12 “If one bears set-apart meat in the fold of his garment, and with the edge he touches bread or stew, or wine or oil, or any food, is it set-apart?” ’ ” And the priests answered and said, “No.”
13 And Ḥaggai said, “If someone defiled by a dead body touches any of these, is it defiled?” And the priests answered and said, “It is defiled.”
14 And Ḥaggai answered and said, “ ‘So is this people, and so is this nation before Me,’ declares יהוה, ‘and so is every work of their hands. And whatever they bring near there is defiled.
15 ‘But now, please consider, from this day onward: Before a stone was laid on a stone in the Hĕḵal of יהוה,
16 since those days – one came to a heap of twenty ĕphahs, and there were ten; one came to the winepress to draw out fifty baths from the press, and there were twenty –
17 ‘I smote you with blight and mildew and hail in all the labours of your hands, and ther2 was none of you with Me,’ declares יהוה.
18 ‘Consider now from this day forward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, from the day that the foundation of the Hĕḵal of יהוה was laid, consider it: