LEB HAB book

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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

2 I will stand at my post,
- 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

3 A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth.
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”