Haggai 1:6

You have planted much but harvested little. You eat but never have enough. You drink but never have your fill. You put on clothes but never get warm. You earn wages to put into a bag pierced through.”

Berean Standard Bible

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Study note

Setting — Haggai speaks on behalf of the LORD of Hosts to the returned exiles in Judah, who have abandoned the temple rebuild for roughly eighteen years and are now complaining about economic failure.

The words — הַרְבֵּה (harbeh, "much") and מְעָט (me'at, "little") form the verse's structural hinge: the same labor yields a disparity the speaker refuses to explain away.

The thread — Deuteronomy 28:38 states the covenant curse in identical terms (sow much, reap little); Hosea 4:10 extends the pattern to unsatisfied eating; Haggai 1:9 adds the agent — "I blew away."

Why it lands — The verse names a diagnostic pattern (effort without yield, consumption without fullness) and stops short of offering comfort, forcing the reader to locate the cause upstream of their own labor.

Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.

The Hebrew words

זְרַעְתֶּ֨םze.ra'.Temyou have sown הַרְבֵּ֜הhar.Behmuch וְהָבֵ֣אve./ha.Ve'and/ you have brought מְעָ֗טme.'Atlittle אָכ֤וֹל'a.Kholyou have eaten וְאֵין־ve./'ein-and/ not לְשָׂבְעָה֙le./sa.ve.'Ahto/ satiety שָׁת֣וֹsha.Toyou have drunk וְאֵין־ve./'ein-and/ not לְשָׁכְרָ֔הle./sha.khe.Rahto/ become drunk לָב֖וֹשׁla.Vo.oshyou have dressed וְאֵין־ve./'ein-and/ not לְחֹ֣םle./Chomto/ be warmל֑וֹl/oto/ himוְהַ֨מִּשְׂתַּכֵּ֔רve./Ha/m.mis.ta.Kerand/ the/ [one who] earns wages מִשְׂתַּכֵּ֖רmis.ta.Ker[is] earning wages אֶל־'el-to צְר֥וֹרtze.Rora bag נָקֽוּב׃ פna.Kuvpierced

King James Version

Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

Cross-references

Haggai 1:9 You expected much, but behold, it amounted to little. And what you brought home, I blew away. Why? declares the LORD of Hosts. Because My house still lies in ruins, while each of you is busy with his own house.
Deuteronomy 28:38 You will sow much seed in the field but harvest little, because the locusts will consume it.
Hosea 4:10 They will eat but not be satisfied; they will be promiscuous but not multiply. For they have abandoned the LORD to give themselves
Hosea 8:7 For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. There is no standing grain; what sprouts fails to yield flour. Even if it should produce, the foreigners would swallow it up.
Haggai 2:16 from that time, when one came expecting a heap of twenty ephahs of grain, there were but ten. When one came to the winepress to draw out fifty baths, there were but twenty.
Malachi 3:9 You are cursed with a curse, yet you—the whole nation—are still robbing Me.
Malachi 2:2 If you do not listen, and if you do not take it to heart to honor My name,” says the LORD of Hosts, “I will send a curse among you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have already begun to curse them, because you are not taking it to heart.
Isaiah 5:10 For ten acres of vineyard will yield but a bath of wine, and a homer of seed only an ephah of grain.”
2 Samuel 21:1 During the reign of David there was a famine for three successive years, and David sought the face of the LORD. And the LORD said, “It is because of the blood shed by Saul and his family, because he killed the Gibeonites.”
Zechariah 5:4 I will send it out, declares the LORD of Hosts, and it will enter the house of the thief and the house of him who swears falsely by My name. It will remain inside his house and destroy it, down to its timbers and stones.”