Through all that time, when one came to a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten. When one came to the wine vat to draw out fifty, there were only twenty.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 16. Day, the 24th of the ninth month, when you began to build. verse 19. Henceforward your crops shall be abundant. Menochius.—I judge not from natural appearances, as the corn is still in the granary. verse 20. Calmet.—Upon a stone. The foundations had been laid the year after the Jews returned, and an altar set up. 1 Ezra 3. Nothing more of consequence was done till the second year of Darius. The temple was finished and dedicated in the sixth. Ib. 6:15. Hence Aggeus speaks of the stones to be used hereafter. Those in the foundation were to be laid afresh, (verse 19) or were not seen or noticed. In the same sense our Saviour predicts, that a stone shall not be left upon a stone in the temple, which the Romans should destroy before that generation had passed away. Matthew 24:2. 34. This was verified within forty years. Yet A. Rutter observes it was more fully accomplished when the Jews dug up the foundations, by order of Julian, who wished to falsify the prediction. Bible.