Therefore, because of you the sky has withheld its dew, and the earth has withheld its produce.
Parallel translations
- WEB Therefore for your sake the heavens withhold the dew, and the earth withholds its fruit.
- KJV Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed from her fruit.
- BSB Therefore, on account of you the heavens have withheld their dew and the earth has withheld its crops.
- NKJV Therefore the heavens above you withhold the dew, and the earth withholds its fruit.
- NLT It’s because of you that the heavens withhold the dew and the earth produces no crops.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Because of the people's neglect, the heavens withhold rain and the ground withholds its produce. Creation itself reflects God's displeasure.
Overview
The withholding of dew and crops fulfills the covenant warnings of Deuteronomy 28:23-24. God, sovereign over nature, links the land's barrenness directly to the people's spiritual neglect. The verse teaches that all of creation serves the purposes of its Maker, including His discipline of His people.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- 1 Kgs 8:35“When the sky is shut up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against you; if they pray toward this place, and confess your name, and turn from their sin, when you afflict them,
- Lev 26:19I will break the pride of your power, and I will make your sky like iron, and your soil like brass.
- 1 Kgs 17:1Elijah the Tishbite, who was one of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, “As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.”
- Deut 28:23–24Your sky that is over your head will be brass, and the earth that is under you will be iron.
- Joel 1:18–20How the animals groan! The herds of livestock are perplexed, because they have no pasture. Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.
- Jer 14:1–6This is Yahweh’s word that came to Jeremiah concerning the drought.
- Hos 2:9Therefore I will take back my grain in its time, and my new wine in its season, and will pluck away my wool and my flax which should have covered her nakedness.
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Christ at the center
The promise that the latter glory of the temple will exceed the former, and that God will shake the nations and bring 'the desire of all nations,' is fulfilled when Christ enters his temple.
How Haggai 1:10 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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