2:14 Then Haggai responded, “‘The people of this nation are unclean in my sight,’ 7 says the Lord. ‘And so is all their effort; everything they offer is also unclean. 8 2:15 Now therefore reflect carefully on the recent past, 9 before one stone was laid on another in the Lord’s temple. 10 2:16 From that time 11 when one came expecting a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten; when one came to the wine vat to draw out fifty measures from it, there were only twenty. 2:17 I struck all the products of your labor 12 with blight, disease, and hail, and yet you brought nothing to me,’ 13 says the Lord.
2:1 On the twenty-first day of the seventh month, 14 the Lord spoke again through the prophet Haggai: 15
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 The Hebrew text has “over you” (so KJV), but this is redundant in contemporary English and has been left untranslated.
5 sn This linkage of human sin to natural disaster is reminiscent of the curse brought upon the earth by Adam’s disobedience (Gen 3:17-19; see Rom 8:20-22).
6 tn Heb “all the labor of hands” (similar KJV, NASB, NIV); cf. NAB “all that is produced by hand.”
7 tn Heb “so this people, and so this nation before me.” In this context “people” and “nation” refer to the same set of individuals; the repetition is emphatic. Cf. CEV “this entire nation.”
8 sn The point here is that the Jews cannot be made holy by unholy fellowship with their pagan neighbors; instead, they and their worship will become corrupted by such associations.
9 tn Heb “and now set your heart from this day and upward.” The juxtaposition of מָעְלָה (ma’lah, “upward”) with the following מִטֶּרֶם (mitterem, “before”) demands a look to the past. Cf. ASV “consider from this day and backward.”
10 sn Before one stone was laid on another in the
11 tn Heb “from their being,” idiomatic for “from the time they were then,” or “since the time.” Cf. KJV “Since those days were.”
12 tn Heb “you, all the work of your hands”; NRSV “you and all the products of your toil”; NIV “all the work of your hands.”
13 tn Heb “and there was not with you.” The context favors the idea that the harvests were so poor that the people took care of only themselves, leaving no offering for the
14 tn Heb “In the seventh [month], on the twenty-first day of the month.”
15 tc Heb “the word of the
16 tn For the translation of χαριζόμενοι (carizomenoi) as “forgiving,” see BDAG 1078 s.v. χαρίζομαι 3. The two participles “bearing” (ἀνεχόμενοι, anecomenoi) and “forgiving” (χαριζόμενοι) express the means by which the action of the finite verb “clothe yourselves” is to be carried out.
17 tn Grk “if someone has”; the term “happens,” though not in the Greek text, is inserted to bring out the force of the third class condition.
18 tn The expression “forgive others” is not in the Greek text, but is implied. It is included in the translation to make the sentence complete and more comprehensible to the English reader.
19 tn BDAG 365 s.v. ἐπί 7 suggests “to all these” as a translation for ἐπὶ πᾶσιν δὲ τούτοις (epi pasin de toutoi").
20 tn The term “virtues” is not in the Greek text, but is included in the translation to specify the antecedent and to make clear the sense of the pronoun “these.”
21 tn The verb “add,” though not in the Greek text, is implied, picking up the initial imperative “clothe yourselves.”
22 tn The genitive τῆς τελειότητος (th" teleiothto") has been translated as an attributive genitive, “the perfect bond.”
23 tn Grk “in one body.” This phrase emphasizes the manner in which the believers were called, not the goal of their calling, and focuses upon their unity.