Haggai 2:16

16 From that time [one] hath come to a heap of twenty, And it hath been ten, He hath come unto the wine-fat to draw out fifty purahs, And it hath been twenty.

Haggai 2:16 Meaning and Commentary

Haggai 2:16

Since those [days] were
From the time the foundation of the temple was laid, unto the time they began to work again, which was a space of about fifteen or sixteen years: when [one] came to an heap of twenty [measures], there were [but]
ten;
when the husbandman having gathered in his corn, and who was generally a good judge of what it would yield, came to a heap of it on his corn floor, either of sheaves not threshed, or grain not winnowed, and expected it would have produced at least twenty measures, seahs, or bushels; afterward it was threshed and winnowed, to his great disappointment he had but ten out of it; there were so much straw and chaff, and so little grain; or when he came to a heap of grain, wheat, or barley, in his granary, where he thought he should have twenty bushels of it; but when he had measured it, proved but ten; being either stolen by thieves, or eaten by vermin; rather the latter: when [one] came to the wine vat for to draw out fifty [vessels] out
of the press, there were [but] twenty;
by the quantity of grapes which he put into the press to tread and squeeze, he expected to have had fifty measures, or baths, or hogsheads of wine; but, instead of that, had but twenty; the bunches were so thin, or the berries so bad: there was a greater decrease and deficiency in the wine than in the grain.

Haggai 2:16 In-Context

14 And Haggai answereth and saith, `So [is] this people, and so [is] this nation before Me -- an affirmation of Jehovah -- and so [is] every work of their hands, and that which they bring near there -- it is unclean.

15 And now, lay [it], I pray you, to your heart, From this day, and onwards, Before the laying of stone to stone in the temple of Jehovah.

16 From that time [one] hath come to a heap of twenty, And it hath been ten, He hath come unto the wine-fat to draw out fifty purahs, And it hath been twenty.

17 I have smitten you with blasting, And with mildew, and with hail -- All the work of your hands, And there is none of you with Me, An affirmation of Jehovah.

18 Set [it], I pray you, to your heart, from this day and onwards, from the twenty and fourth day of the ninth [month], even from the day that the temple of Jehovah hath been founded, set [it] to your heart.