Haggai

Chapter 1

Ver. 1. In the second year of Darius the king] Not of Darius the Mede, as Genebrard noteth, for he was predecessor to Cyrus, #Da 5:31, and Haggai prophesied after Cyrus and Cambyses, #Ezr 4:5 5:1, neither of Darius Nothus, as Scaliger in his book, De Emend. Temporum (the doctrine whereof is almost wholly fictitious, saith one, and founded upon the confines of nothing); but of Darius son of Hystaspes, who succeeded Cambyses in the kingdom of Persia; being chosen king by the peers, upon the neighing of his horse first, as Herodotus testifieth. Whether this Darius was the husband of Queen Esther, as some affirm, or her son, as others (and was therefore so favourable to the Jews), I undertake not to determine; only take notice, that by heathen historians it is said, that the wife of this Darius was called Atossa, which sounds in part somewhat like Hadassah, that is, Esther, #Es 2:7. Hadassah was her own Hebrew name; and after she was made queen she was called Esther. He is called Darius the king, as if he were the only king on earth. His successor, Darius, in his proud embassy to Alexander, called himself the king of kings and cousin of the gods; and for Alexander, he called him his servant; but Alexander soon after became his lord: for the kingdom of Persia was lost by that Darius, as it had been restored by this to its former splendour, after the havoc made by Cambyses (παλιν επι Δαρειου σχεδον εσωθη); who among other vile acts of his (as "wickedness proceedeth from the wicked, according to the proverb of the ancients," #1Sa 24:18), forbade the building of the temple, #Ezr 4:22. But he who sets up princes at his pleasure, and turns their hearts whithersoever he will, #Pr 21:1 (as the ploughman doth the watercourse with his paddle, or the gardener with his hand), turned here the heart of this great king to his people the Jews; so that he made a new decree for the advancement of the building, #Ezr 5:8. God also seasonably stirred up Haggai and Zechariah to quicken the people (who were soon after their return from Babylon grown cold again and careless), and so blessed their ministry, that the house, that is, the sanctuary, and the holy of holies, was finished in four years’ time, or thereabouts, #Ezr 6:14. The outward court, and so the whole temple, in three years after that, as Josephus witnesseth.

In the sixth month] In the 3484th year of the world, as Ussher computeth it, on the first of September, {confer #Hag 2:19} when the Jews were ingathering their harvest and fruits, and found a dearth toward. This the prophet makes use of, pressing it upon the people as a just hand of God upon them, for slighting and slacking the rebuilding of his house. It is good for God’s ministers to set in with him, to strike while the iron is hot, to cry, "Hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it," #Mic 6:9; for as iron is very soft and malleable while in the fire; and as molten metals are fit for the mould; so when men are under the cross they are more easily wrought upon; they will hearken to instruction, that before laughed at it, as the wild ass doth at the horse and his rider, #Job 39:18. The wild ass, that is used to the wilderness, though she kick up her heels, and snuff up the wind at her pleasure, so that they that seek her will not weary themselves, yet there is a time when she may be taken; in her month they shall find her, #Jer 2:24.

In the first day of the month] Heb. In one day. One for first is ordinary in both Testaments, #Ge 1:5 Nu 29:1 Da 9:1 Mt 28:1 Joh 20:1 1Co 16:2. The time of this prophecy (as of others, #Isa 1:1 Jer 1:2,3, &c.) is precisely noted, to teach us what account we should make of God’s oracles and inspirations; and how God will one day reckon with us for the helps we have had and the time we have enjoyed them. He sets down all: how much more should we, and live up to our means and mercies, propagating our thankfulness into our practice! Jeremiah prophesied forty years, but with ill success; it was his unhappiness to be physician to a dying state, Tunc etiam, docta plus valet arte malum. The Holy Ghost sets a special mark upon these forty years of his prophesying, #Eze 4:6, by bidding the prophet lie forty days upon his right side, and bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days, a day for a year.

Came the word of the Lord] i.e. He began to prophesy, as #Ezr 5:1, being sent and set to work by God, whose alone it is to make fit ministers of either Testaments, #2Co 3:5, to send, gift, and bless them, #Jer 23:21. Prophetarum ora sunt Dei os The mouths of the prophets are the mouth of God. (Chrysost.).

By Haggai the prophet] Heb. by the hand of Haggai, that is, by his means and ministry. {See Trapp on "Mal 1:1"} Haggai signifieth merry and pleasant ( Festivus et laetus), as at a solemn feast; which name of his excellence suited both with the time of his prophecy, viz. after the return from captivity, see #Ps 126:1,2, and also with the matter whereof he treats and whereto he drives, Christ, the Desire of all nations, #Hag 2:7 Wilt thou be merry at any time? saith Seneca, think on Caesar: canst thou be sad and he be in health? How much more cause have we to be merry in the Lord Christ! Let us keep the feast with all solemnity; let us keep holy day (εορταζωμεν), since Christ our passover is sacrificed for us, #1Co 5:7,8. Let this swallow up all our discontents, and crown the calendar of our lives with continual festivals; let the ransomed of the Lord return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, &c., #Isa 35:10. The Septuagint ascribe certain of the Psalms to Haggai and Zechariah, in the titles they prefix; though some think that the Hallelujah Psalms (as they are called, because they begin and end with Hallelujah, or, Praise ye the Lord) were sung by the Jews, returning out of Babylon; those two prophets beginning the tune, or giving the verse (as they call it). And hereunto the prophet Jeremiah might have an eye, #Jer 31:12 "Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together, to the goodness of the Lord," &c.

Unto Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel] Philo saith he was also called Barachias; others Pedaiah, out of #1Ch 3:19. He is called Sheshbazzar, #Ezr 1:8. His name, Zerubbabel, signifieth either, Born in Babel, or, Far from confusion. A prince (of all men) should observe order, and keep the peace. By the laws of England a nobleman cannot be bound to the peace; because it is supposed that the peace is always bound to him, and that of his own accord he will be careful to keep others in good order. But what a regnum Cyclopicum was at Rome in Nero’s days, Quando poterat quisque ea quam cuperet potiri, negare licebat nemini? Turn servus cum Domina, praesente Domino suo, et gladiator cum virgine nobili inspectante patre rem habuit (Dio in Vit. Neron). Blessed be God for better times.

Governor of Judah] Or duke, captain, provincial, president. The many headed multitude hath need of a guide, who may be αθορυβος και φρονιμος, peaceable and prudent (saith Plato), to keep and care for the welfare of his subjects. Such a one was Zerubbabel, Nobilis genere, nobilior sanctitate, Noble by birth, but more noble by his piety; drained from the dregs and sifted from the brans of the baser sort of people. In the seventeenth year of his age he led back part of the people from Babylon to Jerusalem, where he continued governor for the time of 58 years, saith Gryaenus. Those that make Darius in the text to be Darius Nothus must needs allow him a much longer life and government; which God, say they, granteth to some because he hath something to be done by them. The change of states may here also be remarked. This people was first governed by judges, or captains; then by kings, and now by captains again. So the principality of Edom, as it began with dukes, and rose to kings, so it returned to dukes again, after the death of Hadad, in Moses’ time, #1Ch 1:51 Ge 36:43. Adeo nihil est in vita firmum aut stabile (ασταθμητον του βιου). Truly, nothing in life is fixed and secure. So uncertain are all things.

And to Joshua the son of Josedech] A brand plucked out of the fire, #Zec 3:2, and therefore the fitter for such a preferment, ut in alto positus non altum sapiat (Bernard). David came not to the kingdom till his soul was even as a weaned child, #Ps 131:2. Queen Elizabeth swam to her crown through a sea of sorrows. Matthias, King of Hungary, was taken from the prison to the throne. But to the business: Joshua, the high priest, was a type of Christ in regard, 1. Of his name, which signifieth a Saviour. 2. Of his office of high priesthood. 3. Of his partnership with Zerubbabel, in bringing the people home to their own country. The Lord Christ is both our Prince of life and our merciful and faithful High Priest, ever living to make request for us, #Ac 2:15 Heb 4:14-16 7:24-28

The high priest, saying] Zerubbabel and Jehoshua were the chieftains of the people; and though not themselves in fault, or, at least, nothing so much (for they were both very religious), yet they were not so forward and forth putting as they should have been in so excellent a work. Howsoever, if the task be not done, the taskmasters are beaten, #Ex 5:14. It is the misery of those that are trusted with authority that their inferiors’ faults are beaten upon their backs. If the people gather manna on the Lord’s sabbath Moses and Aaron shall hear, "How long refuse ye to keep. my commandments?" #Ex 16:28. It is Mr Calvin’s opinion that Haggai, therefore, addressed himself to these two principal persons; to the end that they might join their forces with him, in reprehending and exciting the people to the Lord’s work. When the word and the sword go together there is great likelihood of much good to be done. Upon the sword of Charles the Great was written Utriusque tabulae custos. Guard of both tables of the law. And Queen Elizabeth riding progress once in Suffolk, said, that now she saw the reason why that county was so well governed, for she observed that all the justices coming to meet her had every one his minister next to his person.

Ver. 2. Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying] This title is oft used in these three last prophecies (eighteen different times in that eighth of Zechariah) because, being to build, they had many enemies; therefore had need of all encouragement. And Jerome, in his prologue, noteth it as an act of great courage in Haggai and Zechariah that, against the edict of King Artaxerxes (or Cambyses) and the oppositions of Sanballat, and other potent adversaries, they should stir up the people to build the temple; and as an act of heroic faith in the prince, priest, and people, to set upon the work, and finish it, "Not by might, nor by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord of hosts," #Zec 4:6. See more of this title. {See Trapp on "Mal 3:17"} Doct. 1.

This people say] Words then have their weight; neither are men’s tongues their own; but there is a Lord over them, {#Ps 12:4} that will call them to a strict account of all their waste words, #Mt 12:36, and hard speeches, #Jude 15, and then they shal1 experiment that by their words (which they haply held but wind) they shall be justified, and by their words condemned, #Mt 12:37. How good is it, therefore, to carry a pair of balances between the lips? Nescit poenitenda loqui qui proferenda prius suo tradidit examini, saith Cassiodore; He that weighs his words before he utters them shall prevent an after reckoning for them.

The time is not come, the time, &c.] He repeateth their frivolous and frigid excuses in their own very words; that he may the better confute them, and the sooner bring them to a sight of their sin, Usus est μιμησει ut rei indignitatem amplificaret. Sin and shifting came into the word together, #Ge 3:12. And this is still the vile poison of our hearts, that they will needs be naught, and yet never yield, but that there is reason to be made, and great sense in sinning. These Jews, likely, had both Scripture and reason to plead for their backwardness (as there is no wool so coarse but will take some colour; and the sluggard is wiser in his own eye than seven men that can render a reason, #Pr 26:16). For Scripture: To everything there is an appointed time, a set season, such as we can neither alter nor order, #Ec 3:1 Hag 1:3 "There is a time to break down, and a time to build up." And that this time to rebuild the temple was not yet come, some might pretend that the seventy years foretold were not yet fully expired; others (with more show of reason) that they had been too hasty in laying the foundation long since, as appears by their ill success and many adversaries; that God, who had dwelt so long in a tabernacle, and was now worshipped at his newly created altar, would bear with them, if they first built their own houses, and then be more free to build his house, which they intended to do hereafter, with great care and cost. This is still the guise of graceless procrastinators, to future and fool away their own salvation. Hereafter, say they, may be time enough, and what need such haste to build the spiritual temple? In time comes grace, God is more merciful than so; and at what time soever a sinner repents from the bottom of his heart, &c. Fools and blind men (as our Saviour calls the Pharisees, #Mt 23:17), that thus stand trifling and baffling with God and their souls, being semper victuri, as Seneca saith, always about to do that which, if not well done, they are utterly undone for ever; for upon this little point of time hangs the crown of eternity. The gales of grace are uncertain, the day of grace (which is very clear and bright) is usually a short one. Non licet in belle bis peccare, It is not permitted to error twice in wartime, said Lamachus to a soldier of his brought before him, and pleading he would do so no more: so God will not suffer men twice to neglect the day of grace, which, if once past, will never dawn again. Let none, therefore, when pressed to the present now of meeting God by repentance, answer as Antipater, King of Macedonia, did, when one presented him a book treating of happiness, ου σχολαζω, I am not at leisure. Or as Archias, the Theban, when forewarned of a conspiracy against him, cast the letters by, with In crastinum seria, and was slain ere the morrow came. Or as these Cunctators in the text, that had often in their mouth, "The time is not come, the time," &c., lest the very next minute they be cut off by death from all further time of repentance, acceptation, and grace for ever. Men may purpose, promise, expect a time of healing and happiness, when they shall be deceived, and find a time of terror and torment, #Jer 14:19. Some, when a dying, would have given a world for time: as I have heard (saith a reverend man) one crying day and night, call time again; but that could not be. As in war, so here, none are permitted to err twice. Time must be taken by the forelock, as being bald behind, Posthac occasio calva.

Ver. 3. Then came the word of the Lord, &c.] "Then," after a short silence, as it were, profertur Domini quasi cogitata responsio, follows the Lord’s elaborate and deliberate answer, not without some touch of holy tartness at their ingratitude; for, of all things, God can least endure to be slighted where he hath better deserved. He looks upon such with anger, being grieved at the hardness of their hearts, #Mr 3:5. He complains of such with a sigh; "Ah, sinful nation," #Isa 1:4; he is ready to rid his stomach of them, #Isa 1:24 "Ah, I will ease me," &c.

Ver. 4. Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, &c.] Not covered only, but ceiled with cedar (as the Chaldee here hath it), arched and garnished, as the Greek, carved and trimmed, as Ambrose rendereth it (Lib. 3. epist. 12). Sure, either your beds are very soft or your hearts very hard, that you can not only come into the tabernacles of your houses, but give sleep to your eyes, or slumber to your eyelids, before ye have found "a place for the Lord, a habitation for the mighty God of Jacob," #Ps 132:4,5. Good David could not find in his heart to dwell in a house of cedar when the ark of God dwelt within curtains, #2Sa 7:2. Valiant Uriah deemed it altogether unfit and unreasonable that when the ark, and Israel, and Judah, abode in tents, he should go to his house to eat and drink, and to take his ease and pleasure, #2Sa 11:11. Solomon first built a house for God, and then for himself. The Christian emperors, Constantine, Theodosius, Honorius, &c., exceeded in building churches, which, from their stateliness, were styled Basilicae, or places for a king. The very Turks to this day, though content to dwell in mean and homely houses, yet their Mosques or meeting houses are very sumptuously built and set forth. It is a principle in nature, that the things of God are older and more to be respected than the things of men (τα του Θεου πρεσβυτερα η τα των ανθρωπων. Herodot.). A professor of the Turks’ laws proclaims, before they attempt anything, that nothing be done against religion. This is better than that which was written over the gate of the senate house in Rome (which yet is not to be disliked, in its place and order), Ne quid detrimenti Resp. capiat. Let nothing be done to the harm of the republic. Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s: but with all, and above all, Give unto God the things that are God’s. The Greek article is twice repeated by our Saviour, when he speaketh for God, more than when for Caesar (τα του θεου τω θεω, #Mt 22:21); to show that our special care should be to give God his due, to "seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness," and then all other things shall seek us. Caetera aut aderunt, aut caetera non oberunt The rest either will happen or the rest will not harm. (Cicero). But most people are so busied about their own houses, their cottages of clay, #2Co 5:1, the body, that God’s house, the soul, lies waste and neglected; the lean kine eat up the fat; the strength of the ground is spent in nourishing weeds. Earthly mindedness sucketh the sap of grace from the heart, as the ivy doth from the oak, and maketh it unfruitful. Men are so taken up about the world, that they think not of God’s kingdom: as the Duke of Alva told the French king, who asked him whether he had observed the recent great eclipse? No, said he, I have so much to do upon earth, that I have no leisure to look toward heaven. But is not one thing necessary, and all others but side businesses? And have we not in our daily prayer five petitions for spirituals and but one for temporals? Are we not taught to make it our first request, that God’s name may be hallowed, though our turn should not be served? Is not Esau stigmatized for selling his birthright for a mess of broth? #Heb 12:16. And is not Shimei chronicled for a fool, who, by seeking after his servants, lost his life? Pope Sixtus for a madman, that sold his soul to the devil, to enjoy the Popedom for seven years? "What shall it profit a man to win the world and lose his own soul?" to win Venice, and then be hanged at the gates thereof, as the Italian proverb hath it? Surely such a man’s loss will be, 1. Incomparable, 2. Irreparable; for "What shall a man give in exchange of his soul?" #Mt 16:26. It was no evil counsel that was given to John III, King of Portugal, to meditate every day a quarter of an hour on that Divine sentence. It would be time well spent to ponder as often and as long together on this text, "Is it time for you, O ye," that are so sharp set upon the world, so wholly taken up about your private profits, your pleasures and preferments, to sit in your ceiled houses, as Ahab once did in his ivory palace, or Nebuchadnezzar in his house of the kingdom (as he vain gloriously calleth it, #Da 4:30), and God’s house lie waste, and his service neglected, to whom we ourselves owe, #1Co 6:19, our lives, #Mt 16:25, our parents, children, friends, means, #Mt 19:29, our gifts and abilities, #1Co 4:7, our honours and offices, #Ps 2:10-12, all that we are and have? How justly may God curse our blessings (as he threateneth these self-seeking, God neglecting Jews both here and #Mal 2:2), scatter brimstone upon our houses, dry up our roots beneath, and above cut off our branches, drive us from light into darkness, and chase us out of the world with his terrors, #Job 16:15-21. Surely such are the (ceiled) dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him that knoweth not God, that inverteth the order appointed of him, by coveting, not the best gifts, #1Co 12:21, but an evil covetousness, #Hab 2:9, by setting his affections, not on things above, but on things on the earth, by seeking their own things, every man, and not the things of Jesus Christ, #Col 3:2 Php 2:21.

Ver. 5. Now therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts] Haggai was but a young man, saith Epiphanius: now, therefore, lest any one that heard him should despise his youth, and slight his doctrine, he shows his authority, he comes to them cum privilegio, he delivers not the conceptions of his own brain, but the word and mind of God. For as Chrysostom saith of St Paul, so may we say of all the rest of the penmen of the Holy Scripture, Cor Pauli est cor Christi, The mind of Paul is the mind of Christ, their heart is Christ’s own heart; and their words are to be received, reverenced, and ruminated, not as the words of mortal men, but (as they are indeed) the words of the ever living God, #1Th 2:13. Excellently spake he who called the Scripture cor et animam Dei, the heart and soul of God. It is, every whit of it, divinely inspired, or breathed by God, saith the apostle, and is profitable both for reproof and for instruction in righteousness, #2Ti 3:16. See an instance hereof in this text, together with the prophet’s rhetorical artifice in first chiding, and now directing them: to reprove, and not withal to instruct, is to snuff the lamp, but not pour in oil that may feed it.

Consider your ways] Heb. set your hearts upon them, diligently recogitate and recognize your evil doings; and so shall ye soon find out the cause of your calamity. Judge yourselves, so shall ye not be judged of the Lord: accept the punishment of your iniquity, so iniquity shall not be your ruin; your ruth (repentance), but not your ruin, #1Co 11:30 Le 26:41 Eze 18:32. Capite consilium ex rebus ipsis, vel experimentis, Learn at least by the things ye have suffered: let experience, the mistress of fools, reduce you to a right mind. Lay to heart your manifold miseries, those διδασκαλοι αμισθοι, as one calleth them, free school masters, cursed enough and crabbed, but such as whereby God openeth men’s ears to discipline, and eyes to observation of his works and their own ways, #Job 36:8-10; according to that of #Eze 40:4 "Son of man, behold with thine eyes, and hear with thine ears, and set thy heart upon all that I shall show thee," &c.: the senses must be exercised that the heart may be affected with the word and works of God; according to that, "mine eye affecteth my heart," #La 3:51; and Solomon got much of his wisdom by observation, as appeareth by his Ecclesiastes, which some have not unfitly called Solomon’s soliloquy. It is but little that can be learned in this life without due and deep consideration; which is nothing else but an act of the practical understanding, whereby it reflects and stays upon its own intentions; and, comparing them with the rule, it proceeds to lay a command upon the will and affections to put them in execution. Thus David considered his ways, and, finding all out of order he turned his feet to God’s testimonies, #Ps 119:59. And, to still God’s enemies, #Ps 4:4, he bids them commune with their own hearts and be still, or, make a pause, viz. till they have brought their consideration to some good upshot and conclusion. For when consideration hath soundly enlightened a man’s mind, informed his judgment according to that light (that candle held to his mind), and determined his will according to that judgment, it must needs bring forth sound resolutions purposes, and practices; as it did in the Ninevites, Ephraim, #Jer 31:19, Josiah, #2Ch 34:27, the prodigal, #Lu 15:17-19, the Church in Hosea, #Ho 2:6,7. She considered she was crossed, and hedged in with afflictions, and resolved to return to her first husband. The contrary inconsiderateness is complained about as a public mischief, #Jer 6:8 8:6 12:11. They have laid it waste, and being waste it mourneth unto me; the whole land lieth waste, because no man layeth it to heart, that is, considereth deeply of the cause of its desolation. Without this, though a man had all possible knowledge locked up in his brain and breast, it would be but as rain in the middle region, where it doth no good; as the horn in the unicorn’s head, where it helps no disease; or as a fire in a flintstone, insensible and unprofitable till beaten out by sound consideration; this makes knowledge to become experimental, as #Ps 116:6 Ro 8:1,2; this is to "follow on to know the Lord," #Ho 6:3, as without this men’s knowledge is but a flash, and may end in ignorance and profaneness; because never formed and seated in their hearts, never digested by due meditation and application to their own consciences.

Ver. 6. Ye have sown much and bring in little] This was visible to them; and they are called upon to consider it. The philosopher affirms that man is therefore the wisest of creatures, because he alone can compute and consider. And yet how little doth man respect this privilege, without which he were to be sorted with beasts or madmen! "God hearkened and heard, but no man spake advisedly, no man repented of his wickedness, saying, What have I done?" #Jer 8:6; no man humbled himself under the mighty hand of God, though God thrust him down, as it were, with a thump upon the back. Most men’s minds are as ill set as their eyes are; neither of them look inwards. "Lord," saith the prophet, "when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see: but they shall see," &c., #Isa 26:11. So, when God’s rod call for reformation they will not hear it and who hath appointed it, but they shall hear, #Job 33:15. Conscience, their domestic chaplain, shall ring this peal in their ears, "Consider your ways: Ye have sowed much but brought in little," &c. Omnia fuistis et nihil profuit, you have tried all ways to live, and it will not be, laboured all night, and taken nothing, "laboured in the very fire, and wearied yourselves for your vanity," #Hab 2:13; as those that seek after the philosopher’s stone, the most they can look for is their labour for their pains. Either vanity or violence hath exhausted you, as #Zec 8:10, and God’s vengeance is visible enough in those secret issues and drains of expense at which your estates run out, because he puts not his holy finger on the hole in the bottom of the bag. For it is his blessing alone that maketh rich, #Pr 10:22 "and except he build the house, they labour in vain that build it," #Ps 127:1. There is a curse upon unlawful practices, though men be never so industrious, as in Jehoiakim, #Jer 22:13-19 And all their policies, without dependence upon him for direction and success, are but arena sine calce, sand without lime; they will not hold together when we have most need of them, but fall asunder, like untempered mortar. Hence the Psalmist assureth us that "promotion comes neither from the east, nor from the west, nor yet from the south," where the warm sunshine is, "but from the Lord: he putteth down one, and setteth up another," #Ps 75:6. So Hannah: "The Lord," saith she, "maketh poor, and maketh rich: he bringeth low, and lifteth up," #1Sa 2:7. And albeit no man knows either love or hatred by all that is before them, because all things come alike to all, #Ec 9:1,2 (God maketh a scatter, as it were, of these outward commodities: good men gather them, bad men scramble for them), yet if he blow upon a man’s estate, and by losses and crosses so beat him down with his own bare hand (as here in the text) that either he hath not to eat, or dare not eat his fill for fear of wanting another day, or if he do eat, yet the staff of bread being broken, and for want of God’s concurrence, he eats and is not satisfied, &c., he hath but prisoners’ pittance, which will neither keep him alive nor yet suffer him to die; he is to be very sensible of it, to consider his ways, and looking upon his penury (as a piece of the curse for neglect of God’s service, #Le 26:14-20), to deprecate that last and worst of miseries, the judgment of pining away in their iniquities, #Le 26:39. This is worse than any scarcity, than any bulimy or doggish appetite, a disease common in times of famine. "The righteous eateth to the satisfying of his soul: but the belly of the wicked shall want," #Pr 14:25. As his belly prepareth deceit, #Job 15:35, so it suffers deceit; imposturam faciunt et patiuntur, as the emperor said of them that sold glass for pearls. Fumos vendidit, fumo pereat, he that sells vapours let him pass away as a vapour. as another. Ye looked for much, and lo it came to little, as it followeth, #Hag 1:9; and why? but because they thought every little too much for God, and all well saved that was kept from him, #Mal 3:9-11. {See Trapp on "Mal 3:9"} {See Trapp on "Mal 3:10"} {See Trapp on "Mal 3:11"} The Popish commentators upon this text call upon the people (if ever they mean to thrive) to keep holy days, to, hear masses, &c.; yea, some priests in Gerson’s time publicly preached to the people that whosoever would hear a mass he should not fall blind on that day, nor be taken away by sudden death, nor want sufficient sustenance, Non erit caecus, nec subito morietur, nec carebit sufficienti sustentatione. This was more than they had good warrant to promise; and yet they are believed. Shall not we learn to live by faith, to trust "in the Lord and do good? so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed," #Ps 37:3. The wicked in the fulness of their sufficiency are in straits, #Job 20:22. Contrarily, the godly, in the fulness of their straits are in a sufficiency; and this is the gain of godliness, #1Ti 6:6. Piety is never without a well-contenting sufficiency, it hath treasure that faileth not, bags that wax not old, #Lu 12:33; and shall have hereafter riches without rust, wealth without want, store without sore, beauty without blemish, mirth without mixture.

Ver. 7. Consider your ways] See #Hag 1:5. Do it early and earnestly. Excutite vos, iterumque excutite, as Tremellius rendereth that in #Zep 2:1 "Search you, search you, O nation not worthy to be beloved." So #La 3:40 "Let us search and try our ways." Not search only, but try, and, as it were, sift them to the bran. So #2Co 13:5 "Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith: prove your own selves," as it were, with redoubled diligence, in a most needful but much neglected duty, of dealing with your own hearts. But if ye will not, see that flaming place, #Eze 16:43. If men will not judge themselves, God will; as, though scholars will not scan their verses, their masters will. Men are as loth to review their actions, and read the blurred writings of their own hearts, as schoolboys are to parse their lessons and false Latins they have made. But as he who will not cast up his books, his books will cast up him at length; so those that will not consider their ways, and take themselves to task, shall find that sparing a little pains at first will double it in the end; and that the best that can come of this forlorn negligence is the bitter pangs of repentance. Oh, therefore, that, with Solomon’s wise man, we had our eyes in our heads, and not in the corners of the earth! #Ec 2:14. And that our eyes were, like the windows in Solomon’s temple, broad inward, that we might see our sins to confession, so should we never see them to our confusion, #1Ki 6:4. The Israelites confessed their murmuring and stubbornness when God sent evil angels among them, that is, some messengers of his wrath and displeasure. The prophet Haggai here would have their posterity consider, and better consider, since the hand of God was so heavy upon them, and that he came against them, as it were, with a drawn sword, how they might disarm his just indignation by a speedy reformation. To which purpose he addeth,

Ver. 8. Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, &c.] Set upon the work, and be serious; build the temple with like zeal as Baruch repaired the wall, #Ne 3:20, accendit seipsum, he burst out into a heat, being angry with his own and others’ sloth; and so finished his task in a short time. It must be an earnest, upright, and constant endeavour of reformation that must follow upon our sense of sin and fear of wrath; or else all will be but motus aliquis evanidus (as Calvin on the text hath it), a very flash; it will be but as prints made on water; as soon as finger is off all is out. It was certainly, therefore, an excellent saying of Luther (though condemned for heretical by Pope Leo X), Optima et aptissima poenitentia est nova vita. Amendment of life is the best repentance; neither is there any wiser way to break off our sins than to practise the contrary duties. He that repents with a contradiction (saith Tertullian), God will pardon him with a contradiction. Thou repentest and yet continuest in thy sin. God will pardon thee and yet send thee to hell. Those that will have God to take pleasure in them, as in his temple, to love them and come unto them, and make his abode with them, #Joh 14:23, to dwell in them, and walk in them, #2Co 6:16 (as they did in Solomon’s porch, and other walks and galleries about the temple, #Zec 3:7), to be glorified in them (accounting himself to receive, as it were, a new being, by those inward conceptions of his glory, and those outward honours we do to his name), they must go up to the mountain, not of Lebanon (though that was a pleasant and plentiful place, #De 3:25), but of heaven, that hill from whence comes their help, and bring wood (growing wood, #So 1:17, living stones, #1Pe 2:5), and build the house, #1Co 3:9 Eph 2:22, laying faith for a foundation, love for a covering, having hope for a pinnacle, humility for a pavement, washing it with tears, sweeping it by repentance, beautifying it with holiness, perfuming it with prayers, hanging it with sincerity. So shall Christ the King be held in the galleries, #So 7:5, he shall covet their beauty, #Ps 45:12, and be held fast bound to them in the bands of pure affection and spiritual wedlock. He will take pleasure in them, as he did in those that prayed in or toward the temple, #De 12:11 1Ki 8:29, as he did in Daniel, that man of desires, #Da 9:23, in David, God’s corculum, or darling, #1Sa 13:14, in his Hephzibah, or sweetheart, the Church, #Isa 62:4, called elsewhere the beloved of his soul, or his beloved soul: and he will be glorified in them by their spiritual sacrifices, #1Pe 2:5, reasonable services, #Ro 12:1, performed in spirit and in truth, #Joh 4:24, by some one of which God is more glorified than by all the actions of unreasonable or unregenerate creatures.

Ver. 9. Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little] Spes in oculis, luctus in manibus, as Jerome here. The hope of unjust men perisheth, #Pr 11:7, etiam spes valentissima, his likeliest hope, as some render it; he thinks himself sure, as Esau did of the blessing, but he only thinks so; God cuts off the meat from his mouth, #Joe 1:16, takes away his corn in the time thereof, #Ho 2:9, confutes him in his confidences, which prove like the brooks of Tema, #Job 6:17, and serve him as Absalom’s mule did her master; his high hopes hop headless, as one phraseth it. It happens with him as with those perverse Israelites in the wilderness, made to tack about forty-two times after that they thought themselves sure of the promised land.

I did blow upon it] i.e. I dispersed it with ease. By a like phrase (for sense) God is said, #Isa 25:11, to spread forth his hands in the midst of his enemies, as he that swimmeth spreadeth forth his hands to swim; and to bring down their pride, together with the spoils of their hands, with greatest facility. The motion in swimming is easy, not strong; for strong violent strokes in the water would rather sink than support. In like sort God blasted their treasure or blew their hoards hither and thither, he consumed their substance and cursed their blessings, as #Mal 2:2. {See Trapp on "Mal 2:2"}

Why? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, &c.] Their sin of preferring their own private interests and self-respects before God’s work and service is here repeated, and exaggerated, as the ground and cause of all their calamities: and all little enough to bring them to a sound and serious sight and hatred of their sins. Such a deep kind of drowsiness hath surprised us, for the most part, that whereas every judgment of God should be a warning peal to repent, we be like the smith’s dog, who the harder the anvil is beaten on lieth by and sleepeth the sounder; or like the silly hen, which loseth her chickens one by one by the devouring kite, and yet, as altogether insensible of her loss, continues to pick up what lieth before her. This is to swelter and pine away in iniquity, as if nothing could awaken men, #Le 26:39, and it is threatened last of all, as worse than all their losses, captivities, &c. A lethargy is no less deadly than the most tormenting disease. Let ministers, therefore, by such forcible and quick questions as this in the text and otherwise, arouse their hearers (as they once did here their dear friends in the sweating sickness, who, if suffered to sleep, died certainly), that they may awake, and recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, &c. It is well observed by one that the devil’s particular sin is not once mentioned in Genesis, because he was not to be restored by repentance; but the sin of man is enlarged in all the circumstances. And why this? but that he might be sensible, ashamed, and penitent for his sin. They say in philosophy that the foundation of natural life is feeling; no feeling, no life; and that the more quick and nimble the sense of feeling is in a man the better is his constitution. Think the same of life spiritual, and of that hidden man of the heart, as St Peter calls him.

And ye run every man unto his own house] Or, ye take pleasure every man in his own house, q.d. Ye are all self-seekers, privatespirited persons, ye are all for your own interests; like the snail, that seldom stirs abroad, and never without his house upon his back; or like the eagle, which, when he flies highest, hath still an eye downward to the prey, that he minds to seize. In parabola oves capras suas quaerunt. In the parabole of the sheep, he seeks his sheep. They serve not the Lord Jesus Christ, but their own bellies, #Ro 16:18; or if they serve Christ, it is for gain, as children will not say their prayers unless we promise them their breakfasts. In serving him they do but serve themselves upon him; as those carnal Capernaites did, #Joh 6:26. Well might the apostle complain, as #Php 2:21, and another since, that it is his pleasures, his profit, and his preferment that is the natural man’s trinity; and his carnal self that is these in unity. May he be but warm in his own feathers, he little regards the dangers of the house. He is totus in se, wholly drawn up into himself, and insensible of either the public good or common danger: though the waterpot and spear be taken from the bolster, yet he stirs not. Far enough from St Paul’s frame of spirit or speech, Who is offended, and I burn not? far enough from his care and cumber, anxiety and solicitude for the house of God (επισυστασις μεριμνα) and prosperity of his people, #2Co 11:28. Nothing like they are to Ambrose, who was more troubled for the state of the Church than for his own dangers. Nothing like Melancthon, of whom it is said, that the ruins of God’s house and the miseries of his people made him almost neglect the death of his most beloved children. True goodness is public spirited, though to private disadvantage; as nature will venture its own particular good for the general, so will grace much more. Heavy things will ascend to keep out vacuity and preserve the universe. A stone will fall down to come to its own place, though it break itself in twenty pieces. It is the ingenuity of saints, in all their desires and designs, to study God’s ends more than their own; to build God’s house with neglect of their own, as Solomon did; to drown all self-respects in his glory and the public good, as Nehemiah did; of whom it might be more truly said than the heathen historian (Dio) did of Cato, that he did υπεραγαπαν το κοινον, overly loved the commonwealth, and that he did— toti genitum se credere mundo, believe himself born for the benefit of mankind (Lucan).

Ver. 10. Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from rain, &c.] It is never well with man (whose life is ever in fuga, in flight, as the philosopher hath it, and must be maintained by meat, as the fire is by fuel) till God "hear the heaven, and the heaven hear the earth, and the earth hear the corn, the wine, and the oil, and these hear Jezreel," #Ho 2:21,22, where we may see the genealogy of these good creatures resolved into God. The earth, though a kind mother, cannot open her bowels, and yield "seed to the sower, and bread to the eater," if not watered from above. The heaven, though the storehouse of God’s good treasure, which he openeth to our profit and nourishment, #De 28:12, cannot drop down fatness upon the earth if God close it up, and withhold the seasonable showers. This the very heathens acknowledged in their fictions of Jupiter and Juno; and the Metapontines, having had a good harvest, consecrated χρυσουν θερος, a harvest cut in gold, to their god, in the temple at Delphi. Now, when a rabble of rebels shall conspire against God, and fight against him with his own weapons, as Jehu did against Jehoram with his own men, what can he do less than cut them short? that make them know the worth of his benefits by the want of them?

Ver. 11. than call for a drought &c.] and so for a dearth (which inevitably followed in those hot countries), and consequently for pestilence and sword, the usual concomitants? The Septuagint for drought here (by a mistake of points) translate a sword Pro chorebb legunt cherib. And in the original there is an elegance alliteration past the ability to translate. Because my house is chareb, that is, waste, therefore I have called for a choreb, drought, or for a chereb, a sword, which shall in like sort lay your land waste and make your houses desolate; according to that which is threatened, #De 28:15-68 Mt 23:38. And in the very next chapter #Mt 24:7, Christ telleth his apostles that those refractory Jews, and others, that rejected him, the true temple, in "whom the Godhead dwelt bodily," #Col 2:9, that is, essentially (and not in clouds and ceremonies, as once between the cherubims, which they used to call Shechinah), because they loathed the heavenly manna, therefore they should be pined with famine. They that would have none of the gospel of peace should taste deeply of the miseries of war. They that despised the only medicine of their souls should be visited with pestilence. The black horse is ever at the heels of the red; and the pale of the black #Re 6:4. As there hath been a conjuncture of offences, so there will be of miseries; a conflux of them abideth the neglecters of God’s house, the contemners of his gospel. Ursine tells us, that those that fled from England for religion in Queen Mary’s days, acknowledged that that great inundation of misery came justly upon them, for their unprofitableness under the means of grace, which they had enjoyed in King Edward’s days. Zanchy likewise tells us, that when he first came to be pastor at Clavenna there happened a grievous pestilence in that town, so that in seven months’ time there died twelve hundred persons. Their former pastor, Mainardus, that man of God, as he calleth him, had often foretold such a calamity, for their profaneness and Popery; but he could never be believed till the plague had proved him a true prophet; and then they remembered his words, and wished they had been warned by him (Zanch. Miscel. ep. ad Lantgrav.). Let us also fear, lest for our many and bony sins (as the prophet’s expression is, #Am 5:12, Peccata ossea, bony sins i.e. fortia) strong, but especially for our hateful and horrible contempt of his servants and services (never the, like known), we pull upon our land Amos’s famine, not of bread, but (which is a thousandfold worse) of hearing the words of the Lord, #Am 8:11; a famine long since foretold and feared by our martyrs and confessors; and now, if ever (if God forefend not), in procinctu, in readiness of battle to fall upon us, as the most unworthy and unthankful people that ever the sun of heaven beheld or the sun of Christ’s gospel shone upon so fair and so long together. The best way of prevention is prevision and reformation; beginning at our own, as Gideon did at his father’s household, #Jud 6:27. And the best almanack we can rely upon for seasonable weather and the lengthening of our tranquillity is our obedience to God, love to our neighbours, care of ourselves.

Ver. 12. Then Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, &c.] So mighty in operation, so quick and powerful, is the good word of God in the mouths of his faithful ministers, when seconded and set on by his Holy Spirit. See for this #Isa 55:10,11 Jer 23:28,29 Ac 19:20 1Co 14:24,25 Heb 4:12. See that scala coeli, ladder of heaven, as one calleth it, #Ro 10:14,15, and consider how mightily the word of God grew and prevailed in those primitive times. It spread through the world like a sunbeam, saith Eusebius; it was carried about into all places as on eagles’, or, rather, as on angels’ wings. Athanasius of old and Luther of late, were strangely upheld and prospered against a world of opposers to the truth they preached. Farellus gained five large cities with their territories to Christ. How admirably and effectually King Edward VI was wrought upon by a sermon of Bishop Ridley’s, touching works of charity, see his Life, written by Sir John Heywood. It is the Spirit that quickeneth the seed of the word, and maketh it prolific and generative. And as in the body there are veins to carry the blood, and arteries to carry the spirits that quicken the blood; so is it with the word and spirit in the soul. If God’s Spirit open not man’s heart, the word cannot enter. If he enlighten not both organ and object, Christ, though never so powerfully preached, is both unkent and unkist, as the northern proverb hath it. The word heard profited them not, because not mixed with faith in them that heard it, #Heb 4:2. They heard it only with the hearing of the ear, with that gristle that grew on the outside of the head; whereas they should have drawn up the inward ear to the outward, that one and the same sound might have pierced both. But this all that hear cannot do, because all are not of God, #Joh 8:47, and so have not his earmark, spiritual senses habitually exercised to discern good and evil, #Heb 5:14; they have a heavy ear, which is a singular judgment, #Isa 6:10.

With all the remnant of the people] i.e. The generality of the returned captives followed their leaders. A remnant they are called, because but few in comparison of those many hedge rogues, Mr Dyke calleth them, potters they are called, #1Ch 4:23, men of base and low spirits, that dwelt still in Babylon among plants and hedges; being the base brood of those degenerated Israelites, who, when liberty was proclaimed for their return to Jerusalem, chose rather to get their living by making pots for the King of Babylon. These are ancient, or rather obsolete things, as Junius rendereth it, worn out and forgotten; and indeed they deserve to be utterly forgotten, and not written or reckoned among the living in Jerusalem, #Isa 4:4.

Obeyed the voice of the Lord their God] With the obedience of faith; and this they did by the good example of their rulers. Thus, when Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, believed, many of the Corinthians believed also, #Ac 18:8, When the kings of Judah were good or evil the people were so likewise. Great men are the lookingglasses of their country; according to which most men dress themselves. Qualis Rex, talis grex. How excellent a king, such a great company. "Why compellest thou the Gentiles," said Paul to Peter, so, by thine example, to Judaize? #Ga 2:14.

And the words of Haggai the prophet] Whose mouth God was pleased to make use of. And this is added for a confirmation of the prophet’s calling to the work; because of long time before there had been no prophet among the people, nor any to tell how long, as the Church complaineth, #Ps 74:9.

As the Lord their God had sent him] Heb. according as the Lord their God had sent him, after the same manner they heard, and obeyed the prophet, as the Lord had sent him; they did not wrest his words to a wrong sense; nor did they question his commission; but receiving it as the word, not of man, but of God, they set forthwith upon the work, yielding as prompt and present obedience, as if God with his own mouth had immediately spoken to them from heaven.

And the people did fear before the Lord] As if he himself bad been visibly present in his own person. So St Peter’s hearers, #Ac 10:33, Now, therefore, say they, we are all here present before God, to hear all things commanded thee of God. If young Samuel had known that it was the Lord that called him once and again he would not have returned to his bed to sleep. If men were well persuaded that the God of heaven bespeaks them by his faithful ministers they would not give way to wilful wanderings, but hear as for life, and fear to do anything unworthy of such a presence; they would work out their salvation with fear and trembling, yea, work hard at it, as afraid to be taken with their task undone. "They that fear the Lord will keep his covenant," saith David, #Ps 103:13 "Fear God, and keep his commandments," saith Solomon, #Ec 12:14 "And, in every nation he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of him," saith Peter, #Ac 10:35.

Ver. 13. Then spake Haggai the Lord’s messenger] Or angel. {See Trapp on "Mal 1:1"} (Then speaks) Namely, on the four and twentieth day of the month, as it is in the last verse; until which day they had been building for three weeks together. But Governor Tatnai and his complices came upon them, and discouraged the people and hindered the work, #Ezr 5:6,8. It was but needful, therefore, that God’s command should be repeated, and a special promise added, "I am with you," saith the Lord. Where we may well take up that of Cicero concerning Brutus’ laconical epistle, Quam multa, quam paucis! how much in a little. "I am with you," saith the Lord, you need not therefore fear what man can do unto you. God is all-sufficient to those that are altogether his, see #2Ch 15:2. The Church is called Jehovah Shammah, that is, "The Lord is there," #Eze 48:35 "God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved," #Ps 46:5. Immota manet may better be her motto than Venice’s. She is surely invincible, #Zec 12:5-7, as having a mighty champion, even the Holy One of Israel; and this makes her (though but a virgin) to laugh to scorn her proudest enemies; yea, to shake her head at them, #Isa 37:22,23, as rather to be pitied than envied. There were they in great fear (saith David, of the Church’s enemies); for what reason? God is in the generation of the righteous, #Ps 14:5 Hence those Philistines were so woe-begone, #1Sa 4:7. And the Eygptians no less, #Ex 14:25. Let us flee, say they, from the face of Israel; for the Lord fights for them. "What shall we then say to these things?" saith Paul (who had often heard when he was in the enemy’s hand, Fear not, I am with thee), "If God be for us, who can be against us?" who dare be so fool-hardy, so ambitious of his own destruction? Hath ever any waxed fierce against God and prospered? #Job 9:4. Where is Pharaoh, Nero, Nebuchadnezzar, &c.? Was it safe for these or any other to provoke the Lord to anger? were they stronger than he? Oh that men would (according to Solomon’s counsel) meddle with their match, and not contend with him that is mightier than they! Can God be with his people and see them abused to his face? Will they force the queen also before him in the house, #Es 7:8. Will they, giant-like, fight against God? will they needs touch the apple of his eye, that tenderest piece of the tenderest part? Will they invade his portion, plunder him of his jewels, pull the signet from his right hand? Surely God is so with his people, that as he taketh notice of the least courtesy done to them to reward it (even to a cup of cold water), so of the least affront or offence, to revenge it, be it but a frown or a frump, #Ge 4:6 Nu 12:10 "Better a millstone were hanged," &c. Better anger all the witches in the country than one of God’s zealous witnesses, #Re 11:5. Death cannot hurt them, #Ps 23:3. Hell could no more hold them (the pains of hell got hold on David, but he was delivered, #Ps 116:3) than the whale could hold Jonas; it must needs render them up again, because God is with them. Now I had rather be in hell (said Luther) with God than in heaven without him, and it were far safer for me.

Ver. 14. And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel, &c.] Here is the appendix of the foregoing sermon, whereof we have heard but the brief notes. That one word, I am with you, seconded and set on by God’s holy Spirit, set them all to work. "How forcible are right words!" #Job 6:25. One seasonable truth falling on a prepared heart hath often a strong and sweet operation, sc. when God is pleased to work with it, and make it effectual; this man cannot do no more than the husbandman can make a harvest. "The weapons of our warfare are mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds," #2Co 10:4. Luther, having heard Staupicius say, that that is kindly repentance which begins from the love of God, found from that time forward the practice of repentance far sweeter to him than before. Galeacius Caracciolus, an Italian marquis, was converted by an apt similitude used by Peter Martyr, reading on the First Epistle to the Corinthians. Dr Taylor, martyr, blessed God that ever he became fellow prisoner to that angel of God (as he called him), John Bradford. Senarclaeus (in his epistle to Bucer, prefixed before the history of the death of John Diarius, slain by his own brother, as Abel was, for religion’s sake), I remember, saith he, when he and I were together at Newburg, the day before his slaughter, he gave me a great deal of grave and gracious counsel: Ego vero illius oratione sic incendebar, ut cum eum disserentem audirem, Spiritus Sancti verba me audire existimarem, i.e. I was so stirred up with his discourse, as if I had heard the Holy Ghost himself speaking unto me; so fervent was he, and full of life; for he first felt what he spake, and then spake what he felt. So should all do that desire to speak to purpose; and then pray to God, as for a door of utterance, so for a door of entrance to be opened unto them; such as St Paul had to the heart of Lydia, and as Bishop Ridley had to the heart of good King Edward VI, whereof before.

And they came and did work] The governors also, by overseeing others, and ruling the business by their discretion. Where God’s glory and the common good is concerned all sorts must set to their helping hand.

Ver. 15. In the four and twentieth day] {See Trapp on "Hag 1:13"} The time is diligently noted, to teach us to take good note of the moments of time, wherein matters of moment have been, by God’s help, begun, continued, and perfected in the Church. This will be of singular use, both for the increase of faith and of good affection in our hearts.

Chapter 2

Ver. 1. In the seventh month, in the one and twentieth day of the month] This is the preface to the fourth sermon, as some reckon it; noting the exact time when it was delivered. {See Trapp on "Hag 1:1"} {See Trapp on "Hag 1:15"}

Came the word of the Lord] This he often inculcateth, to set forth the truth of his calling, and validity of his commission. {See Trapp on "Hag 1:5"}

By the prophet Haggai] Heb. by the hand of the prophet. {See Trapp on "Hag 1:1"}

Ver. 2. Speak now to Zerubbabel, &c.] The better to hearten them on in the work, the prophet is sent again to them, with a like message as before. Note here, 1. That there are none so forward for God and his work but may stand in need of continual quickening; there being more snares and backbiting earth than there are stars in heaven; and the good gift of God having so much need of righting up; for, like a dull sea coal fire, if it be not now and then blown or stirred up, though there be no want of fuel, yet will of itself at length die and go out. Besides that, every inch, every artery of our bodies, if it could, would swell with hellish venom to the size of the largest giant, that it might make resistance to the work of God’s sanctifying Spirit. Let us, therefore, consider one another, and study every man his brother’s case, to stir up, or whet on, to love and good works, #Heb 10:24. God will not forget this our labour of love, but abundantly both regard and reward it, #Mal 3:16. See the notes there. 2. That continual preaching makes men continue in well doing. Therefore it was that Barnabas was sent to Antioch, #Ac 11:22,23, who, when he came and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. And hence also it was that Paul and Barnabas, {#Ac 14:21} returned again to Lystra and to Iconium and Antioch, confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and ordaining preachers everywhere for that very purpose, for the increase of their knowledge, for the strengthening of their faith, for the help of their memories, and for the quickening of their affections. Gutta cavat lapidem, non vi sed saepe cadendo. God’s tender plants need be often watered that they may spring and sprout, Plantas tenellas frequentius adaquare proderit (Primas.).

And to the residue of the people] Non enim sacris Eleusiniis, quae in vulgus apargi nefas erat similia sunt oracula Dei, saith an interpreter here. God’s oracles are not to be hidden from the common sort, as Sibylla’s were, and as the Popish doctors hold, lest men should be made heretics thereby, that is, right believers. It is heresy, saith one of them, to read the Scriptures. It was the invention of the devil, saith another. A husbandman, reading the Scriptures, was possessed, saith a third. It is not needful for the common sort to know more of God’s mind than the Articles of the Creed, saith Aquinas, Bellarmine, &c. John Barclay, in his Parenesis, excusing the Church of Rome for taking away the Scriptures from the common people, saith thus, Sed de his quoque providit Ecclesia concionibus, in quibus Evangelia referuntur, &c.: But for this the Church hath made sufficient provision by appointing sermons to be made upon the Gospels for the day, and by permitting books of devotion wherein much use is made of the Holy Scriptures. And for the historical part of the Old Testament, saith he, men may read Josephus’s Antiquities, where it is set down more plainly and plentifully than in the Bible, &c. But I am weary of raking in this foul channel.

Ver. 3. Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory?] Some such there were among them (as is here implied), and these must needs be very old, one hundred and twenty, at least, some say more. Zerubbabel might well be one of these; for he was a chieftain in the first year of Cyrus, #Ezr 2:2. And Jehoshua, the high priest, might be another; for he came out of Babylon with Zerubbabel at the same time, #Ezr 3:2. We see by experience that men’s lives are daily shortened. Natural reasons whereof may be these. 1. Untimely marriages. 2. Filling our bodies with variety of foods, and so digging our own graves with our own teeth. 3. Much ease and delicacy. The supernatural reason may be that so the world may sooner come to an end. God maketh haste to have the number of his elect fulfilled, and therefore dispatcheth away the generations, shorteneth life for his elect’s sake, fetcheth home his pilgrims, makes their days few, though evil, {#Ge 47:9} takes them away from the evil to come, &c., death being to them aerumnarum requies rest from all toils, (as Chaucer’s motto was), yea, ianua vitae, porta coeli, the door of life, the gate to heaven, the daybreak of eternal brightness.

And how do ye see it now?] It is a part of old men’s prudence rightly to compare things long since past with things present, and so to conjecture at things to come. Thus the prudent person, by discourse of reason, foreseeth an evil and hideth himself, when the young fool passeth on and is punished.

Is it not in your eyes] That is, in your thoughts; for God taketh notice of the inward workings of the heart, #1Sa 16:7 Ps 139:2 1Ki 8:39. For he made the heart, and must therefore know all that is in it; as a watchmaker knows all the wheels and motions of the watch. He also will bring every secret thing into judgment, #Ec 12:14. Therefore thought is not free (as foolish folk dote), either from the notice of his eye (he had soon found out these Jews, when they did but despise the day of small things in their hearts, #Zec 4:10), or from the censure of his mouth, #Heb 4:12,13 Ro 7:14 (the law is spiritual and meets with involuntary motions to sin, #Hag 2:7), or, lastly, from the stroke of his hand, which is a mighty hand, #1Pe 5:6, and falls very heavy, #De 29:19, even for a root of bitterness, as it is there, for vain thoughts, #Jer 4:14; how much more for mischievous, murderous, covetous, vain-glorious, and adulterous thoughts, &c. It were good, therefore, to write upon walls and windows (yea, would it were written upon the tables of our hearts) that short motto, which as short as it is, yet our memories are shorter, Cave, Deus videt, Take heed, God looks on; for he is omnipresent and omniscient.

Is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?] A mere non-entity or nullity? not fit to be named in the same day with the former temple? For, first, Cyrus appointed the full proportion of this second house, the height thereof threescore cubits, and the breadth thereof threescore cubits, #Ezr 6:3, which was but one-half so large as Solomon’s temple. Herod indeed, to curry favour with the Jews (which yet would never be), built upon Solomen’s foundation, and bestowed a great deal of cost, if we may believe Josephus. But so could not these Jews do, that returned from Babylon; for they were (secondly) but few, and those also poor, and, though helped both by Cyrus and Darius, yet they were glad to build the temple of common stone, and unpolished, nothing like those precious carved stones wherewith Solomon built, #1Ki 6:36. Thirdly, God hereby would draw their minds from the legal ceremonies and services; the Sun of Righteousness being now ready to arise upon them, the Dayspring from on high to visit them. Howbeit, because they could not have so glorious a temple as the former, they slighted it in their thoughts, and would have neglected it. Learn hence, That men naturally account as nothing of God’s service, if not accompanied with outward pomp and splendour. The Israelites in the wilderness would needs have a calf (as the Egyptians had) made of their jewels and ear-rings. Jeroboam would have two, and those of gold. Nebuchadnezzar dedicated a golden image with all manner of music, #Da 3:1-7 The people wept when the foundation of this temple was laid, #Ezr 3:12, because nothing so magnificent as the former. And the Papists explode our religion in comparison of theirs, because nothing so pompous and plausible to the rude people, whom they deceive with apish toys and trinkets, shows and pageants. In their petition to King James they pleaded for their religion, that it was more pleasing than ours, and more agreeable to nature. John Hunt, a Roman Catholic, in his humble appeal to King James, thus blasphemeth: The God of the Protestants is worse than Pan, god of the clowns, which can endure no ceremonies nor good manners at all. Many, like children, like that book best that hath most babies in it; neither will they eat their milk but in a golden dish. This proceeds from a blind understanding and carnal affection. The Church in its infancy was enticed with shows and shadows; but now God requires a reasonable service, he calls for spirit and truth.

Ver. 4. Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, &c.] Here he exhorteth all ranks, first, to good affection, Be strong, or of a good courage; secondly, to good action, work, or, Be doing; for affection without action is like Rachel, beautiful, but barren. Be strong, so as to prevail and carry on the service, all discouragemeats notwithstanding ( Charach unde ισχυειν, valeo. Sept. vertunt. υπερκρατειν υπερισχυειν). Those that will serve God in the maintenance of good causes must be courageous and resolute, #1Co 16:13; for otherwise they shall never be able to withstand the opposition that will be made either from carnal reason within, or the world and devil without, for want of this spiritual mettle, this supernatural strength, this "spirit of power, of love, and of a sound mind," #2Ti 1:7; opposed to the spirit of fear, that cowardly passion that unmans us, and expectorateth and exposeth us to sundry both sins and snares; when he that trusteth in the Lord shall be safe, #Pr 29:25. Here, then, that we falter not, budge not, betray not the cause of God, nor come under his heavy displeasure, who equally hateth the timorous and the treacherous; let us, 1. Be armed with true faith; for Fides tamen non formidat, faith quelleth and killeth distrustful fear. 2. Get the heart fraught with the true fear of God; for as one fire, so one fear, drives out another, #Mt 10:28 1Pe 3:13,14 3. Get and keep a clearing, cheering conscience; for that feareth no colours, as we see in St Paul, Athanasius, Luther, Latimer, and other holy martyrs and confessors. 4. Think on God’s presence, as here, Be strong and be doing, for I am with you. Though David walk through the vale of the shadow of death, that is, of death in its most hideous and horrid representations, he will not fear; for what reason? "thou art with me," saith he, #Ps 23:3,4. Dogs and other creatures will fight stoutly in their master’s presence. 5. Consider your high and heavenly calling, and say, Shall such a man as I flee? &c. Either change thy name or be valiant, saith Alexander to a soldier of his that was of his own name, but a coward, Et Turnum fugientem haec terra videbit? (Virg.). Lastly, look up, as St Stephen did, to the recompense of reward, steal a look from glory, as Moses, #Heb 11:26, help yourselves over the difficulty of suffering together with Christ, by considering the happiness of reigning together. Thus, be of good courage, or deal courageously, and God shall be with the good, as Jehoshaphat told his judges when to go their circuit, #2Ch 19:11.

And work] Good affections must end in good actions, else they are scarcely found, but much to be suspected. Good wishes (and no more) may be found in hell’s mouth, #Nu 23:10. Orpah had good affections, but they came to nothing, #Ru 1:14. God must be entreated to fix our quicksilver, to ballast our lightness, to work in us both to will and to do, that it may be said of us, as of those Corinthians, that as there was in them a readiness to will, so there followed the performance also, #2Co 8:12. Desire and zeal are set together, #2Co 7:11; desire after the sincere milk, and growth in grace, #1Pe 2:2. John Baptist’s hearers so desired after heaven that they offered violence to it, #Mt 11:12. True affections are the breathings of a broken heart, #Ac 2:37 Ro 7:23. But the desires of the slothful kill him, #Pr 21:25. Virtutem exoptat contabescitque relicta (Pers.), Good affections are ill bestowed upon the sluggard, since they boil not up to the full heat and height of resolution for God, or, at least, of execution of his will. The sails of a ship are not ordained that she should lie always at road, but launch out into the deep. God likes not qualmy Christians, good by fits, as Saul seemed to be, when David’s innocence triumphed in his conscience, or as Ephraim, whose duties were dough-baked, and whose goodness was as the morning dew, &c. "Be ye stedfast and unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord." Stick not at any part of it; difficulty doth but whet on heroic spirits, as a bowl that runs downhill is not slugged, but quickened, by a rub in the way. If this be to be vile, I will be yet more vile, #2Sa 6:22 "Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain," #Zec 4:7 "And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness," #2Co 12:9.

For I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts] By a twofold presence: 1. Of help and assistance; 2. Of love and acceptance. Of the first see #Hag 1:13. {See Trapp on "Hag 1:13"} The second seems here intended. The Jews were poor, yet God assureth them they had his love. So had the Church of Smyrna, #Re 2:9, I know thy poverty, but that is nothing, thou art rich, rich in reversion, rich in bills and bonds; yea, rich in possession, or, All is theirs, they hold all in capite: they have, 1. plenty; 2. propriety in things of greatest price; for they have God all-sufficient for their portion, for their protection. "I am with you," saith he, and that is enough, that is able to counterpoise any defect whatsoever, as we see in David often, but especially at the sack of Ziklag; where, when he had lost all, and his life also was in suspense, the text saith, he comforted or "encouraged himself in the Lord his God," #1Sa 30:6; whereas Saul in like case goes first to the witch, and then to the sword’s point. A godly man, if any occasion of discontent befall him, retires himself into his counting-house, and there tells over his spiritual treasure; he runs to his cordials, he reviews his white stone, #Re 2:17, his new name ("better than that of sons and of daughters," #Isa 56:5), he hath meat to eat that the world knoweth not of, the stranger meddleth not with his joy. Virtus lecythos habet in malis. Tua praesentia, Domine, Laurentio ipsam craticulam dulcem fecit, saith a father, Thy presence, O Lord, made the very gridiron sweet to the martyr Laurence. It made the fiery furnace a gallery of pleasure to the three worthies, the lions’ den a house of defence to Daniel, the whale’s belly a lodging chamber to Jonah, Egypt a harbour, a sanctuary, to the child Jesus, &c. He goes with his into the fire and water, as a tender father goeth with his child to the surgeon. "Nevertheless," saith David, "I am continually with thee: thou hast holden me by my right hand. Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterwards receive me to glory," #Ps 73:23,24. Again, "I am with you"; that is, I will accept your worships, though in this meaner temple. If God may have the substance of worship, he stands not much upon the circumstance. The sick may pray upon their beds, the persecuted in chambers, #Ac 1:12-14, yea, "in dens and caves of the earth," #Heb 11:38. The Church, in Queen Mary’s days, met and prayed often together in a cellar in Bow church yard. It was one of the laws of the twelve tables in Rome, Ad divos adeunto caste, pietatem adhibento, opes amovento. The upright shall approach to the gods, they shall summon the righteous, they shall put away their deeds. "Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire" (viz. in comparison of obedience, #1Sa 15:22), but, as a better thing, "mine ears hast thou opened," #Ps 40:6. Hypocrites by cold ceremonies think to appease God; they observe the circumstance, neglect the substance; they stick in the bark of rebellion, gnabble on the shell, offer the skin, keep back the flesh, serve God with shows; and shall be served accordingly.

Ver. 5. According to the word] Or, as Tremellius hath it better, Cum VERBO quo pepigeram vobiscum, With the WORD, in and for whom I covenanted with you, &c. So my Spirit remaineth among you. And so it is a gracious promise that the whole Trinity will be with them. The particle eth seemeth put for gnayim; and the article he is emphatic, showing that by Word is meant the second person, often called the Word both in the Old Testament, #2Sa 7:21 cf. #1Ch 17:19, and in the New, #Lu 1:2 Joh 1:1 1Jo 5:7. The Chaldee seemeth to favour this interpretation, for he rendereth it, My word shall be your help. Jerome, Albertus, Nyssen, and Haymo dissent not. Haggai, and other prophets and patriarchs of old, did well understand the mystery of the sacred Trinity. {See Trapp on "Ge 1:1"} Elihu speaks of the Almighty his makers, #Job 35:10. Solomon the same, #Ec 12:1 So 1:11, which Jarchi interpreteth of the Trinity. Isaiah hath his Trisagion, or, "Holy, holy, holy," #Isa 6:3 In #Isa 42:5 "Thus saith God the Lord, he that created the heavens, and they that stretched them out." So #De 6:4, when Moses beginneth to rehearse the law, and to explain it, the first thing he teacheth them is the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity. "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one." Three words answering the three persons; and the middle word, "our God," deciphering fitly the second, who assumed our nature, as is well observed by Galatinus. Others observe that the last letters in the original, both in the word "hear" and in the word "one," are bigger than ordinary; as calling for utmost heed and attention. The old Rabbis were no strangers to this tremendous mystery (as appeareth by R. Solomen’s note on #So 1:11 "We will make," &c.), though their posterity desperately deny it. The Greek Church was not as sound in this fundamental point; therefore their chief city, Constantinople, was taken from them by the Turks (as Estius observeth) on Whitsunday, or (as others) on Trinity Sunday; which day (saith our chronicler) the Black Prince was used every year to celebrate with the greatest honour that might be, in due veneration of so divine a mystery. Now, Christ is here and elsewhere called The Word, either because he is so often promised in the word, or else because by him God’s will was manifested and revealed to men, and that either mediately, in the prophets, whence Peter, martyr, thinketh that phrase came, Then came the word of the Lord, that is, Christ; or, immediately, himself, #Heb 1:2 2:3.

That I covenanted with you] Or, in whom I covenanted, and whence Christ is called the angel of the covenant, #Mal 3:1. Christ, then, was a Saviour to those of the Old Testament also, "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," #Re 13:8. Christ undertook to pay his people’s debt in the fulness of time; and hereby they were saved. A man may let a prisoner loose now upon a promise to pay the debt a year after. See #Heb 9:15, and take notice of the unity of the faith in both Testaments; they of old saw Christ afar off in the promises, they greeted him (ασπασαμενοι), and were regreeted by him, #Heb 11:13

When ye came out of Egypt] Ye, that is, your ancestors. Things done by the parents may be said to be done by the children; because of the near conjunction that is between them. Hence Levi is said to pay tithes in Abraham, #Heb 7:9, and Adam’s sin is imputed to us all.

So my spirit remaineth among you] Not the substance, but the gifts of the Spirit; not the tree, but the fruits. Those whom God receiveth into the covenant of grace he endues them with the spirit of grace. See #Ro 8:9,11. How else should they be able to perform their part of the covenant, since we cannot so much as suspirare unless he do first inspirare, breathe out a sigh for sin till he breathe it in to us by his Spirit? Hereby, then, we may know whether or not we are in covenant with God (the devil will be sure to sweep all that are not), sc. if his Spirit remain in us, #Jer 31:33, working illumination, #1Co 2:14,15, mortification, #Ro 8:13, motion, #Ro 8:14, gifts, #1Co 12:4,7,8, &c., fruits, #Ga 5:22,23, strength, #Isa 11:2, courage, as here.

Fear ye not] Cur timer hominem homo, in sinu Dei positus (Aug.)? Why should such fear man who have God in Christ by his Spirit standing with them and for them? The righteous may be bold as a lion; he hath the peace of God within him and the power of God without him, and so goes ever under a double guard; what need he fear? It is said of Achilles that he was Styge armatus, and therefore could not be wounded. But he that is in covenant with God is Deo, Christo, Spiritu Saneto armatus, and may therefore be fearless of any creature.

Ver. 6. For thus saith the Lord of hosts] i.e. The three persons in Trinity, as appeareth by the note on the former verse. Howbeit, the author to the Hebrews, #Heb 12:25,26, applieth the words to Christ; whence observe that Christ is Lord of hosts and God Almighty; even the same second person that is called haddabhar, the Word, in the former verse, is very God. #Joh 1:3 cf. Col 1:14,16 #Joh 1:9 cf. Joh 8:12 #Joh 1:11 cf. Ac 3:13-15. See those coherencies of sentences, #Joh 9:3,4 11:4 12:39,40, besides the apostle’s argument, #Heb 1:4. That one Gospel written by St John, who was therefore called the Divine, by an excellency (as afterwards Nazianzen also was), because he doth professedly assert and vindicate the Divinity of Christ (ever strongly impugned by the devil and his agents, those odious apostates and heretics ancient and modern; and no wonder, for it is the rock, #Mt 16:18), setting him forth, 1. As co-essential to the Father, his only begotten Son, #Joh 1:14. One with the Father in essence and power, #Joh 10:30,38 14:23 2. As having the incommunicable names and attributes of God, #Joh 8:58 20:28. Eternity, #Joh 1:1 17:5, infiniteness, #Joh 3:18, omniscience, #Joh 2:24 21:22 3. As doing the works of God, such as are creation, #Joh 1:3, conservation, #Joh 5:17, miracles, &c. 4. As taking to himself divine worship, #Joh 9:38 20:28 14:1. This truth men must hold fast as their lives, and be rooted in it; getting strong reasons for what they believe. The second ground wanted depth of earth; the seed was good and the earth was good, but there was not enough of it; therefore the heat of the sun scorched it up. Christ is here called the Lord of hosts, and the Lord of glory, #Isa 6:1 cf. Joh 12:41 Jas 2:1.

Yet once, it is a little while, &c.] Adhuc unum pusillum. This little little while, this inch of time, was the better part of 500 years, viz. till Christ came in the flesh, #Heb 12:26, the Jewish doctors say no less. A long time to us is but a little while to God. A thousand years is but as one day to the Ancient of days. His prophets also, being lifted up in spirit to the consideration of eternity, count and call all times (as indeed they are in comparison) moments, and points of time: Punctum est quod vivimus, et puncto minus, could the poet say. What is that to the infinite? said a certain nobleman of this land to one, discoursing of an incident matter very considerable, but was taken off with this quick interrogation. So say we to ourselves, when under any affliction, we begin to think long of God’s coming to deliver us. What is this to eternity of extremity, which yet we have deserved? Tantillum, tantillum, adhuc pusillum. Yet a very little while and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry; as in the interim, the just must live by faith, #Heb 10:37. God’s help seems long, because we are short. We are short-breathed, short-sighted, apt to antedate the promises, in regard of the accomplishment. We also often find it more easy to bear evil than to wait till the promised good be enjoyed. Those believing Hebrews found by experience that the spoiling of their goods exercised their patience; but staying God’s leisure for the good things he had promised them required more than ordinary patience, or tarriance #Heb 10:36. Take we heed of prescribing to the Almighty, of limiting the Holy One of Israel, of setting him a time, with those Bethulians.

And I will shake the heavens] Not the earth only, as at the giving of the law (to purchase reverence to the law-giver), but the heavens also; viz. by the powerful preaching of the gospel, whereby Satan was seen falling from heaven, #Lu 10:18, that is, from men’s hearts; and the saints set together in heavenly places, or privileges in Christ Jesus, #Eph 2:6. For he that hath the Son hath life, #1Jo 5:10, he hath heaven beforehand. 1. In pretio. In price. 2. In promisso. On Promise. 3. In primitiis. In the firstfruits. Here, then, the prophet encourageth these builders; telling them that under this second temple, how mean soever it seemed, he would first send Christ (called the desire of all nations, #Hag 2:7, and peace, #Hag 2:9 cf. Eph 2:14) to grace it with his presence. Secondly, he would cause the gospel to be preached in a pompous and powerful manner. "I will shake," &c. Shake them, to settle them, not to ruin them, but to refine them, shake their hearts with sense of sin and fear of wrath, that they may truly seek Christ. "For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ," #Joh 1:17. And the end of this universal shake was to show, saith Chrysostom, that the old law was to be changed into the new, Moses into Messiah, the prophets into evangelists, Judaism and Gentilism into Christianism. When Christ was born we know how Herod was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him, #Mt 2:3. What a choir of angels was heard in the air at Bethlehem, and what wondering there was at those things which were told them by the shepherds, #Lu 2:18. Eusebius tells of three suns seen in heaven not long before his birth. Orosius tells of many more prodigies. The Psalmist, foretelling our Saviour’s coming in the flesh, breaks out into this joyful exclamation; "Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad: let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof. Let the field be joyful, and all that is therein: then shall all the trees of the wood reioice before the Lord: for he cometh, for he cometh to judge the earth: he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with truth," #Ps 96:11-13 98:7-9. This, I know, is by some (but not so properly) understood of Christ’s second coming to judgment. And both Augustine and Rupertus construe this text also the same way. But the whole stream of interpreters, old and new, carry it against them; and some of them tell us of various strange and stupendous commotions that occured even according to the letter, in heaven, earth, and sea, about the time of Christ’s birth, death, resurrection, and soon after his ascension, when he rode about the world upon his white horse, the apostles and their successors, #Ps 45:4; with a crown upon his head, as King of his Church, and a bow in his hand, the doctrine of the gospel, whereby the people fall under him, "and he went forth conquering, and to conquer," #Re 6:2.

Ver. 7. And I will shake all nations] First, by the civil wars between the Triumviri, not long before Christ’s incarnation. Secondly, by the general tax, #Lu 2:3, when all went to be taxed every one into his own city. Thirdly, by the preaching and miracles of Christ and his apostles, whereby the nations were shaken out of their sinful condition, and brought to the obedience of faith by effectual conversion. Thus a Lapide. "I will shake all nations" with wonder at so great a mystery, with joy and with newness of life, saith Sa. The gospel (saith Forbes on #Re 14:6) hath three degrees of operation in the hearts of men. First, it falleth to men’s ears as the sound of many waters, a confused sound, which commonly bringeth neither terror nor joy; but yet a wondering and acknowledgment of a strange force, and more than human power, #Mr 1:22,23 Lu 4:32 Joh 7:46. This may be in the reprobate, #Ac 13:41. The second effect is the voice of thunder, which brings not only wonder, but fear. This may also be in a reprobate, as Felix. The third effect, proper to the elect, is the sound of harping; while the gospel not only ravisheth with admiration, and shaketh the conscience with terror, but also filleth it with sweet peace and joy. Certain it is, that the gospel maketh a stir where it cometh, and brings an earthquake to men’s souls, as it did to the jailer’s, #Ac 16:26,27, and Peter’s converts, #Ac 2:37 And this partly through the frowardness of our affections, and partly through the malice of Satan, fearing the ruin of his kingdom. For, as for the gospel, this effect follows it, by accident. See #Mt 10:34,35, {See Trapp on "Mt 10:34"} {See Trapp on "Mt 10:35"} See also #Lu 12:49. It is by accident to the sun that it maketh the dunghill stink. It is by accident to the sea that it maketh the passenger sick; the ill humours in his stomach disease him. So here.

And the desire of all nations shall come] That is, Christ, for so the apostle expoundeth it, #Heb 12:25,26. And the Church saith of him, Totus ipse desideria, #So 5:16, he is all over desirable ( Valete mea desideria. Goodbye my love, Cic. xiv. 2, ad Uxorem et Filiam to wives and daughters). And again, #Isa 26:9 "With my soul have I desired thee in the night: yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early." "And unto Shiloh shall the gathering of the people be," saith Jacob, #Ge 49:10, as unto the standard bearer, #So 5:10, the carcase, #Mt 24:28, as the doves scour to their columbaries, #Isa 60:8. When I am lifted up, saith he, I will draw all men after me, #Joh 12:32, that is, all mine elect; these will follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth, as the hop and heliotrope {a} do the sun. And because the nations had not heard of Christ till he came in the flesh, and this coming of the desire of all nations seems to follow presently upon the preaching of the gospel, therefore Junius renders it Desiderati, the desirable ones of all nations, and interprets it, of the elect (the Septuagint also say the same, of οι εκλεκτοι των εθνων), who should come to the second temple in a spiritual sense, worshipping the same God that these good Jews did, and should come with strength of affection (as the Hebrew importeth), should make hard shift to come, #Isa 66:20 "They shall bring your brethren as an offering to the Lord, upon horses, in chariots, and in litters," that is, though sick, weakly, and unfit for travel, yet rather in litters than not at all. Neither shall they come empty handed, but with all their desirable things (so some render this text), colligent omnes suos thesauros, saith Calvin, they shall come with strong affections, with liberal contributions, as #Ac 4:34, and as Tyrus, who, when once converted, leaves hoarding and heaping up wealth (as formerly), and finds another manner of employment for it, namely, to uphold God’s worship, and to feed and clothe his saints, #Isa 23:18.

And I will fill this house with glory] This rebuilding temple shall be honoured with Christ’s bodily presence (Diodati); and the spiritual temple, which is the Church, shall be honoured by my presence in spirit, the abundance of my graces, the light of my word, and power of my spirit, who shall rest upon my people as a spirit of glory when the world loadeth them with greatest ignominy, #1Pe 4:14, rest upon them by a blessed Shechinah.

{a} A name given to plants of which the flowers turn so as to follow the sun; ŒD

Ver. 8. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts] Whereas the Jews might object that it was not likely the second temple should be more glorious than the first, since they wanted that wealth wherewith Solomon abounded; God answereth in like sort, as once he did Moses, alleging the slowness of his speech, "Who hath made man’s mouth?" #Ex 4:10,11, so here, whose is the silver and the gold? Am not I the true proprietor and chief Lord of all? cannot I furnish you out of my great purse, the earth, and the fulness thereof? #Ps 24:1 ( Terra est marsupium Domini). What is silver and gold but white and red earth, the guts and garbage of the earth, as one phraseth it? things that I have no need of, #Ps 50:13. They lie furthest from heaven; the best of them are in Ophir (perhaps the same with Peru), furthest from the Church. Adam had them in the first paradise, #Ge 2:11,12, in the second you shall not need them, #Job 26:2,3, &c. In defect of other, I myself will be your gold, and you shall have plenty of silver, #Job 22:25. Christ, girt about the paps (that seat of love) with a golden girdle, shall walk in the midst of his seven golden candlesticks, #Re 1:12,13, with a golden censer in his hand, perfuming and presenting the prayers of his people upon the golden altar, #Re 8:3, and measuring that city of pearl, his Church, with a golden reed, #Re 21:15. Ribera and some others think that God, as of old he had stirred up Cyrus and Darius (both of them heathens) to contribute to the building of the temple, so afterwards he stirred up Herod, a wealthy king, not long before Christ came, to bestow abundance of cost upon the same temple; and that this was here afore prophesied. But I should rather incline to Calvin, who doubteth not but that the devil stirred up Herod to do as he did; that the Jews, doting upon the splendour of that brave structure (the disciples did no less, #Mt 24:1,2), might cease looking for Christ or trusting in him. And who knows (saith be) whether Herod himself might not have such a fetch in his head. Howsoever, the devil was in it, doubtless, to take off their minds from the expectation of Christ’s coming, which was now at hand, by those external pomps; and to withdraw the spirits of the godly from the furniture and gaiety of the spiritual temple. We know how the disciples (who, leavened with the leaven of the Pharisees, dreamt of an earthly kingdom) were taken with the beauty and bravery of Herod’s temple, showing the same to our Saviour, and fondly conceiting that by that goodly sight he might be moved to moderate the severity of that former sentence of his, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate," #Mt 23:38 24:1. But his thoughts were not as their thoughts. The bramble reckoned it a great matter to reign over the trees; so did not the vine and olive. The Papists hold that God is delighted with golden and silver vessels in the administration of the eucharist, and offended with the contrary. But the primitive Christians celebrated the sacrament of the Lord’s supper in vessels first of wood, and afterwards of glass. That saying also of Ambrose is well known, Aurum sacramenta non quaerunt, nec auro placent, quae auro non emuntur. It was grown to a proverb soon after Constantine’s time, Once we had golden ministers and wooden vessels, now we have wooden ministers and golden vessels. Religion brought forth wealth; and the mother devoured the daughter.

Ver. 9. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former] Because Christ shall appear and preach in it, {as #Hag 2:7} who is the brightness of his Father’s glory, ac consequenter urbis et orbis; any relation to whom heighteneth and ennobleth both places and persons. Bethlehem, though it be the least, {#Mic 3:6} is yet not the least among the princes of Judah, {#Mt 2:6} because Christ was born there. The tribe of Naphtali is first reckoned of those by Rachel’s side; because at Capernaum, in this tribe, Christ inhabited, #Re 7:6, in which respect also this town is said to be lifted up to heaven, #Mt 11:2,3. Benjamin is called the beloved of the Lord, #Ge 42:4, God’s darling (as their father Benjamin was old Jacob’s), because God dwelt between his shoulders, sc. in his temple built upon those two mountains, Moriah and Zion, #De 33:12. The glory of that first temple was, that the majesty of God appeared in it, covering itself in a cloud. The glory of this latter house was greater, because therein the same Divine majesty appeared, not covered with a cloud but really incarnated. "For the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth," #Joh 1:14. In this flesh of ours, and under this second temple, Christ not only uttered oracles, did miracles, and finished the great work of our redemption, but also laid the foundation of the Christian Church. For the law (that perfect law of liberty, the gospel, #Jas 1:25) came out of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem, to all the ends of the earth, #Isa 2:3 Ps 110:1. From hence it was that the Lord of glory, whom the blind Jews had crucified, sent out his apostles, those messengers of the churches, and the glory of Christ, as they are called, #2Co 8:23, to gather together unto him those desirable ones his elect, {#Hag 2:7} {See Trapp on "Hag 2:7"} whom he calleth the glory, #Isa 46:13, the house of his glory, #Isa 60:7, a crown of glory, #Isa 62:3, the throne of glory, #Jer 14:21, the ornament of God, #Eze 7:20, the beauty of his ornament, and that set in majesty, a royal diadem in the hand of Jehovah, #Isa 62:3.

And in this place will I give peace] Even the Prince of peace, and with him all things also, #Ro 8:32, pacem Pectoris et Temporis, Peace of country and of conscience; this latter especially seemeth here to be meant. For the former (viz. outward peace) was not long enjoyed by these Jews; and their second temple was often spoiled by the enemies, and at length burned and overturned. But the "peace of God that passeth all understanding" is that legacy which the world can neither give nor take from God’s people, #Joh 14:27. And of this inward peace the Septuagint (according to the Roman edition) taketh the text, and so doth Ambrose; Haec est pax super pacem, This is peace above peace. saith he. Christ, as he Was brought from heaven, with that song of peace, #Lu 2:14 "On earth peace, good will toward men" (which is the same with that salutation of St Paul, who learned it, belike, of those angels, "Grace be to you, and peace"), so he returned up again with that farewell of peace, #Joh 14:27, and left to the world the doctrine of peace, the gospel of peace, #Eph 2:17, whose author is the God of peace, #1Co 14:33, whose ministers are ministers of peace, #Ro 10:15, whose followers are the children of peace, #Lu 10:6, whose unity is in the bond of peace, #Eph 4:3, whose duty is the study of peace, #Ro 12:18; and whose end is, to enter into peace, to rest in their beds, their souls resting in heaven, their bodies in the grave till the joyful resurrection, even every one walking in his uprightness, #Isa 57:2 Ps 37:33.

Ver. 10. In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius] This diligence of the prophets in noting and noticing the precise time of God’s hand upon them, should teach us to do the like. {See Trapp on "Hag 1:1"} The churches in Switzerland kept that day yearly as a holiday whereon the Reformation began among them (Scultet. Annal). Bugenhagius kept a feast every year on that day of the month wherein he and some other divines had finished the Dutch Bible, and called it The feast of the translation of the Bible (Melch. Adam in Vit. Bugenhag.). The University of Heidelberg kept an evangelical jubilee three whole days together, A. D. 1617, on the first of November, in the remembrance of the renowned Reformation of religion begun by Luther just a hundred years before. Hereby God s name shall be sanctified, our faith strengthened, and our good affection both evidenced and excited. By the time here described it appeareth that they had now been three months building, and the prophet meanwhile had given them great encouragement thereunto. But forasmuch as he found that they stuck in the bark, as they say, rested in the work done, thought they should therefore win upon God because they built him a temple, the prophet gives them to understand that there is more required of them than a temple, viz. that therein they worship the Lord purely and holily, in spirit and in truth; that their divine worship be right both quoad fontem et quoad finem, for principle and end of intention; for else they impure all that they touch, and are no whit better, but a great deal the worse for all their performances. This the prophet teacheth them in the two following oracles propounded by way of demand to the priests. How apt are men to lose themselves in a wilderness of duties! to dig for pearls in their own dunghills! to think to oblige God to themselves by their good works! to spin a thread of their own to climb up to heaven by! to rest in their own righteousness! to save themselves by riding on horses! #Ho 14:8. The prophet’s design is here to beat them off from such fond conceits; telling them that the person must be accepted ere the service can be regarded, as Abel’s. "To the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure, but even their mind and conscience is defiled," saith the apostle, #Tit 1:15. Calvin upon this text saith no more; and yet Corn. a Lapide is very angry with him for saying so much. There is in Peter Lombard this golden sentence cited out of Augustine: The whole life of unbelievers is sin: neither is anything good without the chiefest good. This sentence Ambrose Ribera, a Popish expositor, censureth for harsh and cruel ( Crudelis est ills sententia); but doth not God here say the same thing? Certain it is that good actions from bad men displease; as a man may speak good words, but we cannot hear, because of his stinking breath. "The sacrifice of the wicked is abomination to the Lord," #Pr 15:8. Charity is nothing unless it flow out "of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned," #1Ti 1:5.

Ver. 11. Ask now the priest concerning the law] For who should know the law better than the priests? And who so fit to resolve cases of conscience as they? It was their office, #Le 10:10,11 De 33:10 Mal 2:7. See the note there. It was an evil time with God’s people when he was put to complain, "Who is blind, but my servant? or deaf, as my messenger that I sent?" #Isa 42:19. When the prophet was a fool, the spiritual man was mad for the multitude of their iniquity, and the great hatred, #Ho 9:7. Varro upbraided the Roman priests of old with their gross ignorance of many things in point of their own rites and religions; and Cicero brake a jest upon Gaius Popilius, an ignorant lawyer, at Rome. For when Popilius, being called for a witness to some controversy, answered, Nihil se scire, that he knew nothing, Cicero answered, by way of jeer, Paras fortasse te de iure interrogari, You mean (perhaps) that you know nothing in the law, which yet you profess to have skill in. What a shame was it for the Pharisees, who took upon them to be guides of the blind, teachers of babes, &c., #Ro 2:19,20, to be found "blind leaders of the blind!" #Mt 15:14 So is it for divines, being asked concerning the law, or will of God, in such and such cases, not to be able to answer discreetly (νουνεχως), and intelligently, as he did #Mr 12:34, as an egregie cordatus homo? distinguished wise man. But so bungler-like, and so far from the purpose, that it may well be seen that "desiring to be teachers of the law, they understand neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm," #1Ti 1:7. How like the motion of a puppet, the language of a parrot, is the discourse of such unlearned or uninterested casuists! Every minister of God’s making can truly say, "The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know to time a word to him that is weary: he wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned," #Isa 10:4. See #1Co 12:8 Tit 1:9 Eph 3:4,7 1Co 2:13.

Ver. 12. If one bear holy flesh in the skirt, &c.] Problems and parables are notable helps to the bolting out of the truth, and conviction of the gainsayers. For problems see #Mt 13:10-15 21:25 22:42. For parables see #Jud 9:7-15, that of Jotham, of Nathan, #2Sa 12:1-4, of the woman of Tekoah, #2Sa 14:5-7, of our Saviour concerning the two brethren sent into the vineyard, the wedding of the king’s son, the sower. {See Trapp on "Hag 2:10"}

And the priests answered and said, No] Roundly and readily; without hacking and hewing, without doubling and dissembling; as those perverse priests, those self-condemned hierophants, {a} #Mt 21:27, that, against their consciences, "answered Jesus and said, We cannot tell." The wit of graceless persons will better serve them to falter and fumble, deny, or devise a thousand shifts to evade and elude the truth, than their malice will suffer them to yield to it, or profess it. This is to detain the truth in unrighteousness, #Ro 1:18, as Plato, who had the knowledge of one God, yet he dared not to communicate it to the common people; and as some of the chief champions of Popery, who held justification by faith alone, but refused to say so, lest their Dagon should down, their Diana be despised. Let every spiritual man (but especially ministers) be ready, as to every good work, so to this of comparing spiritual things with spiritual, that he may judge or discern of all things, #1Co 2:13,15, according to the analogy of faith, #Ro 12:6, the tenor of the Scriptures, his sure cynosura; and laying up all in his heart, #Lu 2:18, he may have a treasure there of new and old, a word of wisdom and a word of knowledge too, #1Co 12:8, both as a teacher and as a pastor, to bring forth for common benefit.

{a} Antiq. An official expounder of sacred mysteries or religious ceremonies, esp. in ancient Greece; an initiating or presiding priest. ŒD

Ver. 13. If one that is unclean by a dead body] With a ceremonial uncleanness. The Hebrew hath it thus, If one that is unclean in soul, that is, in his whole person, as every wicked man is totus totus pollutus, wholly covered with corruption, a loathsome leper from head to foot, wholly set upon sin, as #Ex 32:22, lying down in wickedness, or in that wicked one, #1Jo 5:19, sick of such a disease as the physicians call corruptionem totius substantiae, nay, dead in sins and trespasses, #Eph 2:1; and can therefore do no better than dead work at best, #Heb 9:14, such as the living God will not be served with. {See Trapp on "Mal 3:16"} doct. 4, use 1. He is unclean, unclean, and impureth all that he toucheth, according to that which followeth.

Ver. 14. So is this people, and so is this nation before me] Though pure in their own eyes, #Pr 30:12, and to the world-ward unrebukeable, as Paul the Pharisees, #Php 2:14,15, and those self-justiciaries, #Lu 16:14,15 "Ye are those that justify yourselves" (and have the world’s good word for you), "but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God." Sordet in conspectu iudicis quod fulget in conspectu operantis. Filthy in the sight of the judge who glisten in the sight of their works. Wicked men’s services are but glistering sins ( splendida peccata), they rejoice in a thing of nought, as Amos hath it, #Am 6:13, like as Leah rejoiced in that whereof she had cause to repent, and said, "God hath given me my hire," when she had more cause to say, God, I fear, will give me my hire, my payment, "because I have given my maiden to my husband," #Ge 30:18. But she was in the common error of measuring and judging of things by the success; as if God were not many times angry with men, though they outwardly prosper; or as if there were not here one event to the clean and to the unclean, #Ec 9:2. Until the day that God shall separate the sheep from the goats, whom for the glory of his name and the good of his people he suffers for present to go one among another, to make his own to stick the faster together and to their principles. Shepherds say that it is wholesome for a flock of sheep to have some goats to feed among them; their bad scent being good medicine for the sheep, to keep them from the shakings. {a} Only let God’s sheep take heed that they contract no corruption by conversing with goats; which is soon done, for sin is catching, and ill company is contagious. Nemo errat sibi ipsi; sed dementiam spargit in proxiruos, saith Seneca, No man errs out of the right way alone, but draws others along. And multos sollicitat societas nefauda, saith Chrysostom, evil company soliciteth many to sin. Virtue is oft overcome by vice, saith Nazianzen, as a little wormwood sooner embittereth a great deal of honey than twice so much honey can sweeten a small deal of wormwood; or as one spoonful of vinegar will soon sour a great deal of sweet milk; but a great deal of milk will not so soon allay one spoonful of vinegar. Remove but one stone, and the whole river will rush downward; but you can hardly stop the stream again with a strong dam. Touch pitch and you shall presently be defiled, but touch soap and you shall not presently be made clean without much rubbing and rinsing. Mezentius the tyrant, Corpora a corporibus iungebat mortua vivis, tied living men to dead carcasses; but the dead did not revive the living, the living rather putrefied by reason of the dead. He that bore consecrated flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt touched bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any food, he made it not thereby holy. But if an unclean person touched any of these he made it unclean. The Donatists abused this text, to prove that baptism was defiled and vacated if administrated by an unregenerate minister; but Augustine again, against Fulgentius the Donatist, vindicateth the text from their false glosses, and asserteth from it the contrary truth. May not clean grain be sowed with foul hands, and grow nevertheless? May not a trumpet be well sounded by an impure breath? And is not the water in baptism, that cleanseth the child, cast afterwards into the draught? saith Gregory, Aqua baptismatis baptizatos ad regnum caelestis mittit, et ipsa postea in cloacam descendit.

So is this people, and so is that nation before me, and so is every work of their hands, and that which they offer, &c.] Note the order of the induction. First, themselves were unclean, both people and nation; there was a general defection and defilement ran through all sorts and sexes, as the woof runs through the warp; so that they were all together but one continued web of wickedness, as it were, spun out and made up by the hands of the devil, and the flesh, an evil spinner, and a worse weaver; both root and fruit were nought, as #Isa 5:4, both head, heart, and foot were out of order, #Isa 1:5,6, and they are barely and boldly told of it by the prophets. Secondly, the works of their hands were unclean; for not only the praying, but "the plowing of the wicked, is sin," #Pr 21:4, all their natural and civil actions also are abominable. Whether they plough, or play, or eat, or sleep: corruption is like copperas, {b} which will turn wine or milk into ink; or leaven, which turns a very passover into pollution; or as the sanies of a plague sore, which will render the richest robe infectious. Thirdly, that which they offer there, their sacrifices and all their religious performances, were likewise unclean; not in respect of God, who commanded them; nor of the matter, for they offered clean beasts; but of the manner of offering (which makes or mars the action), and of the men, who were unregenerate, and rested in the work done, and drew near to God with their lips, thinking to put God off with an external worship only; Ludenies cum Deo tanquam pueri cum suis puppis, as Calvin hath it, that is, playing with God, as children do with their babies. The poets declaimed against this foppery, as Persius; and another, Non bene caelestes impia dextra colit.

{a} A disease in sheep and swine. Also the ague. ŒD

{b} A name given from early times to the protosulphates of copper, iron, and zinc (distinguished as blue, green, and white copperas respectively). ŒD

Ver. 15. And now, I pray you, consider] Heb. Lay it upon your heart, as #Hag 1:5; {See Trapp on "Hag 1:5"} The often repetition of this precept sets forth, 1. The necessity of the duty pressed. 2. Their singular stupidity, that were no more affected with such manifest marks of God’s wrath upon them; no, though he had even snatched the meat out of their mouths, and kept them hunger-starved, which is the way of taming the most untameable creatures.

From this day and upward] To the end that when I shall have blessed you with greater plenty, as #Hag 2:19, ye may recognize your sins, the cause of your calamities, and, remembering (as Jacob did his baculinam paupertatem, #Ge 32:10) your former penury, you may thankfully cry out with that noble Iphicrates; From how hungry to how plentiful an estate am I raised (εξ οιων εις οια)! Let a profane Demetrius attribute such a change as this to blind fortune, saying, Ευ με εφυσας συ και καταθειν δοκεις. But let all saints sing with holy Hannah, "They that were full have hired themselves out for bread; and they that were hungry ceased. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich; he bringeth low, and lifteth up," #1Sa 2:5,7.

From before a stone was laid upon a stone] i.e. Before there was any hand set to the work of rebuilding the temple, which was interrupted for many years, after the return from Babylon. See #Ezr 3:8 5:2.

Ver. 16. Since those days were] Or, as some read it, Antequam essent in eo opere, Before they were about that work, minding God’s house more than their own.

When one came to an heap of twenty measures] That is, where you expected twenty measures (and experienced good husbands can partly guess at harvest how their grain will yield when threshed out) there were but ten. God’s hand was upon your increase, not in the field only, but also in the floor; so that you were defeated and your hopes frustrated; and not in the barn only, but at the winepress too, God hath cut you short. This was that which was long before threatened, but little regarded, #De 28:20. Carnal men read the threats of God’s law as they do the old stories of foreign wars, or as they behold the wounds and blood in a picture, or piece of coat of arms, which never makes them smart or fear. This hasteneth their judgment, and shows them ripe for wrath, even then when they think themselves far enough out of the reach of God’s rod.

Ver. 17. I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail] Pugnis pluvi, colaphis grandinavi, I have followed you close with one judgment upon another; and all to bring you back into mine own bosom; that as ye had run from me by your sins, so ye might return to me by repentance; but, behold, I have lost my labour, and ye have lost the fruit of your sufferings, which indeed is a very great loss, were ye but soundly sensible of it, Perdidistis fructum calamitatis (Aug.). These Jews were sensible of their calamities and disasters abroad and at home, but they did not wisely inquire into the cause thereof; as David did into the cause of the famine that fell out in his days, #2Sa 21:1. God had not hitherto "given them a heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear," as it is #De 29:4. And as #Isa 9:13 "The people turneth not unto him that smiteth them, neither do they seek the Lord of hosts." But after their hardness and impenitent heart treasured up wrath, &c., #Ro 2:5. They could not but see themselves grievously crossed, and cursed in all the labours of their hands. Neither were they so blind as not to see God in that they suffered. They had learned that out of #Ps 78:47,48 29:3, &c. Cicero indeed thought that God minds not mildew, or hail, &c. Nec si uredo aut grando quippiam nocuit, id Iovi animadvertendum fuit: neque enim in regni reges omnia minima curant, &c. As kings take not notice of smaller businesses in their kingdoms, saith he, so neither doth God of these ordinary occurrences. But the Jews (for the generality) had learned better things. And the apostle tells those heathens too, #Ac 14:15-17, that God had not left himself without witness among them, in that he did good and gave rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, &c. Cicero himself likewise, another time, could say, Curiosus est et plenus negotii Deus, God taketh care of all, and is full of business. And oh that this truth were as fruitfully improved as it is generally acknowledged! Oh that men would turn at God’s reproof; his real reproofs, his vocal rods, #Mic 6:9; and not put him to his old complaint, "Why should ye be smitten any more? ye revolt more and more," #Isa 1:5. This we may wish, but God alone can effect. For till he please to thrust his holy hand into men’s bosoms, and pull off the foreskin of their hearts; afflictions (those hammers of his) do but beat cold iron. See #Jer 2:30,31 6:29,30 Le 26:41. Plectimur a Deo, nec flectimur tamen: corripimur sed non corrigimur (Salvian.). We are put to pain, but to no profit, #Jer 12:13, as Ahaz, that stiff stigmatic, #2Ch 28:23, and Ahaziah, who sent a third captain to surprise the prophet, after two before consumed with fire from heaven, #2Ki 1:13; as if he would despitefully spit in the face of God, and wrestle a fall with the Almighty.

Ver. 18. Consider now from this day and upward] And see how punctually the time of benediction answereth to the time of your conversion; so that you no sooner begin to build, but I begin to bless. It is said of the men of Issachar, that they were in great account with David because they "had understanding of the times," #1Ch 12:32. It is certainly a point of spiritual prudence to consider the times, and to compare things past with present and future. Time is the wisest of all things, said Thales; the best counsellor, said Plutarch. Truth is the daughter of time, saith another philosopher. {See Trapp on "Hag 2:15"}

Ver. 19. Is the seed yet in the barn?] Jerome rendereth it, in germine, in the sprouting, or spirting, as they call it, and so far enough from the harvest; and yet farther, if yet in the barn, and not put into the ground. Nevertheless, for your diligence in building God’s house, I assure you, in the word of truth, that you shall have a very great increase, a plentiful harvest.

From this day will I bless you] And it is the blessing of God that maketh rich, as is to be seen in the examples of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. Others, whose godliness was their gain, whose piety was profitable to all things, as having the promises of both lives, #1Ti 4:8. Now all that are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham, #Ga 3:9, are heirs of the world with him, #Ro 4:13, and so have right to all things in Christ, the heir of all things, #1Co 3:22 Heb 1:2; though these things on earth be detained from them for the present by those men of God’s hand, #Ps 17:14, as Canaan was from Israel by the cursed Amorites, till their sins were full; yet they shall shortly have power over the nations, and (which is better) Christ will give them the morning star, #Re 2:28,22:16, that is, himself, and with himself a cornucopia of spiritual blessings, #Eph 1:3. The Lord that made heaven and earth will bless them out of Zion, that is, with better blessings than heaven or earth afforded. We read not here of any other blessings but increase of corn, wine, oil, &c., because this people was wholly almost affixed to earthly things. The prophet could not speak wisdom among those that were perfect, #1Co 2:6. But better things were implied and assured to the godly, as appeareth by the ensuing oracle.

Ver. 20. And again, the word of the Lord] Again the same day. Twice a day preaching is no new practice then. This prophet did it; so did our Saviour, #Mt 13:1. So did Chrysostom, as appeareth by his note on #1Th 5:17. So did Luther; which, because one Nicholas White commended in him, he was accused of heresy, in the reign of Henry VIII It is not so long since it was held here practical Puritanism. The late arch-prelate being sued unto by a nobleman to prefer a chaplain of his (whom he commended for an able divine, and a twice-a-day preacher), turned away in a great heat, saying, The more fool he.

Ver. 21. Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah] Governors are sure to meet with many difficulties and discouragements (high seats are never but uneasy), and had need therefore of singular consolation, that they may hold on their course, like the sun in the firmament, and show themselves to be of an undaunted resolution. We may well say to governors, as that prophetic Simeon spoke to the pillars which he whipped before the earthquake: Stand fast, for ye shall be shaken.

I will shake the heavens and the earth] sc. By abrogating and abolishing both Jewish ceremonies and heathenish superstitions, #Heb 12:27. As also by national commotions, and translations of monarchies; the Greeks shall break the power of the Persians, the Romans of the Greeks, the Goths and other barbarous nations of the Romans, #Mt 24:7. But especially, by casting the devil out of the heaven of men s hearts, #Lu 10:18, those strongholds wherein he had entrenched himself, #2Co 10:4,5, that the ransomed of the Lord may receive a kingdom, which cannot be moved, #Heb 12:28, and partake of those new heavens and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness, #2Pe 3:13, even that world to come, as these days of the gospel are called, #Heb 2:5. {See Trapp on "Heb 2:6"} {See Trapp on "Heb 2:7"}

Ver. 22. And I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms] sc. "By pouring contempt upon princes, and causing them to wander in the wilderness, where there is no way," #Ps 107:40 (as he dealt with Darius, the last Persian monarch); "by putting down the mighty from their seat, and exalting them of low degree," #Lu 1:52 (as he dealt with Bajazet, the Great Turk, and Tamerlane, the Scythian shepherd); by changing the times and the seasons, removing kings, and setting up others in their stead, #Da 2:21. All this God will do, and all that follows in the text, viz. destroy the strength of kingdoms, overthrow the chariots and their riders, &c., rather than his Church shall be unhelped or his kingdom of grace hindered. "Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth," #Ps 124:8, and will rather unmake all again than we shall be unrelieved. "Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion," #Ps 2:6. Yet, for all the sorrow, for all the malicious machinations and attempts of his enemies to the contrary; who are therehence admonished to be wise for themselves, and to kiss the Son, for he must reign, and all his foes must be his footstool. There is a council in heaven will dash the mould of all contrary councils upon earth. The stone cut out of the mountain without hands (which is Christ the conqueror) will break in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold. And in the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever, #Da 2:44,45. So, #Da 7:21,22,26,27, after that the prophet had described the greatness and glory of all the four menarchies, at length he comes to speak of a kingdom which is the greatest and mightiest under the whole heaven, and that is the kingdom of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom: and all rulers shall serve and obey him, #Da 7:27.

Ver. 23. I will take thee, O Zerubbabel] That is, O Christ, of whom Zerubbabel was both a father and a figure, #Lu 3:27 Zec 4:10 "I will take thee," that is, I will advance and exalt thee. See this expounded and applied by that great apostle, #Php 2:5-12.

And will make thee as a signet] That is, I will highly esteem thee, inviolably keep thee, and entirely love thee, #So 8:6 Jer 22:24, and all my people in thee, and for thee, #Isa 49:16.

For I have chosen thee] As #Isa 42:1. Quoniam in te mihi complacui, saith the Chaldee. For in thee I am well pleased, as #Mt 3:17. See the note there.

Saith the Lord of hosts] This is three different times set down in this one verse, for our greater assurance and confirmation of our faith. I shall close up all with that observation of divines, that all the prophets (except Jonah and Nahum) expressly end in some prophecy concerning Christ. He being their mark at which all of them chiefly aimed. Indeed, he is both mark and matter of both Old and New Testament. And therefore if we profit in teaching, hearing, reading, we must have the eye of our mind turned toward Christ, as the faces of the cherubims were toward the mercy-seat. Do this, if ever you will do well.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2