Hagai 1:9

1:9 ‘You expected a large harvest, but instead ¹  there was little, and when you brought it home it disappeared right away. ²  Why?’ asks the Lord who rules over all. ‘Because my temple remains in ruins, thanks to each of you favoring his own house! ³ 

Hagai 2:18

2:18 ‘Think carefully about the past: ⁴  from today, the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, ⁵  to the day work on the temple of the Lord was resumed, ⁶  think about it. ⁷ 

¹ tn Heb “look!” (הִנֵּה, hinneh). The term, an interjection, draws attention to the point being made.

² tn Heb “I blew it away” (so NRSV, TEV, NLT). The imagery here suggests that human achievements are so fragile and temporal that a mere breath from God can destroy them (see Ezek 22:20, 21; and Isa 40:7 with נָשַׁב, nashav).

³ tn Heb “and each of you runs to his own house”; NIV “is busy with”; TEV “is busy working on”; NCV “work hard for.”

⁴ tn Heb “set your heart.” A similar expression occurs in v. 15.

⁵ sn The twenty-fourth day of the ninth month was Kislev 24 or December 18, 520. See v. 10. Here the reference is to “today,” the day the oracle is being delivered.

⁶ sn The day work…was resumed. This does not refer to the initial founding of the Jerusalem temple in 536 b.c. but to the renewal of construction three months earlier (see 1:15). This is clear from the situation described in v. 19 which accords with the food scarcities of that time already detailed in Hag 1:10-11.

⁷ tn Heb “set your heart.” A similar expression occurs in v. 15 and at the beginning of this verse.