The Command to Rebuild the Temple
1 In the second year of aDarius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of bHaggai the prophet to cZerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to dJoshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest: 2 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: These people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.” 3 Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, 4 “Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your epaneled houses, fwhile this house lies in ruins? 5 Now, therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: gConsider your ways. 6 hYou have sown much, and harvested little. iYou eat, but you never have enough; jyou drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns kwages does so to put them into a bag with holes.
7 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. 8 Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord. 9 You looked for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? declares the Lord of hosts. Because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house. 10 Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the ldew, and the earth has withheld its produce. 11 And I have called for a drought on the land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast, and on all their labors.”
The People Obey the Lord
12 Then mZerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent him. And the people feared the Lord. 13 Then Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, spoke to the people with the Lord’s message, n“I am with you, declares the Lord.” 14 And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people. And they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God, 15 on the twenty-fourth day of the month, in the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king.
The Great Prostitute and the Beast
1 Then one of the wseven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the judgment of the xgreat prostitute ywho is seated on many waters, 2 zwith whom the kings of the earth have committed sexual immorality, and with the awine of whose sexual immorality the dwellers on earth have become drunk.” 3 And he bcarried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of cblasphemous names, and it had dseven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was arrayed ein purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a fgolden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her sexual immorality. 5 And on her gforehead was written a name of mystery: “Babylon the great, mother of prostitutes and of earth’s abominations.” 6 And I saw the woman, hdrunk with the iblood of the saints, the blood of the martyrs of Jesus.1
When I saw her, I marveled greatly. 7 But the angel said to me, “Why do you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman, and of the beast with seven heads and ten horns that carries her. 8 The beast that you saw jwas, and is not, and is about to krise from the bottomless pit2 and go to destruction. And the dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the lbook of life from the foundation of the world will mmarvel to see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come. 9 nThis calls for a mind with wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated; 10 they are also seven kings, five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come, and when he does come he must remain only a little while. 11 As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to destruction. 12 And othe ten horns that you saw are ten pkings who have not yet received royal power, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour, together with the beast. 13 These are of one mind, and they hand over their power and authority to the beast. 14 They will make war on the qLamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is rLord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful.”
15 And the angel3 said to me, “The waters that you saw, swhere the prostitute is seated, are tpeoples and multitudes and nations and languages. 16 And the ten horns that you saw, they and the beast will hate the prostitute. They will make her desolate and naked, and devour her flesh and burn her up with fire, 17 for God has put it into their hearts to carry out his purpose by being of one mind and handing over their royal power to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled. 18 And the woman that you saw is uthe great city that has dominion over the kings of the earth.”
