Haggai 2:8-9
splendor <03519> [glory.]
declares <05002 0559> [saith.]
Whoever compares the description of the temple of Solomon, in the first book of Kings, with the most splendid accounts of the second temple, however adorned with costly stones and other magnificent decorations in after ages, must perceive that the former, being wholly overlaid with pure gold, was incomparably more glorious than the latter in its greatest magnificence; and the Jews themselves allow that the ark of the covenant, fire from heaven, the {Urim} and {Thummim,} the anointing oil, the {Shechinah,} or visible glory, and the spirit of prophecy, which distinguished the former temple, were wanting in this. In nothing, in fact, could the second temple excel the first in glory, except in the personal presence of "the Desire of all nations," He who is "the glory of the Lord," and the true temple, "in whom dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily," and who was the true {Shechinah,} of which that of Solomon's temple was merely a type. And if it be admitted that the presence of the promised Messiah was intended, then it will follow that "Jesus of Nazareth" was He; for the second temple, in which as the "Prince of peace" he preached peace and reconciliation with God, has been utterly destroyed for upwards of seventeen hundred years.
give <05414> [give.]
