Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Haggai 1:4
[Is it] time for you, O ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, and this house [lie] waste?
4. for you, O ye ] Lit., for you, you: you, yourselves, R. V. The repetition of the pronoun is emphatic, “you are the people I mean;” or you in implied contrast to Almighty God, comp. 1Sa 25:24, where Abigail, anxious to appease David’s anger at the churlishness of Nabal, exclaims, “upon me, my Lord, I (am the person at fault), let this iniquity be.”
your cieled houses ] Lit. your houses cieled, i.e. your houses ( and they too) cieled. The adjective thus added without an article has the force of a predicate and so becomes emphatic. With the article it would form part of the subject. Comp. Psa 143:10: “Let Thy Spirit good (as it is, and therefore ready to help and guide the sinful and infirm), lead me,” &c. The translators in A. V., feeling the force of the adjective as a predicate, have broken the first part of the sentence into a separate proposition, “Thy Spirit is good, lead me,” &c. The Prayer-Book version is, “Let thy loving Spirit lead me,” &c.
cieled ] Lit. covered or boarded. The word is used with reference to the roof of the Temple, which was high-pitched like our modern roofs, and cieled with boards within. “He covered the house with beams (rafters) and boards of cedar,” 1Ki 6:9. It is also used of the cieling with boards of Solomon’s house of the forest of Lebanon, 1Ki 7:3, and of some kind of covering or boarding (the passage is obscure) of his “Porch of Judgment,” 1Ki 7:7. The practice was luxurious and magnificent even in a king (Jer 22:14). Yet they who professed themselves unable to restore the House of the Lord were indulging in it in their own houses. They built costly houses for themselves, even using, it may be, to decorate them, the cedar wood which had been brought for the Temple (Ezr 3:7; Dict. of the Bible, Art. Zerubbabel), and had grown indifferent to the ruin and desolation of the House of God.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Is it time for you – You, being what you are, the creatures of God, to dwell in your ceiled houses, more emphatically, in your houses, and those ceiled, probably with costly woods, such as cedar . But where then was the excuse of want of means? They imitated, in their alleged poverty, what is spoken of as magnificent in their old kings, Solomon and Shallum, but not having, as Solomon first did (1Ki 6:9, ), covered the house of God with beams and rows of cedar . Will ye dwell in houses artificially adorned, not so much for use as for delight, and shall My dwelling-place, wherein was the Holy of holies, and the cherubim, and the table of showbread, be bestreamed with rains, desolated in solitude, scorched by the sun?
With these words carnal Christians are reproved, who have no glow of zeal for God, but are full of self-love, and so make no effort to repair, build, or strengthen the material temples of Christ, and houses assigned to His worship, when aged, ruinous, decaying or destroyed, but build for themselves curious, voluptuous, superfluous dwellings. In these the love of Christ gloweth not; these Isaiah threateneth, Isa 5:8, Isa 5:12. Woe to you who join house to house and field to field, and regard not the work of the Lord!
To David and Solomon the building of Gods temple was their hearts desire; to early Christian Emperors, to the ages of faith, the building of Churches; now mostly, owners of lands build houses for this worlds profit, and leave it to the few to build in view of eternity, and for the glory of God.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 4. Is it time for you] If the time be not come to rebuild the temple, it cannot be come for you to build yourselves comfortable houses: but ye are rebuilding your houses; why then do ye not rebuild the house of the Lord? The foundation of the temple had been laid fourteen years before, and some considerable progress made in the building; and it had been lying waste in that unfinished state to the present time.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Is it time? you think it full time to build your own houses, you judge it seasonable enough to lay out much cost on adorning them, what pretence can you make that it is not seasonable to build my house?
For you, Jews, who were by a king (that knew not your God) sent to build my house, you unthankful and forgetful ones.
To dwell; to settle yourselves securely, and for continuance with stateliness.
Ceiled; searched and with cedar wainscot, curiously carved and covered, and as richly adorned as if you were full of treasures.
Houses: it seems to intimate some of them had more than one house, a city and a country house, and whilst Gods house lay waste; they thus lavish out their wealth on private worldly conveniences, but grudge the charge on Gods house. Can you thus live without a temple, an altar, a sacrifice, and yet cannot live without stately houses? Do you owe so much to yourselves, and so little to your God? so much to your bodies, so little to your souls?
Lie waste; in its rubbish, or in bare, naked foundations without any superstructure.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
4. Is it timeIt is not time(Hag 1:2), ye say, to buildJehovah’s house; yet how is it that ye make it a fit time not only tobuild, but to “dwell” at ease in your own houses?
you, O yerather, for”you, you”; the repetition marking the shameful contrastbetween their concern for themselves, and their unconcern forGod [MAURER]. Compare asimilar repetition in 1Sa 25:24;Zec 7:5.
ceiledrather,”wainscoted,” or “paneled,” referring to thewalls as well as the ceilings; furnished not only with comfort butluxury, in sad contrast to God’s house not merely unadorned, but thevery walls not raised above the foundations. How different David’sfeelings (2Sa 7:2)!
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
[Is it] time for you, O ye, to dwell in your panelled houses,…. They could not only find time, leisure, and convenience to build houses to dwell in; but to wainscot them, and line them with boards of cedar, as the Targum; as bad as the times were complained of; and could sit in them, indulging themselves in luxury, ease, and sloth; and why then was it not a fit and convenient time as well to build the house of the Lord in?
and this house [lie] waste? or, “and shall this house lie waste?” or, “when this house lies waste?” o not indeed in its rubbish and ruins, as it was demolished by the Chaldeans, and left; but with a bare foundation, laid some years ago; and ever since neglected; the superstructure not carried on, and much less built up to be fit for service; and therefore might be said with propriety to lie waste and desolate, being unfinished, unfit for use, and no regard had unto it. David was of another mind, 2Sa 7:2 and truly religious persons will be more concerned for the house of God than for their own houses.
o “et domus ista deserta manebit?” Drusius; “quum domus haec vasta est?” Junius Tremellius, Piscator “dum domus haec desolata est?” Cocceius.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(4) Is it time for you . . .Literally, Is it time for you to dwell in your houses, and those ceiled?i.e., probably with cedar and other costly woods. A crushing retort. If the adverse decree of Artaxerxes, which disallowed the building of Jerusalem (Ezr. 4:21), had not hindered them from erecting magnificent residences for themselves, how could it reasonably excuse an utter neglect of Gods House?
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Hag 1:4. Is it time for you, &c. Is the time come for you to inhabit your ceiled houses, while that house lieth desolate? This is in answer to Hag 1:2. “You complain of the times; yet they have not been so difficult but you have found means and opportunity to build fine houses for yourselves, though you are content to let the house of the Most High continue in ruins.” See Houbigant and Calmet.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Hag 1:4 [Is it] time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house [lie] waste?
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,” Psa 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 ( Y . 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 ( , Mat 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?” Mat 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, Dan 4:30 ), and God’s house lie waste, and his service neglected, to whom we ourselves owe, 1Co 6:19 , our lives, Mat 16:25 , our parents, children, friends, means, Mat 19:29 , our gifts and abilities, 1Co 4:7 , our honours and offices, Psa 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 Phi 2:21 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
you, O ye. Hebrew Figure of speech Epizeuxis (App-6), for emphasis = you, even you, or that ye yourselves.
ceiled = panelled. Used of the lining of an arched roof. Occurs in 1Ki 6:9; 1Ki 7:3, 1Ki 7:7. Jer 22:14. Showing that their houses were not only roofed, but wainscotted or decorated. Hebrew = “in your houses [and that too] panelled”. Compare David (2Sa 7:2. Psa 132:3). This proves that the Temple had not then been commenced. Compare Hag 1:9. See notes on Neh 7:4, and longer note on Neh 2:1, Neh 5:14, Neh 13:4. Also App-58.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
to: 2Sa 7:2, Psa 132:3-5, Mat 6:33, Phi 2:21
and: Psa 74:7, Psa 102:14, Jer 26:6, Jer 26:18, Jer 52:13, Lam 2:7, Lam 4:1, Eze 24:21, Dan 9:17, Dan 9:18, Dan 9:26, Dan 9:27, Mic 3:12, Mat 24:1, Mat 24:2
Reciprocal: Exo 23:2 – to decline Lev 19:25 – General Deu 8:12 – and hast built 2Ki 7:9 – they said one 1Ch 17:1 – I dwell Neh 7:4 – the houses Pro 3:9 – General Jer 22:14 – ceiled with cedar Eze 41:16 – ceiled with wood Hag 1:9 – Because Hag 2:14 – So is this people
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Hag 1:4. Haggai chides them with their inconsistency because they were interested in their own personal affairs instead of the Lord’s. They were building homes for their personal uae and allowing the Lord’s house to lie waste.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1:4 [Is it] time for you, O ye, to dwell in your {d} cieled houses, and this house [lie] waste?
(d) Showing that they sought not only their necessities, but their very pleasures before God’s honour.