peopli:i into a display of energy and self-denial, and to encourage them to conti1'me their efforts till the whole work was satisfactorily completed. Steiner and others have questioned the £act that the rebuilding of the temple was begun under Cyrns. They say that no genuine passage in the Book of Ezra gives any conntennnce to the statement, and that it was only in consequence of the interference of Haggai and Zechariah that the work was first commenced in the second year of Darius, being then carried on without interruption till it was completed four years afterwards. Haggai himself does not expressly mention any earlier attempt a.t le.ying the foundation, and indeed places this event in the four and twentieth day of the ninth month of the second year of Darius ( eh. ii. 18). But this passage is capable of another interpretation ; and the direct statement of Ezra iii 8, that "in the second year of their coming . . . they began to set forward the work of the house of the Lord,'' and " the foundation of the house of the Lord we.a laid" (ver. 11), can only be surmounted by arbitrarily denying the genuineness of this chapter and the authenticity of its details. The grounds of this rejection are weak and inconclusive. When we consider the enormous importance attached to the rebuilding of the temple-which, indeed, was the test of fidelity to the Lord, and the desire to abide by the covenant-it is inconceivable that the good men who guided the nation should allow some sixteen years to elapse before making any attempt to set in hand the good work ; so that the very nature of the case confirms the statement of Ezra, while nothing in the books of Haggai and Zechariah really militates against it. On the contrary, there are passages in Haggai which distinctly involve its truth. Thus in eh. ii. 14 it is implied that formal sacrifices were offered before Hagge.i's public interference, and in eh. ii. 3 that the temple was already so far built that its future appearance and condition could be conceived. The book comprises four discourses, which make natural divisions, and a.re accurately dated. The first, uttered on the first day of the sixth month of Darius's second regnal year, contains an exhortation to Zernbbabel and Joshua to take in hand at once the rebuilding of the temple. The people are sternly reproached for their indifference, which they think to excuse by affirming that the time for this work has not yet come, while they expend their energies in increasing their own material comfort. The prophet shows them that the barrenness of their land and the distress which they suffer are a chastisement for this neglect. He concludes with an account of the effect of this expostulation, how that the chiefs and all the people listened to his words, and " came and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts " ( eh. i.). The following month witnessed the second address, wherein the prophet comforts those who, contrasting the new with the former temple, depreciated the present undertaking, and assures them that, although its appearance is humbler, the glory of the latter house shall far exceed that of the former, because of the splendid donations of princes, and because of M:essiah's presence there (oh. ii. 1-9). The third exhortation iv INTRODUCTION TO -- ----------------------------- was uttered in the four and twentieth day of the ninth month. Dy certain legal questions concerning the communication of holiness and pollution, Haggai demonstrates the.t the people's tendency to rest in external righteous- ness is sinfnl, and that their lukewarmness in the holy work before them vitiat,ed their worship e.nd occasioned want and misery, which would only be relie,ed by their strenuous efforts to finish the temple (eh. ii. 10-19). The prophecy ends with a promise to the scion of the house of David, that amid the destruction of the powers of the world, his throne should ,pe e.xa.lted and glorified," for I have chosen thee, saith the. Lord of hosts" (oh. ii. 20-23). The reason ·why the rebuilding of the temple is made of such ~ingular importance is found in the light in which the house of God is regarded, a.nd the opportunity thus afforded for displaying zeal and fidelity towards God. The temple is the visible token of the Lol'd's presence with hie people, the ma.terial sign of the covenant ; its restoration showed that the Israelites desired to maintain this relation with Jehovah, and to do their pa.rt in the matter. Here alone could the federal relation be renewed and sustained ; here alone could the daily worship be duly offered .. While the temple lay in ruins, the covenant was, as it were, i;uspended; for i.ts re-establishment the Lord's house .must be rebuilt and adapted to Divine service. A.ud yet this covenant was not simply a revival of the old one in its Sinaitic form; it was a new one, without the visible cloud of glory, without the ark and mercy-seat and the tables of the Law, but one attested by the very presence of :Messiah himself, and the laws of which were written in the heart and mind of the faithful. Of this the material build- ing was a symbol, and therefore its reconstruction was an imperative duty.
§ II. AUTHOR AND DATE.
Of the Prophet Haggai we know nothing save what may be gathered from his book e.nd a few words in Ezra. The name Haggai, in Greek 'Ayyai:os, is explained by St. Jerome to mean " Festive; " for, he says, he sowed in tears that he might reap in joy, when he witnessed the re-erection of the ruined temple. Reinke deems that he was so named because he was born on some great feast-.day. He is mentioned with Zechariah in Ezra (v. 1; vi. 14) as prophesying unto the Jews that were in Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, urging them to continue the work of rebuilding the house of the Lord. It has been conjectured, from eh. ii. 3, that he had seen the temple of Solomon, .that he was one, as Dr. Pusey says, "who had lived among the outward splendour of the former temple, who had himself been carried into captivity, and was now part of that.restoration which God had promised." But this idea is not supported by the language of the passage on which it is founded : " Who is ·le~ among you that saw the house in her first glory ? " If the conjecture ·were true, he would have been ·at least eighty years old at the time of hie prophecy, the date of which he hims1ilf THE BOOK OF HAGGAI. V