What Does Haggai 2:17 Mean?
I struck you with scorching and with mildew and with hail in all the toil of your hands, yet you did not turn back to me, says the LORD.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the LORD.THE KEY
The blow reaches both you and the work your hands produce, yet it cannot make you turn toward God.
THE MEANING
The verse holds you and what you make inside the same impact. Even when your work is struck by loss, suffering does not guarantee that you turn toward God.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Hardship automatically makes a person turn toward God.
THE ROOT
מַעֲשֵׂה
maʿăśeh
GROWS FROM
עשׂה
ʿ-ś-h
Do, make.
“toil” in this verse is maʿăśeh. Maʿăśeh means work or deed, from ʿāśâ, to do or make. The Hebrew names both “you” and “all the work of your hands” as objects of the blow, reaching the maker and what the maker produces.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāśâ: Do, make.
עָשָׂה
This verb is the doing that gives rise to the work named in the verse.
maʿăśîm: Deeds, works.
מַעֲשִׂים
This plural form shows how the same root can name the many things a person does or makes.
הִכֵּיתִי
hikkēti
GROWS FROM
נכה
n-k-h
Strike, hit.
“struck” in this verse is hikkēti. The verb names a strike, and the verse gathers blight, mildew, and hail as the means of that striking. The blow reaches the work, but the final clause shows that a strike does not itself produce a turn.
ALSO GROWS
makkāh: Blow, wound, plague.
מַכָּה
This noun carries the same strike into the language of a blow or plague, linking the listed afflictions to the act of striking.
mukkēh: One who is stricken.
מֻכֶּה
This form names the condition of the one who receives the blow.
THE PATTERN
Striking a person or the work of their hands does not by itself produce a turn toward God.
The people do not turn back to the one who strikes them, and they do not seek the LORD of hosts.I struck you with scorching and with yellowing. As your gardens multiplied, your vineyards, your fig trees, and your olive trees, the cutter devoured them. Yet you have not turned back to me, says the LORD.And the rest of the men who are not killed by these blows still do not turn from the works of their hands, that they should not bow down to demons and idols of gold, and of silver, and of bronze, and of stone, and of wood, which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk.THE THREAD
The people do not turn back to the one who strikes them, and they do not seek the LORD of hosts.Isaiah uses the same Hebrew root נכה (n-k-h, strike) for the one who smites. Like Haggai, it sets the blow beside the absence of turning.
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