Haggai

The second shortest book in the old testament, Haggai is best understood when read with Chapters 1-6 of Ezra and all of Zechariah. Haggai was written in around 520 BC just 15 years after the Jewish people were allowed to return to Jerusalem after 70 years of captivity in Babylon. In 536 BC, the Jews were allowed to return by the Persian king Cyrus. The next king in line was convinced by the local non-Jewish people in Israel that he should stop the building. From that time, approximately 525 BC to the time of Haggai's prophecies, the Jews had stopped building. They were instead working diligently on their own homes and forsaking the work of building God's house, the Temple of God.

At the beginning of Haggai's prophecy to began rebuilding the temple, it was actually illegal in the land for the Jews to follow the Lord's command. The previous king, Cambyses had made a decree to stop and the new king Darius had not changed it yet. Haggai's prohecy hit hard to the Jewish people. He explained that they had famine in the land because they did not build the Lord's house. The leaders, Zerubbabel and Jeshua listened to the prophecies and Haggai and began the rebuilding again.

Once the people obeyed God, He opened the door with the king, and the current king, Darius, made a new decree that the building should continue, and even that the non-Jewish people in the land should take their taxes and direct them to the building also. To better understand Haggai, again, I recommend reading the first 6 chapters of Ezra, and I also recommend studing the other prophet that encouraged the Jewish people at the same time as Haggai, the prophet Zechariah.

Other reading that will open your insight into the time era would be Daniel, which occurs just prior to Haggai, and Esther, Nehemiah and the second half of Ezra, which happens just after Haggai.