where there is not wood to be burned, but wood that serves for the works of my house; and so that you may do this more attentively, know that what you are doing will please me. The Hebrews say that only wood for roofing was needed, since the walls of the temple were left standing after the fire. So they say. But we are commanded not to set our hearts outside our ways, but to set again in our ways the hearts we had set before; and after we have done this, to go up from the hollow houses up the mountain, so that when we have come to the height of the mountain, in which is the wood needed for building the temple of God, from the whole mountain of holy Scripture, in which the various trees of the virtues and of paradise are planted, we may cut them down, and build the temple of the Lord with good works and the doctrines of truth; and when it has been built, may it please the Lord, and may he be glorified in it. Therefore, since these things have been commanded us, that we set our hearts in our ways, let us go up the rational mountain, and, seeking for each problem the fitting wood from the testimonies of the Scriptures, let us cut it down and build the house of wisdom in ourselves; for after this has been built, the end of its building will be that the Lord be glorified in us.

Neither does he build a sepulchre for himself who dies before the time, for "he is dead while he liveth;" and he hears not the voice of Haggai, that is being interpreted, of the Feaster, for he enters not the Tabernacle of God, "in the voice of praise and thanksgiving, the sound of one feasting." For how can he hear His voice, who sees not His works? If he saw them, he would have heard the Word which has been put in His Hand, rejoicing in His acts, whereby "He knocked and it was opened to Him," and He descended into his soul that He might feed therein upon the food of sincerity and truth. Now because he has not heard, the word of Haggai comes again to hand, and says, Rise up from your "cieled houses" that are weighed down by wickedness, and "go up to the mountain" of the heavenly Scriptures, and "hew wood," the wood of wisdom, the wood of life, the wood of knowledge; and make straight your ways, direct your acts that they may keep their due order which is useful and necessary for building the house of God.

I believe, brothers, that you remarked and committed to memory the title of this psalm. "The conversion," he said, "of Haggai and Zechariah." These prophets were not as yet in existence when these verses were sung.… But both, the one within the year after the other, began to prophesy that which seemed to pertain to the restoration of the temple, as was foretold so long before. … "For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are." Whoever therefore converted himself to the work of this building together, and to the hope of a firm and holy edifice, like a living stone from the miserable ruin of this world, understands the title of the psalm, understands "the conversion of Haggai and Zechariah." Let him therefore chant the following verses, not so much with the voice of his tongue as of his life. For the completion of the building will be that ineffable peace of wisdom, the "beginning" of which is the "fear of the Lord." Let him therefore, whom this conversion builds together, begin there.

You looked to more, and behold, it became less; and you brought it into the house, and I blew it away. LXX: You looked to many things, and they became few, and you brought them into the house, and I blew them away. So that, casting aside delay and laying down all hesitation, you may build my house more zealously, I tell you also another thing that has befallen you, who put off building my house: not as above, You have sown much, and because the earth did not return the seed, you have brought in little; but when the crops were already whitening, and the time of harvest was at hand, and you thought you held the grain in your hands, you reaped empty stalks and gathered hollow straw without the fruit of the ears. The threshing floors were full: hope in the eyes, grief in the hands. But even this very thing which had scarcely been picked out of the great crop and the countless heaps, you brought into the house, and it was scattered by my power. For I blew it away and reduced it to nothing, because the dead grain and the empty husks had not the flour and the fine flour which are useful for eating. Now what he said, You brought it into the house, and I blew it away, can also be taken of the gifts which they offered on the altar, and that God blew them away. But since he said, you brought it into the house, if we understand the things brought in as gifts, we are certainly saying that they were offered in the temple. And that will not fit our case, because at that time the house of God had not yet been built. This indeed happens to very many even to this day, who dwell in lowly buildings and, as far as in them lies, despise the desolate house of God, and though they could build it, disdain to; and as if already seeing ripe crops, they promise themselves the fruits of their works, and, when hope deceives them, instead of great things they scarcely find small ones. But even these small things, which they had stored in the house and granary of the mind, are blown away by the word of God, as unworthy of his keeping and protection. How often have I myself seen very much hoped for from certain men, both in doctrine and in way of life; and after it came to the point that they had their time of harvest, that is, the time of teaching and of offering their life as an example to the peoples, I have seen them cast down from on high, and less found in them than the opinion of all had promised itself. Whence it happened that little by little, as negligence crept in, they lost even the very little that they seemed to have. And they suffered this for the reason that they were secure in their former houses, and did not go up the mountain of the Scriptures, cutting from it the wood for the Lord's building, nor did they build up the house of the Lord in themselves daily, but, despising its desolation, they lost even what they believed they had. For this is the cause given for the aforesaid evil.

For which cause, says the Lord of hosts, because my house is deserted, and you hasten each one into his own house.

He intends by this to remind them of what they have suffered by neglecting the temple. When you overlooked my house lying in ruins and took an interest in rebuilding your own houses, he is saying, then the rain stopped, the land did not yield its crops, and I destroyed all the crops on the ground as though with a sword, striking many times both people and cattle, and in short ruining the fruit of your labors. In fact, to this exhortation to climb up, cut wood, bring it and give thought to rebuilding, he added these things to cause them fear by the reminder of what had happened lest they receive the command listlessly.

Now the God of all made these threats on account of the neglect of the divine house, though not for any need of it: the Maker of all things has no need even of heaven, creating everything out of lovingkindness alone. Rather, it was in his care for them all and his interest in their salvation that he ordered the rebuilding of the temple so that they might observe the law in it and reap the benefit, wanting as he did worship according to the law to be performed until the coming of the heir, according to the divine apostle. After the incarnation of our Savior, you see, when the new covenant was revealed, the old came to an end, and the law, which as a tutor had given us a glimpse of the teacher of great wisdom, yielded pride of place, since those tutored by it had no further need of the basic elements.

Because of this, over you the heavens were forbidden to give dew, and the earth held back its growth. Not only, he says, did the heavens not give rain, by which the watered soil produces crops, but not even the morning and the night dew, so that the parched fields might at least be tempered by a little moisture. The earth too devoured, and, not meaning to return the seed to the farmers, held back in its greedy bosom even what it is accustomed to produce of its own accord. I think that this is the dew of which it is said to Jacob in the blessing: May God give you of the dew of heaven; and the dew of Hermon which descends upon Mount Zion, and descends not from the air, in which flits a manifold number of eagles and hawks and vultures, but from heaven, so that if anyone's soul burns with passions and has been wounded by the dart of the devil, it may be cooled by this dew and temper its heats. When this is withheld, the earth also does not bring forth its growth. For no soul can bring forth grain without the dew of Christ.

And I called a drought upon the earth, and upon the mountains, and upon the wheat, and upon the wine and upon the oil; and whatever the ground brings forth, and upon men and upon beasts, and upon all the labor of hands. For drought the Seventy translated μάχαιραν, that is, sword; but in the Hebrew too I found it written with three letters, heth, res, beth, which, if we read harseb, means sword; if oreb, καύσωμα, which we have translated drought, although it could better be translated burning wind. And indeed, since the discourse is about the earth and about the barrenness of the fields, it seems to me that burning wind ought rather to be understood in the present place than sword, although every plague that is brought upon men for their sins can also be taken for a sword. Now a drought, or a sword, was called upon the earth and upon the mountains, so that they should not bring forth wheat, and wine and oil, and whatever the ground produces of its own accord. And with famine going before, death consequently comes upon men and upon beasts. And the same sword or burning wind consumes all that the hands of men have labored on. Therefore the word of God, living and effective and sharper than any two-edged sword, is called or brought in, so that the negligent soul, which is interpreted as parched earth, and which desires rather to dwell in hollow places than to build the house of God, may be struck by its point, and may lose whatever fruits it thinks it has. The sword is brought also upon the mountains that lift themselves up against the knowledge of God, and upon the grain and the wine and the oil, with which, as with food and drink and refreshment, the conventicles of the heretics flatter the deceived peoples. One might fittingly say that their bread is the bread of mourning, and that their wine is the fury of dragons and the incurable fury of asps. Their oil too is the promise of heavenly things, with which they as it were anoint their disciples and promise them rewards for their labors, which the prophet detests, saying: But let not the oil of the sinner fatten my head. But also the other things which, without the authority and testimonies of the Scriptures, they find and invent of their own accord, as if by apostolic tradition, the sword of God strikes; and men and beasts we may take either as λογισμοὺς and αἰσθήσεις, that is, their thoughts and their senses, or at any rate as the rational and the irrational among them, that is, the learned and the unlearned alike; and all the labor of hands as their fasts, and their various observances, and chameunias, that is, sleeping on the ground. Those who fast three Lents a year, and humble their soul with ξηροφαγίαις (dry-food fasts), and above all spring from the root of Tatian, hear concerning labors of this kind: You have suffered so much without cause. Now all these things that I have said can be understood of the rulers of the Church, who, building a carnal house and providing for their children and their possessions, do not care either to build up the temple of God in themselves or to restore the Church of the Lord, which is unroofed and demolished; their life and incongruous speech often scandalize very many and cast them out of the Church, and bring the house of God to desolation. Nor do we say this in order to accuse all in general, but because in every office and rank there are some who build and others who destroy the temple of God, and because of their vice neither do the heavens give dew nor the earth its growth; the ground is dried up, the mountains are parched, the wheat and the oil, and all that the earth brings forth, the men themselves too and the beasts, and all the labor of hands perish under the cutting sword, and by drought, or burning wind.

And Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and Joshua son of Jehozadak, the great priest, and all the remnant of the people heard the voice of their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God sent him to them, and the people feared before the face of the Lord. Attend carefully (because of the two understandings of the Savior in Zerubbabel the governor and Joshua the priest, for he himself is both king and priest) to this: that he did not say, Zerubbabel and Joshua feared; but when Zerubbabel and Joshua and the people heard the words of Haggai the prophet, which are the words of the Lord, the people alone feared before the face of the Lord, that is, the multitude alone, which had not yet come into one and perfect man, and which, not joined to the spirit, did not merit to be what the spirit is. But the people feared before the face of the Lord, knowing that the face of the Lord is upon those who do evil, to destroy their memory from the earth.

And Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, from among the messengers of the Lord, spoke to the people, saying: I am with you, says the Lord. Some think that John the Baptist, and Malachi, which means angel of the Lord, and Haggai, whom we now have in hand, were angels, and that by the dispensation and command of God they took on human bodies and lived among men. Nor is it surprising that this should be believed of angels, since for our salvation even the Son of God took on a human body; and for this reason they also offer testimony from the apocrypha, where it is said that Jacob, who was afterwards called Israel, was an angel, and that for this reason he supplanted his brother in his mother's womb; also that John, at the voice of Mary, the mother of the Lord, leapt for joy in the womb of Elizabeth; and that all rational beings have one nature, and that for this reason men who have pleased God become equal to the angels. Let them think so. But as for us, let us take the messenger of the Lord, that is, the angel, which in Hebrew is called Malach, to be called simply a prophet from the fact that he announced the Lord's will to the people; or else, since in many places our Lord and Savior is called the angel of God, as in that place: Angel of great counsel; we say that a type of the Savior went before in Haggai. Moreover, what he says: The messenger of the Lord, from among the messengers of the Lord, is as if he had said: a prophet from among the prophets. What he says: The messenger of the Lord to the people, saying: I am with you, says the Lord, is not spoken to Zerubbabel and Joshua, with whom and in whom the Lord always was — for we have said once for all that, according to different understandings, they are taken in the person of the Savior —, but to the people, which had feared before the face of the Lord. And they, because they were the people, had not yet come to the love of God, which casts out fear. The people, therefore, receives as the reward for the fear of God that the Lord should be with them; and the sense is: I will be your helper; build my house, which has been destroyed in you; with me set in your midst, no one will be able to hinder your building.

In the whole sequence of Scripture, at any one time they are said to be men and at another time angels. But the one who thinks this will say that just as there are angels among those who are admittedly men, as Zechariah, who says, "I am with you as an angel of God, says the Lord almighty," and John, of whom it has been written, "Behold, I send my angel before your face," so also the angels of God, when they are called "men," are called this because of their work and not because of their nature.

And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua son of Jehozadak, the great priest, and the spirit of the rest of all the people; and they went in and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts, their God. On the twenty-fourth day of the month, in the sixth month, in the second year of King Darius. For governor of Judah the Seventy translated, of the tribe of Judah, and for work, works; the rest likewise. But wherever we put: the Lord of hosts, they variously render either the Lord Almighty, or the Lord Sabaoth, or the Lord of powers. So the spirit of Zerubbabel is stirred up, and the spirit of Joshua, for the present according to the letter, so that the kingdom and the priesthood may build the temple of God. The spirit of the people is stirred up too, which before was sleeping in them: not the body, not the soul, but, as we have said, the spirit, which knows better how to build the temple of God. And they went in, for they had been outside, and did works, such as were worthy of the inner chambers of the house of the Lord; in the same year of King Darius as above, in the month that was also set down at the beginning, but not on the same day. For there the first day of the month is set down, but here the twenty-fourth, so that between the first day, on which the Lord speaks through Haggai, and the twenty-fourth, on which they went in and did work in the house of the Lord, there were twenty-two days in between, as many as the letters among the Hebrews. For they needed to be taught what the elements of the beginning of the words of God were, which would keep them from saying: The time has not yet come for the house of the Lord to be built, and from living in hollow houses and, as I said above, being sunk into the depths. But they were to be roused to set their hearts upon their ways, and to remember how much they had suffered through negligence. And they were to go up into the mountain, and cut wood, and build the house of the Lord, and not suffer the things they had suffered before. Finally, in these twenty-two days the people feared before the face of the Lord, and they went in on the twenty-fourth day of the month, in the sixth month, in the second year of King Darius, and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts, their God. But we are commanded, so that a spiritual house may be built into a holy priesthood, for offering spiritual sacrifices pleasing to God, to show ourselves such that the Holy Spirit may be stirred up in us, and that we may go into the house of the Lord and do the works of the Lord. For Zerubbabel of the line of David and Joshua, priest for ever, has already been raised up by the Father in power, according to the spirit of sanctification, from the resurrection of the dead, so that he may preside over the work; and let us do it, with him helping and directing. Yet we cannot do these works of God unless we first fear before the face of the Lord, and believe, and go into the temple of God, and accomplish the things that are worthy of the house of God. But since we are still in the world, and the time of our building falls under King Darius, in which generation, marriage and the flesh are served, for this reason, in the sixth number, in which the world was made, and in the second year, which divides unity — for the matter in which the restoration of the world and of offspring consists loves the double number —, we go into the house of the Lord, and with both peoples gathered together we build the temple of God. For from two twelves the sum of the number twenty-four is made up, because the Church of Christ, the first, which had been overthrown, was built from the circumcision as well as from the Gentiles. But we can also say this: since the number eight, which is holy and is taken as a type of the true circumcision, when tripled makes the number twenty-four, we are taught figuratively to build the house of the Lord in the cutting off of the flesh and the circumcision of vices, and to believe that true purity is in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, another has reckoned the number as four six times, and refers the four to the elements of the world, of which we consist, and the six to the creation of the world, in which those very elements are found. And he says: since we are still in matter, and are surrounded by a heavy body, and serve generations, we do indeed build the temple, and enter the house of God, and our spirit is stirred up as if from a heavy sleep, but we still do this very thing on the twenty-fourth day.