Charles Ellicott Commentary Haggai 2:13

"Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by reason of a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean." — Haggai 2:13 (ASV)

Unclean. —The defilement incurred by contact with a dead body was one of the deepest. (See Numbers 19:11-16.) On the force of the term tmê nephesh, compare the passages Leviticus 21:11, Leviticus 22:4, and Numbers 6:6.