th the Lord of hosts.

2:10. Great shall be the glory of this last house more than of the
first, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place I will give peace,
saith the Lord of hosts.

2:11. In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, in the second
year of Darius the king, the word of the Lord came to Aggeus the
prophet, saying:

2:12. Thus saith the Lord of hosts: Ask the priests the law, saying:

2:13. If a man carry sanctified flesh in the skirt of his garment, and
touch with his skirt, bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat:
shall it be sanctified? And the priests answered, and said: No.

2:14. And Aggeus said: If one that is unclean by occasion of a soul
touch any of all these things, shall it be defiled? And the priests
answered, and said: It shall be defiled.

By occasion of a soul... That is, by having touched the dead; in which
case, according to the prescription of the law, Num. 19.13, 22, a person
not only became unclean himself, but made every thing that he touched
unclean. The prophet applies all this to the people, whose souls
remained unclean by neglecting the temple of God; and therefore were not
sanctified by the flesh they offered in sacrifice: but rather defiled
their sacrifices by approaching to them in the state of uncleanness.

2:15. And Aggeus answered, and said: So is this people, and so is this
nation before my face, saith the Lord, and so is all the work of their
hands: and all that they have offered there, shall be defiled.

2:16. And now consider in your hearts, from this day and upward, before
there was a stone laid upon a stone in the temple of the Lord.

2:17. When you went to a heap of twenty bushels, and they became ten:
and you went into the press, to press out fifty vessels, and they became
twenty.

2:18. I struck you with a blasting wind, and all the works of your hand
with the mildew and with hail, yet there was none among you that
returned to me, saith the Lord.

2:19. Set your hearts from this day, and henceforward, from the four and
twentieth day of the ninth month: from the day that the foundations of
the temple of the Lord were laid, and lay it up in your hearts.

2:20. Is the seed as yet sprung up? or hath the vine, and the fig tree,
and the pomegranate, and the olive tree as yet flourished? from this day
I will bless you.

2:21. And the word of the Lord came a second time to Aggeus in the four
and twentieth day of the month, saying:

2:22. Speak