Haggai

Haggai appeared in 520 BCE, speaking to a community that had returned from Babylonian captivity but let the work on the Second Temple stall. He was the first of three post-exilic prophets — ahead of his contemporary Zechariah and Malachi, who came a century later. His message was direct: the Temple must be rebuilt. That urgency earned him a book in the Hebrew Bible, a slim scroll among the twelve minor prophets. His name means "my holidays," though the text remembers him for the opposite of celebration — for the hard push to finish unfinished work.