LEB HAB book

God’s Answer to Habakkuk

5 “Look among the nations and see; be astonished and astounded.

For a work is about to be done in your days
- that you will not believe if it is told.
- 6 For look! I am raising up the Chaldeans, the bitter and impetuous nation,
the one who walks through the spacious places of earth
- to take possession of dwellings not belonging to it.[fn]
- 7 They[fn] are dreadful and awesome; their[fn] justice and their[fn] dignity proceed from themselves.[fn]
- 8 Their[fn] horses are more swift than leopards; they are more menacing than wolves at dusk.
Their[fn] horsemen gallop; their[fn] horsemen come from afar;
- they fly like an eagle that is swift to devour.
- 9 All of them[fn] come for violence, their faces pressing forward.
- They gather captives like the sand.
- 10 And they themselves scoff at kings and rulers are a joke to them.
They laugh at every fortification,
- and they heap up earth and take it.
- 11 Then they sweep like the wind and pass on; they become guilty, whose might is their[fn] god!”

Habakkuk’s Second Complaint

12 Are you not from of old, O Yahweh my God, my Holy One?
You[fn] shall not die.

O Yahweh, you have marked them[fn] for judgment;
- O Rock, you have established them[fn] for reproof.
- 13 Your eyes are too pure to see evil, and you are not able to look at wrongdoing.[fn]
Why do you look at the treacherous?
Why are you silent when the wicked swallows up
- someone more righteous than him?
- 14 You make humankind like fish of the sea, like crawling creatures that have no ruler among them.
- 15 He brings up all of them with a fishhook; he drags them up with a fishnet;
he gathers them in his dragnet.
- Therefore, he rejoices and exults.
- 16 Therefore he sacrifices to his fishnet and makes offerings to his dragnet,
for by them he makes a good living[fn]
- and his food is rich.
- 17 Will he therefore empty his fishnet and continually kill nations without showing mercy?

The Righteous Will Live by Faith

and station myself on the rampart.

And I will keep watch to see what he will say to me,
- and what he will answer concerning my complaint.
2 Then Yahweh answered me and said, “Write the vision and make it plain on the tablet
- so that it might be read quickly .[fn]
- 3 For there is yet a vision for the appointed time; it will give witness to the end, and it will not lie.
If it tarries, wait for it,
- for it will surely come and not delay.
- 4 Look! His spirit within him is puffed up; it is not upright.
- But the righteous shall live by his faithfulness.
- 5 How much less[fn] the defiant;[fn] the arrogant, treacherous man?
He who broadens his throat like Sheol,
- and who, like death, is not satisfied,
and who gathers to himself all the nations,
- and harvested for himself all the peoples,
- will not succeed.
- 6 Shall not all of these take up a taunt against him, with ridicule and riddles against him, saying,
‘Woe to him who heaps up what is not his’?
- For how long?
- And, ‘ Woe to him who makes himself heavy with pledges’?
- 7 Will not your creditors suddenly rise up and awaken those who make you tremble?
- Then you shall be as plunder for them.
- 8 Because you plundered many nations, all the remaining nations will plunder you
on account of the blood of humanity
- and violence against the land,
- and against cities and all who live in them.
- 9 Woe to him who obtains profit from evil gain for his house, to set his nest on high,
- to be saved from the hand of misfortune!
- 10 You have plotted shame for your house, cutting off many peoples
- and sinning against your life.
- 11 For the stone will cry out from the wall, and the plaster from the wood will answer it.
- 12 Woe to him who builds a city by bloodguilt, and who founds a city by wickedness!
- 13 Look! Is it not from Yahweh of hosts that people labor for mere fire,
- and nations exhaust themselves for mere vanity?
- 14 For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of Yahweh,
- like the waters covering the sea.
- 15 Woe to him who gives a drink to his neighbors, pouring out your wrath and also making them drunk
- in order to see their nakedness!
- 16 You will be sated with shame rather than glory. Drink also yourself, and expose yourself!
The cup of the right hand of Yahweh
- will come around upon you
- and disgrace upon your glory.
- 17 For the violence of Lebanon will cover you, and the destruction of wild animals will shatter them
on account of the blood of humanity,
- and the violence against the land,
- against a city and all the inhabitants in it.
- 18 What value is an idol when its carver has fashioned it,
- a molten idol, a teacher of lies?
For he who fashioned his creation trusts in it,
- though making mute idols!
- 19 Woe to him who says to the wood, ‘Wake up!’ And to a lifeless stone, ‘Arise!’
- Can he teach?
Look, it is covered with gold and silver,
- and there is no breath within it.
- 20 But Yahweh is in his holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before him.”

The Prayer of Habakkuk

2 O Yahweh, I have heard the report of you; O Yahweh, I stand in awe of your works.

In the midst of the years, revive it!
- In the midst of the years, make it known!
- In wrath, may you remember to show compassion.
- 3 God came from Teman; the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah
His splendor covers the heavens,
- and his praise fills the earth.
- 4 And his brightness was like the light; flashing rays came from his hand for him;
- And there is the covering of his strength.
- 5 Before him went Disease,[fn] and Pestilence[fn] went out at his feet.
- 6 He stood and measured the earth; he looked and made the nations tremble.
Then the mountains of old were shattered;
- the hills of old collapsed.
- The ways of old belong to him.
- 7 Under affliction I saw the tents of Cushan; the tent curtains of the land of Midian trembled.
- 8 Was the anger of Yahweh against the rivers? Was your wrath against the rivers,
- or your fury against the sea,
when you mounted upon your horses,
- upon your victory chariot?
- 9 You laid bare the nakedness of your bow, swearing oaths with the arrows of your word.
- You split the earth with rivers.
- 10 When the mountains saw you they writhed; a torrent of waters swept by;
the deep gave its voice;
- it raised its hands on high.
- 11 Sun and moon stood still in their place; at the light of your arrows they moved about;
- at the gleam of the flashing of your spear.
- 12 In fury you marched through the earth; in anger you trampled the nations.
- 13 You went forth for the salvation of your people, for the salvation of your anointed.
You crushed the head of the house of wickedness,
- laying bare from the foundation to the top.[fn]
- 14 You pierced the head of his warriors with his own arrows; they came like a whirlwind to scatter me,
- their exultation like one who devours the afflicted in ambush.
- 15 You trampled upon the sea with your horses, the churning of many waters.
- 16 I hear and my stomach shakes; my lips quiver at the sound;
infection enters my bones;
- that which is beneath me trembles;
I wait quietly for the day of trouble
- to come upon the people attacking us.
- 17 Though the fig tree does not blossom, nor there be fruit on the vines;
the yield of the olive tree fails,
- and the cultivated fields do not yield food;
the flock is cut off from the animal pen,
- and there is no cattle in the stalls,
- 18 Yet I will rejoice in Yahweh; I will exult in the God of my salvation.
- 19 Yahweh, my Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer;
- he causes me to walk on my high places.
To the choirmaster with stringed instruments.

1:? Or “forever”

1:? Or “him”

1:? Hebrew “He”

1:? Hebrew “his”

1:? Hebrew “him”

1:? Hebrew “His”

1:? Hebrew “his”

1:? Hebrew “him”

1:? Hebrew “his”

1:? Hebrew “we shall not die,” considered a deliberate scribal change of the text to avoid offensive language toward Yahweh

1:? Hebrew “him”

1:? Or “trouble”

1:? Literally “his portion is fat”

2:? Literally “it might run reading upon it”

2:? Literally “And moreover because”

2:? “Defiant” follows the Dead Sea Scrolls (1QpHab)

3:? The Hebrew term is also the name of a Canaanite deity

3:? Or “to the neck”