TEXT [Commentary]

black diamond   C.   The Response of the Remnant (1:12-15)

12 Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the whole remnant of God’s people began to obey the message from the LORD their God. When they heard the words of the prophet Haggai, whom the LORD their God had sent, the people feared the LORD. 13 Then Haggai, the LORD’s messenger, gave the people this message from the LORD: “I am with you, says the LORD!”

14 So the LORD sparked the enthusiasm of Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the enthusiasm of Jeshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the enthusiasm of the whole remnant of God’s people. They began to work on the house of their God, the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, 15 on September 21[*] of the second year of King Darius’s reign.

NOTES

1:12 the whole remnant. The repetition of this phrase in 1:14 emphasizes the unity of purpose within the restoration community for the rebuilding project.

whom the LORD their God had sent. Some commentators read “whom Yahweh had sent to them” (emending the MT’s ’elohehem [TH430/1992.1, ZH466/2157] to ’alehem [TH413/3963.15, ZH448/4392]) on the basis of the LXX (pros autous [TG4314/846, ZG4639/899], “to them”; see Petersen 1984:55). Other ancient versions (Syriac and Vulgate) read, “Yahweh their God sent him to them” (recognizing haplography and inserting ’alehem [TH413/3963.15, ZH448/4392] after ’elohehem; see Meyers and Meyers 1987:4). Verhoef (1987:82-83) rejects the emendation based upon scribal omission, arguing that the relative pronoun “whom” (ka’asher [TH3509.1/834, ZH3869/889]) refers not to the prophet but to his message (“which the LORD their God had sent him,” cf. NJB).

1:13 the LORD’s messenger . . . this message from the LORD. This unusual prophetic title may be explained by the presence of the wordplay of “messenger” (mal’ak [TH4397, ZH4855]) with the “message” in the following phrase (bemal’akuth [TH4400, ZH4857]). The title ascribes distinctive authority to Haggai as Yahweh’s agent (cf. Petersen 1984:56).

I am with you. This is a covenant formula assuring the audience of God’s personal presence and support in the building project (cf. Gen 26:3; Isa 41:10; 43:5; Jer 30:11).

1:14 sparked the enthusiasm. Lit., “stirred the spirit” (ya‘ar [TH5782, ZH6424] + ruakh [TH7307, ZH8120]), frequently attributed to God’s sovereign work in rousing people to accomplish his purposes (e.g., Ezra 1:1; Isa 13:17; 41:25; Jer 51:1, 11).

1:15 the second year of King Darius’s reign. This concludes 1:15. The first verse of ch 2 reads, “On the twenty-first day of the seventh month . . .” and gives no regnal year. Most commentators assume that the reference to “the second year of King Darius’s reign” in 2:1 has been lost in the MT due to haplography. Meyers and Meyers (1987:37) suggest the single reference to “the second year of King Darius’s reign” at the end of 1:15 serves double duty in both date formulas (i.e., 1:15 and 2:1).

COMMENTARY [Text]

Haggai’s use of the word “remnant” (she’erith [TH7611, ZH8642]) has triggered considerable debate among biblical commentators. No consensus has emerged as to the theological nuance the prophet intended when he addressed postexilic Judah as “the whole remnant of God’s people” (1:12). Some have understood the term to refer to a core of righteous people embedded within the larger Hebrew community (Baldwin 1972:42; Mason 1977:17). Others doubt that the word “remnant” has any special theological connotations, noting that this expression is simply one of several the prophet utilizes (e.g., “the people,” 1:2, 12; “all you people,” 2:4; “this people,” 2:14) to designate the people of the covenant (Verhoef 1987:81; cf. Meyers and Meyers 1987:34). In fact, the use here does seem to designate the entirety rather than only a portion of the people. The text is simply reporting the fact that the whole community responded to the prophet’s message. This demonstration of unity of spirit and commonality of purpose was so striking it merited recording. More important, and often overlooked, is the following prepositional phrase “of God’s people.” The theological thrust of the verse is God’s faithfulness in preserving an element of his elect nation and reestablishing them in the land of the promise. He is a God who “always remembers his covenant” (Ps 111:5).

The section reporting the response of the remnant to Haggai’s message offers an interesting sequence of verbal action. First, the people obeyed (1:12). Next, we learn that the people “feared the LORD” (1:12). Finally, we are told that the people began their work on the house of the Lord (1:14). This ordering reinforces the biblical pattern of “worship” followed by “service.” A similar model of response to God may be seen in the post-Exodus experience of Israel at Mount Sinai. There the obedience of the people to the directives of Moses included acts of preparation necessary for entering God’s presence (Exod 19:14). The subsequent experience of formal worship (Exod 24:1) prompted acts of service in the form of giving to the construction of the Tabernacle (Exod 25:2-3).

The New Testament confirms this basic outline in the gospel account of the commissioning of the eleven disciples (Matt 28:16-20). The followers of Jesus obeyed by traveling to the mountain to which he had directed them, and there they worshiped (Matt 28:16). Only after acknowledging God in worship were the disciples instructed to go and serve in the name of Christ (Matt 28:19-20; cf. Heb 13:15-16 where the sacrifice of praise motivates sacrifices of doing good). All of this agrees in principle with Webber’s second fundamental theme of worship: “God speaks and acts and the people respond . . . by remembering, anticipating, celebrating, and serving” (1994:27).

Interestingly, the Protestant “restoration” movement of the eighteenth century, founded by Thomas Campbell and others, appealed to texts like Haggai 1:12-14 (obey, worship, work) and 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10 (turn, serve, wait) in their attempts to recover the unity of the church by means of returning to biblical patterns of doctrine, worship, church discipline, and church government.

Haggai is described as “the LORD’s messenger” only in 1:13. The title is unusual but not unique. In general, the Old Testament identifies the prophets and the priests as “messengers of God” (2 Chr 36:16; see also Mal 2:7). More specifically, the name of the prophet Malachi means “my messenger.” Malachi announced the coming of another divine messenger as a forerunner of the Day of the Lord (Mal 3:1; usually identified as John the Baptist on the basis of Matt 11:14). This word, “messenger” (mal’ak [TH4397, ZH4855]), signifies an agent entrusted with a word of revelation from God. The term is sometimes associated with the divine council or assembly of the gods motif common to the earliest mythic literature of the ancient Near East (e.g., Meyers and Meyers 1987:7, 35; cf. ABD 2.214-217). By analogy, the Hebrew prophets are understood to act as couriers of the council of Yahweh. As a member of the council, the prophet hears the proclamation of Yahweh and is commissioned to report the exact word of revelation directly to the people. This helps account for the repetition of the numerous speech formulas in prophetic literature. Yahweh’s prophets uttered the appropriate speech formulas to validate their role as divine messengers, clarify the source of the message, the fact of its transmission, and the authority of its contents (cf. Meyers and Meyers 1987; see notes on the prophetic word formula [1:1], the messenger formula [1:2], and the divine utterance formula [1:9]). The prophetic epithet, “the LORD’s messenger,” is important theologically for two reasons: First, it legitimizes the human messenger or agent as a true representative of the Godhead; second, it invests the message with divine authority and guarantees its authenticity as a true word from God. It is possible that Peter had this divine council imagery in mind when he wrote that “no prophecy . . . ever came from the prophet’s own understanding . . . . No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God” (2 Pet 1:20-21).