Text -- Habakkuk 2:15-20 (NET)

2:15 “You who force your neighbor to drink wine are as good as dead– you who make others intoxicated by forcing them to drink from the bowl of your furious anger, so you can look at their genitals. 2:16 But you will become drunk with shame, not majesty. Now it is your turn to drink and expose your uncircumcised foreskin! The cup of wine in the Lord’s right hand is coming to you, and disgrace will replace your majestic glory! 2:17 For you will pay in full for your violent acts against Lebanon; terrifying judgment will come upon you because of the way you destroyed the wild animals living there. You have shed human blood and committed violent acts against lands, cities, and those who live in them. 2:18 What good is an idol? Why would a craftsman make it? What good is a metal image that gives misleading oracles? Why would its creator place his trust in it and make such mute, worthless things? 2:19 The one who says to wood, ‘Wake up!’ is as good as dead– he who says to speechless stone, ‘Awake!’ Can it give reliable guidance? It is overlaid with gold and silver; it has no life’s breath inside it. 2:20 But the Lord is in his majestic palace. The whole earth is speechless in his presence!”

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Hab 2:16

O king of Babylon.

Wesley: Hab 2:16

They turned the cup of pleasure about, God will carry the cup of indignation about also, and make them drink deep of it.

Wesley: Hab 2:16

Thou shalt be as much loathed as a shameful drunkard is in his vomit.

Wesley: Hab 2:17

The violence thou hast done to Judea shall overwhelm thee.

Wesley: Hab 2:17

Such spoil as by hunters is made among wild beasts, when they endeavour to destroy the whole kind.

Wesley: Hab 2:20

He is Jehovah, the fountain of being, life, power, and salvation to his people.

Wesley: Hab 2:20

Fear, submit, and depend on him; let his enemies be silent, reverence, hope, pray and wait for him, who will arise and have mercy on them, who will make it to be well with the righteous, and ill with the wicked, who will fully and satisfactorily solve the doubts, and unfold the riddles of his providence.

JFB: Hab 2:15

Literally, "skin," as the Easterns use "bottles" of skin for wine. MAURER, from a different Hebrew root, translates, "that pourest in thy wrath." English Version keeps up the metaphor better. It is not enough for thee to be "drunken" thyself, unless thou canst lead others into the same state. The thing meant is, that the Chaldean king, with his insatiable desires (a kind of intoxication), allured neighboring states into the same mad thirst for war to obtain booty, and then at last exposed them to loss and shame (compare Isa 51:17; Oba 1:16). An appropriate image of Babylon, which at last fell during a drunken revel (Dan. 5:1-31).

JFB: Hab 2:15

With light, like Ham of old (Gen 9:22).

JFB: Hab 2:16

Now that thou art fallen. "Thou art filled" indeed (though so insatiable), but it is "with shame."

JFB: Hab 2:16

Instead of thy former glory (Hos 4:7).

JFB: Hab 2:16

The cup of sorrow is now in thy turn to pass to thee (Jer 25:15-17; Lam 4:21).

JFB: Hab 2:16

Expressing in Hebrew feeling the most utter contempt. So of Goliath (1Sa 17:36). It is not merely thy "nakedness," as in Hab 2:15, that shall be "uncovered," but the foreskin, the badge of thy being an uncircumcised alien from God. The same shall be done to thee, as thou didst to others, and worse.

JFB: Hab 2:16

Literally, "shall turn itself," namely, from the nations whom thou hast made to drink it. "Thou shalt drink it all, so that it may be turned as being drained" [GROTIUS].

JFB: Hab 2:16

That is, vomiting; namely, that of the king of Babylon, compelled to disgorge the spoil he had swallowed. It expresses also the ignominious state of Babylon in its calamity (Jer 25:27). "Be drunken, spew, and fall." Less appropriately it is explained of the foe spewing in the face of the Babylonian king.

JFB: Hab 2:17

Thy "violence" against "Lebanon," that is, Jerusalem (Isa 37:24; Jer 22:23; Eze 17:3, Eze 17:12; for Lebanon's cedars were used in building the temple and houses of Jerusalem; and its beauty made it a fit type of the metropolis), shall fall on thine own head.

JFB: Hab 2:17

That is, completely overwhelm.

JFB: Hab 2:17

MAURER explains, "the spoiling inflicted on the beasts of Lebanon (that is, on the people of Jerusalem, of which city 'Lebanon' is the type), which made them afraid (shall cover thee)." But it seems inappropriate to compare the elect people to "beasts." I therefore prefer explaining, "the spoiling of beasts," that is, such as is inflicted on beasts caught in a net, and "which makes them afraid (shall cover thee)." Thus the Babylonians are compared to wild beasts terrified at being caught suddenly in a net. In cruel rapacity they resembled wild beasts. The ancients read, "the spoiling of wild beasts shall make THEE afraid." Or else explain, "the spoiling of beasts (the Medes and Persians) which (inflicted by thee) made them afraid (shall in turn cover thyself--revert on thyself from them)." This accords better with the parallel clause, "the violence of Lebanon," that is, inflicted by thee on Lebanon. As thou didst hunt men as wild beasts, so shalt thou be hunted thyself as a wild beast, which thou resemblest in cruelty.

JFB: Hab 2:17

Shed by thee; repeated from Hab 2:8. But here the "land" and "city" are used of Judea and Jerusalem: not of the earth and cities generally, as in Hab 2:8.

JFB: Hab 2:17

That is, inflicted on the land by thee.

JFB: Hab 2:18

The powerlessness of the idols to save Babylon from its doom is a fitting introduction to the last stanza (Hab 2:19), which, as the former four, begins with "Woe."

JFB: Hab 2:18

Its priests and prophets uttering lying oracles, as if from it.

JFB: Hab 2:18

Though men can "make" idols, they cannot make them speak.

JFB: Hab 2:19

Arise to my help.

JFB: Hab 2:19

Rather, An exclamation of the prophet, implying an ironical question to which a negative answer must be given. What! "It teach?" Certainly not [MAURER]. Or, "It (the idol itself) shall (that is, ought to) teach you that it is deaf, and therefore no God" [CALVIN]. Compare "they are their own witnesses" (Isa 44:9).

JFB: Hab 2:19

The Hebrew is nominative, "There it is" [HENDERSON].

JFB: Hab 2:19

Outside it has some splendor, within none.

JFB: Hab 2:20

JEHOVAH; in striking contrast with the idols.

JFB: Hab 2:20

"His place" (Isa 26:21); heaven (Psa 11:4; Jon 2:7; Mic 1:2). The temple at Jerusalem is a type of it, and there God is to be worshipped. He does not lie hid under gold and silver, as the idols of Babylon, but reigns in heaven and fills heaven, and thence succors His people.

JFB: Hab 2:20

In token of reverent submission and subjection to His judgments (Job 40:4; Psa 76:8; Zep 1:7; Zec 2:13).

This sublime ode begins with an exordium (Hab 3:1-2), then follows the main subject, then the peroration (Hab 3:16-19), a summary of the practical truth, which the whole is designed to teach. (Deu 33:2-5; Psa 77:13-20 are parallel odes). This was probably designed by the Spirit to be a fit formula of prayer for the people, first in their Babylonian exile, and now in their dispersion, especially towards the close of it, just before the great Deliverer is to interpose for them. It was used in public worship, as the musical term, "Selah!" (Hab 3:3, Hab 3:9, Hab 3:13), implies.

Clarke: Hab 2:15

Wo unto him that giveth his neighbor drink - This has been considered as applying to Pharaoh-hophra, king of Egypt, who enticed his neighbors Jehoiachin and Zedekiah to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar, whereby the nakedness and imbecility of the poor Jews was soon discovered; for the Chaldeans soon took Jerusalem, and carried its kings, princes, and people, into captivity.

Clarke: Hab 2:16

The cup of the Lord’ s right hand - Among the ancients, all drank out of the same cup; was passed from hand to hand, and each drank as much as he chose. The Chaldeans gave to the neighboring nations the cup of idolatry and of deceitful alliance: and in return they received from the Lord the cup of his fury. So Grotius.

Clarke: Hab 2:17

For the violence of Lebanon - Or, the violence done to Lebanon; to men, to cattle, to Judea, and to Jerusalem. See the note on the parallel place, Hab 2:8 (note). This may be a threatening against Egypt, as the former was against Chaldea.

Clarke: Hab 2:18

What profiteth the graven image - This is against idolatry in general, and every species of it, as well as against those princes, priests, and people who practice it, and encourage others to do the same. See on Isa 44:9-10 (note); Isa 46:2 (note)

Clarke: Hab 2:18

Dumb idols? - אלילים אלמים elilim illemim , "dumb nothings."This is exactly agreeable to St. Paul, 1Co 8:4, who says, "An idol is nothing in the world."What signify the idols worshipped by the Chaldeans, Tyrians, and Egyptians? They have not been able to save their worshippers.

Clarke: Hab 2:19

Wo unto him - How foolish and contemptible to worship a thing formed by the hand of man out of wood, stone, gold, or silver! The meanest brute is superior to them all; it breathes and lives, but they have no breath in them. However, they are said above to be teachers of lies; that is, they appeared to give out oracles: but these were lies; and were not given by the statue, but by the priest.

Clarke: Hab 2:20

The Lord is in his holy temple - Jehovah has his temple, the place where he is to be worshipped; but there there is no image. Oracles, however, are given forth; and every word of them is truth, and is fulfilled in its season. And this temple and its worship are holy; no abomination can be practiced there, and every thing in it leads to holiness of heart and life

Clarke: Hab 2:20

Let all the earth keep silence before him - Let all be dumb. Let none of them dare to open their mouths in the presence of Jehovah. He alone is Sovereign. He alone is the arbiter of life and death. Let all hear his commands with the deepest respect, obey them with the promptest diligence, and worship him with the most profound reverence. When an Asiatic sovereign goes to the mosque on any of the eastern festivals, such as the Bairham, the deepest silence reigns among all his retinue, viziers, foreign ambassadors, etc. They all bow respectfully before him; but no word is spoken, no sound uttered. It is to this species of reverence that the prophet alludes, and with this he concludes the prophetic part of this book. What God has threatened or promised, that he will fulfill. Let every soul bow before him, and submit to his authority.

Calvin: Hab 2:15

This passage, in which the Prophet condemns the king of Babylon for his usual practice of rendering drunk his friends, is frigidly interpreted by most expounders. It has been already often said how bold the Jews are in contriving what is fabulous; when nothing certain occurs to them, they divine this or that without any discrimination or shame. Hence they say, that Nebuchadnezzar was given to excess, and led all whom he could into a participation of the same vice. They also think that his associates were captive kings, as though he bid them for the sake of sport to be brought to his table, and by drinking to their health, forced them to intoxication, that he might laugh at them when they made themselves base and ridiculous. But all this is groundless; for there is no history that relates any such thing. It is, however, easy to see that another matter is here treated of by the Prophet; for he does not speak of the king only, but he refers to the whole empire. I therefore doubt not but that this whole discourse, in which the Babylonian king is condemned for making drunk his associates or friends, is metaphorical or allegorical. But before I proceed further on the subject, I shall say something as to the words; for the meaning of the Prophet will thereby be made more evident.

Woe, he says, to him who gives his friend drink; then he adds, מספח חמתך , mesephech chemetak, "who joinest and bottle.” חמה , cheme, is taken in Hebrew for a bottle; and we know, and it is sufficiently evident from Scripture, that the Jews used bottles of skin, as there are casks and larger vessels with us. Since, then, they put their wine into bottles, these were often taken for their cups, as it is in our language, when one says, Des flacons, des bouteilles. Hence some give this explanation—that the king of Babylon brought forth his flagons, that he might force to intoxication, by excessive drinking, those who could not and dared not to resist his will. But others render חמה , cheme, wrath, with a preposition understood: and in order that nothing may be understood, some render the participle, מספח , “displaying,” that is, “his fury.” But as חמה , cheme, means to be hot, we may, therefore, properly give this version, “Uniting thy heat;” that is, “It is not enough for thee to inebriate others, except thou implicates them with thyself.” We now perceive the meaning of this phrase. He adds, And thou also dost inebriate. We may hence learn that the Prophet had no other thing in view, but to show that the king of Babylon sought for himself many associates in his intemperance or excess: at the same time he takes, as I have said, excess in a metaphorical sense. I shall presently explain more fully what all this means; but now we only expound the words. And thou, he says, dost also inebriate: the particle אף , as it is well known, is laid down for the sake of amplifying. After having said, Thou unitest thy heat; that is, thou exhales thine intemperance, so that others also contract the same heat with thyself, he immediately adds, Thou inebriatest them. It follows, that their nakedness may be made open; that is, that they may disclose themselves with shame. The following verse I shall defer until we shall see more clearly what the Prophet had in view. ⁴¹

As I have already said the Prophet charges the Babylonian king with having implicated neighboring kings in his own evil desires, and with having in a manner inebriated them. He indeed compares the insatiable avarice of that king to intemperance; for as it is the object of drunken men not to drink what may suffice them, but to glut themselves with wine, so also when avarice is dominant in the hearts of men, they are seized with a certain kind of fury, like a person who has an immoderate love for wine. This is the reason for the metaphor; for the Babylonian king, when he thirsted for the blood of men, and also for wealth and kingdoms, led into the same kind of madness many other kings; for he could not have succeeded except he had allured the favor of many others, and deceived them with vain expectations. As a person who gives himself up to drinking wishes to leave associates, so Habakkuk lays the same thing to the charge of the king of Babylon; for being himself addicted to insatiable avarice, he procured associates to be as it were his guests, and quaffed wine to them, that is, elicited their cupidity, that they might join him in his wars; for each hoped for a part of the spoil after victory. Since, then, he had thus blinded many kings, they are said to have been inebriated by him. We indeed know that such allurements infatuate the minds and hearts of men; for there is no intoxication that stultifies men more than that eager appetite by which they devour both lands and seas.

We now then apprehend what the Prophet meant—that the Babylonian king not only burnt with his own avarice, but kindled also, as it were, a flame in others, like drunken men who excite one another. As then he had thus inflamed all the neighboring kings to rush headlong without any consideration and without any shame, like a person suffocated and overcome by excessive drinking; so the Prophet designates this inflaming as quaffing wine to them.

And this metaphor ought to be carefully observed; for we see at this day as in a mirror what the Prophet teaches here. For all the great princes, when they devise any plans of their own, send their ambassadors here and there, and seek to involve with themselves other cities and princes; and as no one is willing to endanger himself without reason, they set forth many fallacious allurements. And when any city fears a neighboring prince, it will seek to fortify itself by a new protection; so a treaty, when offered, becomes like a snare to it. And then when any inferior prince wishes to enlarge his borders, or to revenge himself, he willingly puts on arms, nay, anxiously, that he may be able, by the help of a greater, to effect his purpose, which he could not otherwise accomplish. Thus we see that dukes and counts, as they are called, and free cities, are daily inebriated. They who are chief kings, abounding in wine, that is, full of many vain promises, give to drink, as it were with full flagons, bidding wine to be brought forth on a well furnished table—“I will make thine enemy to give way to thee, and thou shalt compel him according to thy wish, and when I shall obtain the victory a part of the spoil shall be allotted to thee; I desire nothing but the glory. With regard to you, the free cities, see, ye tremble continually; now if you lie under my shadow, it will be the best security for you.” Such quaffing is to be found at this day almost throughout the whole of Europe.

Then the Prophet does not without reason commemorate this vice in the king of Babylon—that he made those associates drunk whom he had bound to himself by perfidious treaties; for as it has been said, there is no intoxication so dangerous as this madness; that is, when any one promises this or that to himself, and imagines what does not exist. Hence he not only says, that the Babylonian king gave drink to his friends, but also that he joined his bottles; as though he had said that he was very liberal, nay, prodigal, while seeking associates in his intemperance; for if one condition did not suffice, another was added—“Behold, my king is prepared; but if he is not enough another will be joined with him.” They thus then join together their heat. If we take חמה , cheme, for a bottle, then to join together their bottles would mean, that they accumulated promises until they inebriated those whom they sought to deceive. But if the other interpretation be more approved, which I am disposed to follow, then the meaning would be— They join together their own heat, that is, they implicate others with themselves; as they burn themselves with insatiable cupidity, so they spread this ardor far and wide, so that the desires of many become united.

He afterwards adds— that thou mayest see their nakedness. It was not indeed an object to the king of Babylon to disclose the reproach of all those whom he had induced to take part in his wars; but we know that great kings are wont to neglect their friends, to whom at first they promise every thing. When a king wishes to entice to himself a free city or an inferior prince, he will say—“See, I seek nothing but to be thy friend”. We indeed see how shamefully they perjure themselves; nor is it enough for them to utter these perjuries in their courts; but not many years pass away before our great kings make public their abominable perjuries; and it appears immediately afterwards that they thus seek, without any shame, to mock both God and all mankind. After testifying that they seek nothing except to defend by their protection what is right and just, and to resist the tyranny and pride of others, they immediately draw back when anything adverse afterwards happens, and the city, which had hoped everything from so liberal a king, is afterwards forced to submit and to agree with its enemies, and to manage matters anyhow; thus its nakedness is disclosed. In the same manner also are inferior princes deprived of their power. And to whom is this to be imputed but to the principal author? For when any one, for the sake of ambition or avarice, leads others to inconvenience or to damage, he may justly and correctly be said to disclose their nakedness. We now apprehend the Prophet’s real meaning, which interpreters have not understood. I come now to the next verse—

Calvin: Hab 2:16

He says that he is satiated with shame instead of glory. Some give this rendering—“Thou art satiated with shame more than glory;” but this does not suit the passage; for the Prophet does not mean that the Babylonian king was satiated with his own reproach, but rather with that of others. Secondly, the particle מ , mem, is not put here in a comparative sense, but the clause is on the contrary to be understood thus—“By thy glory, or, on account of thy glory, thou art satiated with shame”. It must also in the third place be observed, that punishment is not what the Prophet describes in these words; for it immediately follows— שתה גם אחה , shite gam ate, “drink thou also.” He comes now to punishment. By saying, then, that the king of Babylon was satiated with shame on account of glory, it is the same as though he had said, that while he was intent on increasing his own glory he brought all others to shame. It is indeed the common game of great kings, as it has been said, to enlarge their own power at the expense and loss of others. They would, indeed, if they could, render their friends safe; but when any one loses ground in their favor they neglect him. We see how at this day great kings, raising great armies, shed innocent blood. When a slaughter is made in war they express their grief, but it is only on account of their own glory or advantage. They will in words profess that they sympathise with the miserable men who faithfully spent their life for them, but they have for them no real concern. As, then, great kings draw human blood, and care nothing when many perish for their sake, the Prophet justly says, That the king of Babylon was satiated with shame on account of glory; that is, that while he was seeking his own glory he was satiated with the reproaches of many; for many perished on his account, many had been robbed of their power, or were afterwards to be robbed—for the Prophet refers not here to what had taken place, but he speaks of things future; and the past tense of verbs was intended to express certainty; and we know that this was a common mode of speaking with the Prophets. ⁴²

He now adds— drink thou also. We hence see that the king of Babylon was secure as long as he remained untouched, though his alliance and friendship had proved ruinous to many. As long then as his kingdom flourished, the king of Babylon cared but little for the losses of others. Hence the Prophet says—“Thou shalt also drink; thou thinkest that others only shall be punished, as though thou were not exposed to God’s judgement; but thou shalt come in thy turn and drink;”—in what way? He speaks here allegorically of the vengeance which was nigh the king of Babylon—“Thou, also,” he says, “shalt drink and become a reproach,” or, shalt be uncovered.

The word ערל , orel, means in Hebrew the foreskin; and the foreskinned, or uncircumcised, was the name given to the profane and the base, or the contaminated; and hence many give this rendering—“Thou also shalt become ignominious;” but others express more clearly the Prophet’s meaning by this version—“Thou shalt be uncovered.” Yet their opinion is not amiss who think that there is here a change of letters, that הערל , eorel, is put for הרעל , erol; and רעל , rol, means to be cast asleep; and it well suits a drunken man to say that he is stupefied. But as the Prophet had spoken of nakedness, I retain the word as it is; and thus the two clauses will correspond— Then thou shalt drink and be uncovered

Then follows the explanation— Poured forth ⁴³ into thee shall be the cup of Jehovah’s right hand; that is, “the Lord shall in his time be thy cup-bearer; as thou hast inebriated many nations, and under the pretense of friendship hast defrauded those who, being bound to thee by treaties, have been ruined; so the Lord will now recompense thee with the reward which thou hast deserved: As thou hast been a cup-bearer to others, so the Lord will now become thy cup-bearer, and will inebriate thee, but after another manner.” We indeed know what the Scripture everywhere means by the cup of God’s hand—even vengeance of every kind. God strikes some with giddiness and precipitates them, when deprived of all humanity, into a state of madness; others he infatuates by insensibility; some he deprives of all understanding, so that they perceive nothing aright; against others he rouses up enemies, who treat them with cruelty. Hence the Lord is said to extend his cup to the wicked whenever he takes vengeance on them.

Therefore he adds— the reproach of spewing shall be on thy glory. The word קיקלון , kikolun, is a compound. ⁴⁴ We have already seen that קלוכ , kolun, is shame; and now he speaks of shameful spewing. And this may be referred to the king of Babylon—that he himself would shamefully spew out what he had before intemperately swallowed down; or it might be fitly applied to his enemies—that they would spew in the face of the king of Babylon.

The end of which Habakkuk speaks, awaits all tyrants, who disturb the world by their cupidity. Ambition does indeed so infatuate them, that they neither spare human blood, nor hesitate to endanger their nearest and most friendly associates. Since then an insatiable thirst for glory thus inflames them, the Prophet justly allots to them this reward—that they shall receive filthy and shameful spewing instead of that glory, in seeking which they observed no limits. Let us now proceed -

Calvin: Hab 2:17

We may hence easily learn, that the Prophet has not been speaking of drunkenness, but that his discourse, as we have explained, was metaphorical; for here follows a reason, why he had denounced such a punishment on the king of Babylon, and that was, because he had exercised violence, not only against all nations indiscriminately, but also against the chosen people of God. He had before only set forth in general the cruelty with which the king of Babylon had destroyed many nations; but he now speaks distinctly of the Jews, in order to show that God would in a peculiar manner be the avenger of that cruelty which the Chaldeans had employed towards the Jews, because the Lord had taken that people under his own protection. Since then the king of Babylon had assailed the children of God, who had been adopted by him, and whose defender he was, he denounces upon him here a special punishment. We thus see that this discourse is properly addressed to the Jews; for he intended to bring them some consolation in their extreme evils, so that they might strengthen their patience; for they were thereby made to see that the wrongs done to them were come to a reckoning before God.

By Libanus then we are to understand either Judea or the temple; for Libanus, as it is well known, was not far from the temple; and it is elsewhere found in the same sense. But if any extends this to the land of Judea, the meaning will be the same; there will be but little or no difference as to the subject that is handled. Because the violence then of Libanus shall overwhelm thee

Then come the words, the pillaging of beasts. Interpreters think that the Chaldeans and Assyrians are here called בהמות , bemutt, beasts, as they had been savage and cruel, like wild beasts, in laying waste Judea; but I rather understand by the beasts of Libanus those which inhabited that forest. The Prophet exaggerates the cruelty of the king of Babylon by this consideration, that he had been an enemy to brute beasts; and I consider the pronoun relative אשר , asher, which, to be understood before the verb יחיתן , ichiten, which may be taken to mean, to tear, or to frighten, Some give this rendering, “The plundering of beasts shall tear them;” as though he had said, “The Babylonians are indeed like savage beasts, but they shall be torn by their own plundering:” but another sense will be more suitable that the plundering of beasts, which terrified them, shall overwhelm thee; for the same verb, יבס , icas, shall cover or overwhelm the king of Babylon, is to be repeated here. He adds at last the clause, which was explained yesterday. We now perceive the meaning of the Prophet to be—that the king of Babylon would be justly plundered, because he had destroyed the holy land and iniquitously attacked God’s chosen people, and had also carried on his depredations through almost the whole of the Eastern world. ⁴⁵ It now follows—

Calvin: Hab 2:18

The Prophet now advances farther, and shows that whatever he had predicted of the future ruin of Babylon and of its monarchy, proceeded from the true God, from the God of Israel: for it would not have been sufficient to hold, that some deity existed in heaven, who ruled human affairs, so that it could not be, but that tyrants would have to suffer punishment for their cruelty. We indeed know that such sayings as these were everywhere common among heathen nations—that justice sits with Jupiter—that there is a Nemesis—that there is Divine vengeance. Since then such a conviction had ever been imprinted on the hearts of men, it would have been a frigid and almost an empty doctrine, had not the Prophet introduced the God of Israel. This is the reason why he now derides all idols, and claims for God the government of the whole world, and clearly shows that he speaks of the Jews, because they worshipped no imaginary gods, as the heathen nations, but plainly understood him to be the creator of heaven and earth, who revealed himself to Abraham, who gave his law by the hand of Moses. We now perceive the Prophet’s design.

As then the king of Babylon did himself worship his own gods, the Prophet dissipates that vain confidence, by which he might be deceived and deceive others. Hence he says, What avails the graven image? He speaks here contemptuously of images formed by men’s hands. And he adds a reason, because the maker has graven it, he says. Interpreters give a sense that is very jejune, as though the Prophet had said, “What avails a graven image, when it is graven or melted by its artificer?” But the Prophet shows here the reason why the worship of idols is useless, and that is, because these gods are made of dead materials. And then he says, “What deity can the artificer produce?” We hence see that a reason is given in these words, and therefore we may more clearly render them thus—“What avails the graven image, when the framer has graven it?” that is, since the graven image has its origin from the hand and skill of man, what can it avail? He then adds, he has formed a molten image; that is, though the artificer has given form to the metal, or to the wood, or to the stone, yet he could not have changed its nature. He has indeed given it a certain external appearance; but were any one to ask what it is, the answer would surely be, “It is a graven image.” Since then its nature is not changed by the work of man, it evidently appears, how stupid and mad must all those be who put their trust in graven images. ⁴⁶

He then adds, and a teacher of falsehood. He added this clause, because men previously entertain false notions, and dare not to form a judgement on the matter itself. For, how comes it that a piece of wood or a stone is called a god? Had any one asked the sages at Rome or at Athens, or in other cities, who thought all other nations barbarous, What is that? on seeing a Jupiter made of silver; or of wood, or of stone, the answer would have been, “It is Jupiter, it is God.” But how could this be? It is a stone, a piece of wood, or of silver. They would yet have asserted that it was God. Whence came this madness? Even from this, because men were bewitched, so that seeing they saw not; they wilfully closed their eyes, and resolved to be blind, being unwilling to understand. This is the reason why the Prophet, by way of anticipation, says, the artificer has formed —what has he formed? a graven image and a teacher of falsehood. The material remains the same, but a false notion prevails, for men think idols to be gods. How come they to think so? It is no doubt the teaching of falsehood, a mere illusion. He then confirms the same thing; the fashioner, or the artificer, he says, trusts in his own work, or in what he has formed. How is this? Must they not be void of sense and reason who trust in lifeless things? “The workman,” as Isaiah says, “will take his instruments, will form an idol, and then he will bow the knee, and call it his god; yet it is the work of his own hands.” What! art not thou thyself a god? thou knowest thine own frailty, and yet thou createst new gods! Even in this manner does the Prophet confirm what he had previously said, that men are extremely stupid, nay, that they are seized with monstrous sottishness, when they ascribe a kind of deity to wood, or to a stone, or to metal. How so? because they are, he says, false imaginations.

And he adds, that he may make dumb idols. He again repeats what he had said,—that the nature of the material is not changed by men’s workmanship, when they form to themselves gods either from wood or from stone. How so? because they cannot speak. To the same purpose is what immediately follows; the next verse must therefore be added. We shall afterwards say something more on the general subject.

Calvin: Hab 2:19

He pursues, as I have said, the same subject, and sharply inveighs against the sottishness of men, that they call on wood and stone, as though there were some hidden power in them. They say to the wood, Awake; for they implored help from their idols. Shall it teach? Some render it thus as a question; but I take it in a simpler form, “It will teach;” that is, “It is a wonder that ye are so wilfully foolish; for were God to send to you no Prophet, were there no one to instruct you, yet the wood and the stone would be sufficient teachers to you: ask your idols, that is, ascertain rightly what is in them. Doubtless, the god that is made of wood or of stone, sufficiently declares by his silence that he is no god. For there is no motion in wood and stone. Where there is no vigor and no life, is it not right to feel assured, that there is no deity? There are, indeed, many creatures endued with feeling and motion; but the God who gives power, and motion, and feeling to the whole world, and to all its parts, does he not surpass in these respects all his creatures? Since, then, wood and stone are silent, they are teachers sufficient for you, provided ye be apt scholars.”

We hence see how the Prophet in this way amplifies the insensibility of men; for they did not perceive what was quite manifest. The design of what follows is the same. Behold, it is covered over with gold and silver; that is, it is made splendid: for idolaters think that their gods are better when adorned with gold and silver; but yet there is no breath in the midst of them. “Look,” he says, “within; look within, and ye shall see that they are dead.” ⁴⁷ The rest we shall dilate on to-morrow.

Calvin: Hab 2:20

After having taught us that the Babylonians were deceived in expecting any help from their idols, and were deluded by Satan, Habakkuk now recalls the attention of the faithful to the only true God; for it would not have been enough to take away from the Babylonians the false confidence which they had in their idols, except the Israelites, on the other hand, trusting in the grace of the true God, were fully persuaded that God was on their side, as he had taken them under his protection.

And we ought carefully to observe this order; for we see that many boldly deride all the superstitions which prevail in the world, and at the same time daringly and with cyclopic fury despise the true God. How many are at this day either Epicureans or Lucianians, who prate jestingly and scoffingly against the superstitions of the papacy, but in the meantime they are not influenced by any fear of God? If, however, we are to choose one of two evils, superstition is more tolerable than that gross impiety which obliterates every thought of a God. It is indeed true, that the more the superstitious toil in their delusions, the more they provoke God’s wrath against them; for they transfer his glory to dead things; but yet they retain this principle—that honor and worship are due to God: but the profane, in whom there is no religion whatever, not only change God from what he is, but also strive as far as they can to reduce him to nothing. Hence I have said, that the order which the Prophet observes here ought to be maintained. For, after having overturned the false illusions of the devil, by which he deludes the superstitious, by setting before them a mere shadow in the place of the true God, he now sets up the true worship of the only true God. Then the Prophet has hitherto been endeavoring to subvert superstitions, but he now builds up: for except God, when idols are pulled down, ascends his own tribunal, and shines there as supreme according to his right, it would be better, at least it would be more tolerable, as I have said, that superstitions should be left entire.

He now says that God is in his own temple or palace: this word is often taken for heaven, but is applied to the sanctuary. Many consider that the reference is made to heaven; as though the Prophet had said, that the true God, who is the artificer and creator of heaven and earth, is not to be seen in a visible form, nor covered over with gold and silver, nor represented by wood or stone; but that he rules in heaven, and fills heaven with his infinite glory and this view is by no means unsuitable. But as he here specially addresses the Jews, it seems to me more probable that he speaks of the temple, where God then designed to be worshipped, and sacrifices to be offered to him for it would not have been sufficient to set God, the creator of heaven and earth, in opposition to the superstitions of all the nations; but it was also necessary to introduce the contrast between the God of Israel and all those gods who then had obtained a name and reputation in the world, as they had been formed by the will of men. The God of Israel was indeed the creator of heaven and earth; but he had made himself known by his law, he had revealed himself to men, so that his majesty was not hidden; for when we speak of God, we are lost except he comes to us, and in a manner exhibits himself to us; for the capacity of our understanding is not so great that it can penetrate above all heavens. Hence the majesty of God is in itself incomprehensible to us; but he makes himself known by his works and by his word. Now as the Israelites worshipped, and surely knew that they worshipped the only true God, the Prophet here rightly confirms them in the hope they derived from the teaching of the law—that God was their Father, inasmuch as he had adopted them. If any prefer to take the word for heaven, I do not object; and that meaning, as I have said, is not unsuitable. But as the Prophet seems to me to have a special vies to his own people, to whom he was appointed a teacher; it is more probable that the word, temple or palace, is here to be understood of the sanctuary.

If any raises the objection that there is then no difference between the God of Israel and the gods of the Gentiles, for he also dwells in an earthly habitation, the answer is obviously this—that though God is said to dwell between the cherubim, he has not been represented by an image, as though he had anything like to wood or stone, or possessed any likeness to human bodies. All these delusions were banished from the Temple; for he commanded his worshipers to look up to heaven. There was an intervening veil, that the people might understand that they could not otherwise come to God than through that celestial model, and the types of which they saw in the altar of incense, in the altar on which they sacrificed, in the table of the shewbread, in short, in all other services of the Temple. And there is another difference to be noticed; for though there was there the golden altar, though there was there the ark of the covenant, and the altar on which the victims were immolated, yet inscribed on all these typical representations was the word of God, by which alone true religion was to be distinguished from all false inventions. For whatever specious appearance of reason may therefore be in fictitious modes of worship, men have no authority to render them lawful; but so much reverence is due to the only true word of God, that it ought to overrule all other reasons. And besides, this word, as I have hinted already, did not retain the Jews in these delusions, but elevated their minds to heaven. We now then see that there was a wide difference between the Temple which was at Jerusalem, and the temples which the superstitious had then built for themselves throughout the world; for God ruled over the Jews, so that they could not have been deluded. And at this day, where the word of God shines among us, we can follow it with safety. And, further, God did spiritually draw to himself his own servants, though he employed, on account of their ignorance, certain outward elements. Hence the Prophet justly says, that God was in his palace or his Temple; for the Israelites knew of a certainty that they did not worship a fictitious God, since in his law he had revealed himself to them, and had chosen the sanctuary, where he intended to be worshipped in a typical, and yet in a spiritual manner.

He then adds, Let all the earth be silent before him. Habakkuk, no doubt, commends the power of God, that the Israelites might proceed with alacrity in their religious course, knowing it to be a sufficient security to be under the protection of the only true God, and that they might not seek after the superstitions of the nations, nor be carried here and there, as it often happens, by vain desires. Keep silence, then, he says, let all the earth. He shows that though the Israelites might be far inferior to the Babylonians and other nations, and be far unequal to them in strength, military art, forces, and, in short, in all things of this kind, yet they would be always safe under the guardianship of God; for the Lord was able to control whatever power there might be in the world.

We now see what the Prophet had in view: for he does not here simply exhort all people to worship God, but shows, that though men may grow mad against him, he yet can easily by his hand subjugate them; for after all the tumults made by kings and their people, the Lord can, by one breath of his mouth, dissipate all their attempts, however furious they may be. This, then, is the silence of which the Prophet now speaks. But there is another kind of silence, and that is, when we willingly submit to God; for silence in this respect is nothing else but submission: and we submit to God, when we bring not our own inventions and imaginations, but suffer ourselves to be taught by his word. We also submit to him, when we murmur not against his power or his judgements, when we humble ourselves under his powerful hand, and do not fiercely resist him, as those do who indulge their own lusts. This is indeed, as I have said, a voluntary submission: but the Prophet here shows that there is power in God to lay prostrate the whole world, and to tread it under his feet, whenever it may please him; so that the faithful have nothing to fear, for they know that their salvation is secured; for though the whole world were leagued against them, it yet cannot resist God. Now follows a prayer:—

Defender: Hab 2:15

This abrupt insertion almost seems out of place following the glorious promise of the preceding verse. It may have a spiritual application as a warning against the export of Babylonian false religion. But it also serves as a needed reminder to Israel, and to all people, of the judgment awaiting those who seduce others into sin, whether by strong drink or other means."

Defender: Hab 2:19

A woe is pronounced against those who induce others to sin (Hab 2:15), and another here against those who seek knowledge and life from wood and stone. These are merely created materials, embellished by men, but possess neither life nor knowledge, and so cannot impart such information to others. Man's heart is corrupt and so he seeks to escape his Creator; nevertheless, he must somehow seek knowledge and life beyond himself, and so "worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator" (Rom 1:25). This sinful ignorance is no less characteristic of modern humanistic evolutionists than it was of the ancient pantheistic evolutionists, and God has pronounced woe on all who turn to such lies."

Defender: Hab 2:20

This can only refer to God's heavenly temple (Isa 6:1), since the earthly temple built by Solomon was about to be destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar (2Ch 36:19).

Defender: Hab 2:20

Men should stand in mute humility at the very thought of the omnipotent, omniscient God. Instead, they, like the pagan Babylonians and the apostate Jews, presume to disobey Him, to find substitutes for Him, to rail against Him, or more often simply to ignore Him in their own clamorous pursuit of wealth and pleasure. Soon may come the proclamation: "Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord GOD: for the day of the Lord is at hand" (Zep 1:7)."

TSK: Hab 2:15

unto : Gen 19:32-35; 2Sa 11:13, 2Sa 13:26-28; Jer 25:15, Jer 51:7; Rev 17:2, Rev 17:6, Rev 18:3

that puttest : Hos 7:5

that thou : Gen 9:22; Exo 32:25

TSK: Hab 2:16

with shame for glory : or, more with shame than with glory, Pro 3:35; Isa 47:3; Hos 4:7; Phi 3:19

drink : Psa 75:8; Isa 49:26, Isa 51:21-23; Jer 25:26, Jer 25:27, Jer 51:57; Rev 18:6

and let : Isa 20:4, Isa 47:3; Nah 3:5

the cup : Jer 25:27-29

and shameful : Isa 28:7, Isa 28:8; Hos 7:5

TSK: Hab 2:17

the violence : Zec 11:1

because : Hab 2:8; Psa 55:23, Psa 137:8; Pro 28:17; Rev 18:20-24

of the city : Jer 50:28, Jer 50:33, Jer 50:34, Jer 51:24, Jer 51:34-37

TSK: Hab 2:18

profiteth : Isa 37:38, Isa 42:17, Isa 44:9, Isa 44:10, Isa 45:16, Isa 45:20, Isa 46:1, Isa 46:2, Isa 46:6-8; Jer 2:27, Jer 2:28, Jer 10:3-5; Jer 50:2; Rom 6:21

a teacher : Jer 10:8, Jer 10:14, Jer 10:15; Jon 2:8; Zec 10:2; Rom 1:23-25; 2Th 2:9-11; 1Ti 4:1, 1Ti 4:2; Rev 13:11-15, Rev 19:20

that the : Psa 115:4-8, Psa 135:15-18; Isa 1:31, Isa 44:14-20

maker of his work : Heb. fashioner of his fashion

dumb : 1Co 12:2

TSK: Hab 2:19

that : 1Ki 18:26-29; Psa 97:7; Isa 44:17; Jer 51:47; Dan 3:7, Dan 3:18, Dan 3:29, Dan 5:23; Jon 1:5

it is : Isa 40:19, Isa 46:6; Jer 10:4, Jer 10:9; Dan 3:1; Act 17:29; Rev 17:4

and there : Psa 135:17

TSK: Hab 2:20

the Lord : Psa 11:4, Psa 115:3, Psa 132:13, Psa 132:14; Isa 6:1, Isa 66:1, Isa 66:6; Jon 2:4, Jon 2:7; Eph 2:21, Eph 2:22

let all the earth keep silence before him : Heb. be silent all the earth before him, Psa 46:10, Psa 76:8, Psa 76:9; Zep 1:7; Zec 2:13

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Hab 2:15

From cruelty the prophet goes on to denounce the woe on insolence. "Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor"(to whom he owes love) drink (literally, that maketh him drink); that puttest thy bottle to him, and makest him drunken also , that thou mayest look (gaze with devilish pleasure) on their nakedness."This may either be of actual insults (as in the history of Noah), in keeping certainly with the character of the later Babylonians, the last wantonness of unbridled power, making vile sport of those like himself (his neighbor), or it may be drunkenness through misery Isa 29:9 wherein they are bared of all their glory and brought to the lowest shame. The woe also falls on all, who in any way intoxicate others with flattering words or reigned affection, mixing poison under things pleasant, to bring them to shame.

Barnes: Hab 2:16

Thou art filled with shame for glory - Oppressors think to make themselves great by bringing others down, to fill themselves with riches, by spoiling others. They loved shame Hos 4:8, because they loved that, which brought shame; they were filled with shame, in that they sated themselves with shamefulness, which was their shame within, before, in the just judgment of God, shame came on them from without Phi 3:19. "Their glory was in their shame."They shall be filled, yea, he says, they are already filled; they would satisfy, gorge themselves, with all their hearts’ desires; they are "filled to the full,"but with shame instead of glory which they sought, or which they already had. "From"and "for"a state of "glory,"they were filled with contempt.

Drink thou also, and let thy foreskin be uncovered - thy shame like those whom thou puttest to shame, only the greater in being uncircumcised. "The cup of the Lord’ s Right Hand shall be turned (round) unto thee (or against thee)."It had gone round the circuit of the nations whom God had employed him to chasten, and now, the circle completed, it should be brought round to himself, "With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured unto you again"Mat 7:2. So Jeremiah says, Jer 25:26, "And the king of Shesbach shall drink after them;"and of Edom, Lam 4:21, "To thee also shall the cup be brought round."Thou, a man, madest man to drink of the cup of thine anger: the cup shall be brought round to thee, but not by man; to thee it shall be given by "the Right Hand of the Lord,"which thou canst not escape; it shall be "the cup of the wine of the fierceness of the wrath of Almighty God"Rev 16:19; as Asaph had said, Psa 76:8, "There is a cup in the Lord’ s hand; it is full of mixture, and He poureth out therefrom; but the dregs thereof all the ungodly of the earth shall suck them out, shall drink them."

And shameful spewing shall be on thy glory - Jerome: "With the shame of thy spewing shalt thou bring up all thou hast swallowed down, and from the height of glory shalt thou be brought to the utmost ills."The shame of the ungodly cometh forth from himself; the shame he put others to is doubled upon himself; and the very means which he had used to fill himself with glory and greatness, cover the glory which by nature he had, with the deeper disgrace, so that he should be a loathsome and revolting sight to all. Man veils foul deeds under fair words; God, in His word, unveils the foulness.

Barnes: Hab 2:17

For the violence of Lebanon - i. e., done to Lebanon, whether the land of Israel of which it was the entrance and the beauty (See Isa 37:24, and, as a symbol, Jer 22:6, Jer 22:23; Eze 17:3; but it is used as a symbol of Sennacherib’ s army, Isa 10:34, and the king of Asshur is not indeed spoken of under the name as a symbol (in Eze 21:3,) but is compared to it), or the temple (See the note at Zec 12:1), both of which Nebuchadnezzar laid waste; or, more widely, it may be a symbol of all the majesty of the world and its empires, which he subdues, as Isaiah uses it, when speaking of the judgment on the world, Isa 2:13, "It shall cover thee, and the spoil (i. e., spoiling, destruction) of beasts (the inhabitants of Lebanon) which made them afraid,"or more simply, "the wasting of wild beasts shall crush , Pro 10:14; Pro 13:3; Pro 14:14; Pro 18:7) them (selves),"i. e., as it is in irrational nature, that "the frequency of the incursions of very mischievous animals becomes the cause that people assemble against them and kill them, so their (the Chaldaeans’ ) frequent injustice is the cause that they haste to be avenged on thee".

Having become beasts, they shared their history. They spoiled, scared, laid waste, were destroyed. "Whoso seeketh to hurt another, hurteth himself."The Chaldaeans laid waste Judea, scared and wasted its inhabitants; the end of its plunder should be, not to adorn, but to cover them, overwhelm them as in ruins, so that they should not lift up their heads again. Violence returns upon the head of him who did it; they seem to raise a lofty fabric, but are buried under it. He sums up their past experience, what God had warned them beforehand, what they had found.

Barnes: Hab 2:18

What profiteth - ( Hath profited) הועיל מה . Samuel warned them, "Serve the Lord with all your heart, and turn ye not aside; for (it would be) after vanities which will not profit nor deliver for they are vain:"and Jeremiah tells their past; "their prophets prophesied by Baal; and after things יועילי לא which profit not, have they gone."Elsewhere the idol is spoken of as a thing "which will not profit"(future) "My people hath changed its glory יועיל בלא for that which profiteth not,"Jer 2:8, Jer 2:11. So Isaiah, "Who hath formed a god, הועיל לבלתי not to profit."Isa 44:9.10. "The makers of a graven image are all of them vanity, and their desirable things יועילו בל will not profit."

The graven image, that the maker therefore hath graven it? - What did Baal and Ashtaroth profit you? What availed it ever but to draw down the wrath of God? Even so neither shall it profit the Chaldaean. As their idols availed them not, so neither need they fear them. Sennacherib and Nebuchadnezzar were propagandists of their own belief and would destroy, if they could, all other worship, false or true : Nebuchadnezzar is thought to have set up his own image Dan. 3. Antichrist will set himself up as God 2Th 2:4; Rev 13:15-17. We may take warning at least by our own sins. If we had no profit at all from them, neither will the like profit others. the Jews did, in the main, learn this in their captivity.

The molten image and teacher of lies - It is all one whether by "teacher of lies"we understand the idol , or its priest . For its priest gave it its voice, as its maker created its form. It could only seem to teach through the idol-priest. Isaiah used the title "teacher of lies,"of the false prophet Isa 9:14. It is all one. Zechariah combines them Zec 10:2; "The teraphim have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie, and have had false dreams."

That the maker of his work trusteth therein - This was the special folly of idolatry. The thing made must needs he inferior to its maker. It was one of the corruptions of idolatry that the maker of his own work should trust in what was wholly his own creation, what, not God, but himself created, what had nothing but what it had from himself . He uses the very words which express the relation of man to God, "the Framer"and "the thing framed."Isa 29:16, "O your perverseness! Shall the framer be accounted as clay, theft the thing made should say of its Maker, He made me not, and the thing framed say of its Framer, He hath no hands?"The idol-maker is "the creator of his creature,"of his god whom he worships. Again the idol-maker makes "dumb idols"(literally, "dumb nothings") in themselves nothings, and having no power out of themselves; and what is uttered in their name, are but lies. And what else are man’ s idols of wealth, honor, fame, which he makes to himself, the creatures of his own hands or mind, their greatness existing chiefly in his own imagination before which he bows down himself, who is the image of God?

Barnes: Hab 2:19

But then the greater is the "Woe"to him who deceiveth by them. The prophet passes away from the idols as "nothings"and pronounces "woe"on those who deceive by them. He . first expostulates with them on their folly, and would awaken them. "What hath it profited?"(As in Psa 115:5; 1Co 12:2) Then on the obstinate he denounces "woe.""Woe unto him that saith to the wood, Awake; to the dumb stone, Arise."Self-made blindness alone could, in the light of truth, so speak; but yet more lies in the emphatic word, "It."The personal pronoun stands emphatically in Hebrew; He shall teach, lo, He (this same of whom he speaks) this is It which shall teach: It, and not the living God. And yet this same It (the word is again emphatic) he points, as with the finger, to it, "behold, It is laid over with, held fast by , gold and silver,"so that no voice could escape, if it had any. "And there is no breath at all in the midst of it"(Compare Jer 10:14 repeated Jer 51:17), literally "All breath, all which is breath, there is none within it;"he first suggests the thought, breath of every sort, and then energetically denies it all ; no life of any sort, of man, or bird, or beast, or creeping thing Isa 41:23; Jer 10:5; none, good or bad; from God or from Satan; none whereby it can do good or do evil; for which it should be loved or feared. Evil spirits may have made use of idols: they could not give them life, nor dwell in them.

The words addressed to it are the language of the soul in the seeming absence or silence of God (Psa 7:7; Psa 35:23; Psa 44:24; Psa 59:6; Isa 51:9; Delitszch), but mockery as spoken to the senseless stone, as Ehijah had mocked the Baal-priests, "peradventure he sleepeth and must be awaked"1Ki 18:26-27.

Barnes: Hab 2:20

And now having declared the nothingness of all which is not God, the power of man or his gods, he answers again his own question, by summoning all before the presence of the majesty of God.

But the Lord - He had, in condemning them, pictured the tumult of the world, the oppressions, the violence, bloodsheddings, covetousness, insolence, self-aggrandizement of the then world-empire, and had denounced woe upon it; we see man framing his idols, praying to the lifeless stones; and God, of whom none thought, where was He? These were people’ s ways. "But the Lord,"he joins it on, as the complement and corrective of all this confusion.

The Lord is in His holy temple - awaiting, in His long-suffering, to judge. "The temple of God"is where God enshrines Himself, or allows Himself to be seen and adored. "God is wholly everywhere, the whole of Him no where."There is no contrast between His temple on earth, and His temple in heaven. He is not more locally present in heaven than in earth. It were as anthropomorphic but less pious to think of God, as confined, localized, in heaven as on earth; because it would be simply removing God away from man. Solomon knew, when he built the temple, that "the heaven and heaven of heavens could not contain 1Ki 8:27 God."The "holy temple,"which could be destroyed Psa 79:1, toward which people were to pray Psa 5:7; Psa 138:2; Jon 2:4, was the visible temple 1Ki 8:29-30, 1Ki 8:35, 1Ki 8:38, 1Ki 8:42, 1Ki 8:44, 1Ki 8:48, where were the symbols of God’ s Presence, and of the stoning Sacrifice; but lest His presence should be localized, Solomon’ s repeated prayer is 1Ki 8:30, 1Ki 8:39, 1Ki 8:43, 1Ki 8:49, "hear Thou in heaven Thy dwelling place"1Ki 8:32, 1Ki 8:34, 1Ki 8:36, 1Ki 8:45; "hear Thou in heaven."There is then no difference, as though in earlier books the "holy temple"meant that at Jerusalem, in the later, "the heavens?"In the confession at the offering of the "third year’ s tithes,"the prayer is, Deu 27:15, "look down from Thy holy habitation, from heaven;"and David says, "the Lord is in His holy temple, the Lord’ s throne is in heaven"Psa 11:4; and, Psa 18:6, Psa 18:9 : "He heard my voice out of His temple - He bowed the heavens also and came down;"and, Psa 29:9, "In His temple doth everyone say, Glory."The simple words are identical though not in the same order as those, in which David, in the same contrast with the oppression of man, ushers in the judgment and final retribution to good and bad, by declaring the unseen presence of God upon His Throne in heaven, beholding and testing the sons of men.

In His Presence, all the mysteries of our being are solved.

The Lord is in His holy Temple - not, as the idols in temples made with hands, but revealing Himself in the visible temple (Jerome), "dwelling in the Son, by Nature and Union, as He saith Joh 14:10, "The Father who dwelleth in Me doeth the works;"in each one of the bodies and souls of the saints by His Spirit 1Co 6:19, in the Blessed, in glory; in the Heavens, by the more evident appearance of His Majesty and the workings of His Power ; "everywhere by Essence, Presence, and Power, ‘ for in Him we live, and move, and have our being;’ nowhere as confined or inclosed."Since then God is in Heaven, beholding the deeds of people, Himself Unchangeable, Almighty, All-holy, "let all the earth keep silence before Him,"literally, "hush before Him all the earth,"waiting from Him in hushed stillness the issue of this tangled state of being. And to the hashed soul, hushed to itself and its own thought, hushed in awe of His Majesty and "His Presence, before His face,"God speaks .

Poole: Hab 2:15

Another public and crying sin of this Chaldean kingdom was excessive drinking, and making one another drunk, and for this God will severely punish.

Puttest thy bottle to him; forcing them by importunity or threats to drink by greater measures then they can bear.

Makest him drunken also never givest over till thou hast made him vile and loathsome, as well as senseless in his drink.

That thou mayest look on their nakedness designing to put the greatest abuse on them, exposing them to view, scorn, and derision, or to beastly or not to be named uncleanness, which vice the Babylonians are charged with by Herodotus and Ctesias.

Another public and crying sin of this Chaldean kingdom was excessive drinking, and making one another drunk, and for this God will severely punish.

Puttest thy bottle to him; forcing them by importunity or threats to drink by greater measures then they can bear.

Makest him drunken also never givest over till thou hast made him vile and loathsome, as well as senseless in his drink.

That thou mayest look on their nakedness designing to put the greatest abuse on them, exposing them to view, scorn, and derision, or to beastly or not to be named uncleanness, which vice the Babylonians are charged with by Herodotus and Ctesias.

Poole: Hab 2:16

Thou O king of Babylon,

art filled shortly shalt be, and it is as sure as if already done, with shame for glory; as much filled with shame by the contempt they shall cast upon thee whom thou didst once vilify and contemn; thy shame shall be greater than ever was thy glory, as the Hebrew seems to import.

Drink thou also: thy sin was that thou didst drink, and madest others drink to shameless excess too; now thy punishment shall be to drink of the cup of God’ s wrath, which will fill thee with astonishment and calamities.

Let thy foreskin be uncovered let thy shame be laid open before all; this retaliation is just and necessary.

The cup a Scripture phrase, expressing the just judgments and corrections of sinners.

Of the Lord’ s right hand it is said to be in his right hand here, and in his hand, Psa 75:8 .

Shall be turned unto thee: they turned the cup of pleasure about, God will carry the cup of indignation about also, and make them drink deep of it, they shall not escape.

Shameful spewing shall be upon thy glory then shalt thou be as much loathed as a shameful drunkard is in his vomit.

Poole: Hab 2:17

The violence of Lebanon shall cover thee: this is added to all the rest, that God’ s people might know this was the time of recompences for Zion, that the violence by Babylon done to Judea and its inhabitants should be avenged and no longer deferred, but now should overwhelm Babylon, in which should be made as great devastations as ever she made in the fruitful and beautiful mountain Lebanon, supposed, in Deu 3:25 , to express the land of Canaan; or else by Lebanon may be meant the temple, and house of the sanctuary, (as the Chaldee paraphrast,) because it was built of the cedars of Lebanon.

Thee Babylon.

The spoil of beasts such spoil as by hunters is made among wild beasts, when they endeavour to destroy the whole kind of them, such havoc, and by all the ways and methods that art and subtlety can invent to extirpate them, such wastes shalt thou suffer; for thou art to be destroyed: Or else thus, such desolations shall thine enemies make in thee as wild, ravenous, and insatiable beasts make where they prevail, they shall tear and devour all they seize, and seize all that peep abroad, and this shall make all men afraid continually.

Because of men’ s blood & c.: see Hab 2:8 .

Poole: Hab 2:18

Here the prophet removes the confidences of Babylon; she would boast of her gods, and depend on them, but this will be vain and unprofitable, it is not imaginable that these idols should help these persons.

The graven image carved in wood, or stone, for of such materials did these idolmakers sometimes make their gods.

The maker: it is brutish folly in any one to value, or desire to be helped, by such lifeless idols, but it is greatest folly for him that makes the image, that remember how it was hewed, plead, tumbled about, and all this without the least degree of sense or feeling of what it suffered; and can that be sensible of my sorrows which feels not any thing itself?

The molten image idols made of gold or silver, or any other rustle metal, were framed out of the metal first melted, and are therefore called molten images.

A teacher of lies but whether graven or molten, yet all such images are but teachers of lies, Jer 10:8,14 . They withdraw the mind from God, our true and only helper, and bewitch men to trust to idols, in which is no help, which ever proved lies to all that trusted on them.

That the maker who knows, for he saw that there was no life, strength, or wisdom in one or other; it is shameless in any, but most in him that made the idol, to worship his own work, and rely upon that which he knows hath no eyes, or hands, or ears, but what his tool framed for it.

His work his own work, and yet his god! the product of his art, and yet the hope of his soul! O brutish folly, self-contradiction!

Trusteth therein resteth confident of defence, and rescue from evil, by it.

Dumb idols which neither can answer a question, nor give a direction in a strait; can neither promise good to a friend, nor denounce a threat against an enemy.

Poole: Hab 2:19

In the former verse the prophet declared the uselessness and unprofitableness of the idols of Babylon, now he threatens the idolaters. They sinned greatly by placing their confidence in them, and they should suffer the more for it.

The wood whatever shape art may give it, or whatever veneration blind idolaters may bear to it, it is still wood, no better; a log, a worthless block.

Awake: this expresseth the idolater’ s prayer to his idol. Awake; what! is he a sleepy god? No, not so much, it is a lifeless log, and its eyes never did see.

The dumb stone another sort of their useless idols, senseless as the stones, and still as unable to rise or help as before they were graven and carved; it is a stone, no god.

Arise another form of praying to this idol; and when the idol can rise Babylon shall be helped, till then it must abide its sorrows.

It shalt teach: sottish men! in misery to hope that lifeless idols shall counsel and direct. What! dumb, and without sense, and yet teach!

Behold look, ye selfdeceiving idolaters, consult your own senses, see what matter they are made of.

It is laid over with gold and silver see the facings or plates are different from that which is under, and can that be a god that is made up of such different materials? it were more like men to pull off the gold and silver, and with these to purchase your safety.

There is no breath at all not so much as the soul of a brute in them.

Poole: Hab 2:20

But the Lord: what idols are. he had already showed, a doctrine of lies, impotent and lifeless statues; but the God of Israel is not like them. He is Jehovah, fountain of being, life, power, and salvation to his people; he can do all he will for or against a people.

Is in his holy temple or palace of his holiness: he is in his temple and in heaven, every where at all times; though his people be in Babylon, yet he is where he doth hear, see, and discern their state, and whence he promised to relieve and help them.

Let all the earth both Chaldea the oppressive, and Judea the oppressed, and Medes and Persians and all their confederates, let all these nations

keep silence before him fear, submit, pray, wait for, and depend on him: let his enemies be silent, fear, make their peace, and prevent his displeasure; let his people be silent, reverence, hope, pray, and wait for him. who will arise and have mercy on them, and destroy their enemies; who will make it to be well with the righteous, and again will make it ill with the wicked; who will fully and satisfactorily solve the doubts and unfold the riddles of his own providence.

But the Lord: what idols are. he had already showed, a doctrine of lies, impotent and lifeless statues; but the God of Israel is not like them. He is Jehovah, fountain of being, life, power, and salvation to his people; he can do all he will for or against a people.

Is in his holy temple or palace of his holiness: he is in his temple and in heaven, every where at all times; though his people be in Babylon, yet he is where he doth hear, see, and discern their state, and whence he promised to relieve and help them.

Let all the earth both Chaldea the oppressive, and Judea the oppressed, and Medes and Persians and all their confederates, let all these nations

keep silence before him fear, submit, pray, wait for, and depend on him: let his enemies be silent, fear, make their peace, and prevent his displeasure; let his people be silent, reverence, hope, pray, and wait for him. who will arise and have mercy on them, and destroy their enemies; who will make it to be well with the righteous, and again will make it ill with the wicked; who will fully and satisfactorily solve the doubts and unfold the riddles of his own providence.

Haydock: Hab 2:15

Wo. All this may refer to the king of Egypt, who deceived Joakim, Sedecias, &c. (Calmet) ---

Septuagint, "O, he who giveth drink to his neighbour, a cruel overthrow, and who maketh," &c. ---

Nakedness. Septuagint, "caverns;" deluding him, so that his places of retreat become useless. (Haydock) ---

The Jews relate that Sedecias was intoxicated, and then acted with indecency. (St. Jerome) ---

But these accounts deserve little credit.

Haydock: Hab 2:16

Glory. Egypt shall suffer at last, Isaias xix. 14., Jeremias xliii., &c. It was customary to hand the cup about, Jeremias xxv. 17., and Matthew xxvi. 27. (Calmet)

Haydock: Hab 2:17

Libanus. That is, the iniquity committed by the Chaldeans against the temple of God, signified here by the name of Libanus. (Challoner) ---

Egypt had persuaded the governor of Cœlosyria and the Jews to revolt, and then abandoned them. ---

Beasts, which were adored in Egypt. Those who explain all of the Chaldeans are much perplexed, understanding the army of Cyrus, or the oppressed nations, or subjects to be meant. (Calmet) ---

And of. Hebrew, "land of the city," as [in] ver. 8.

Haydock: Hab 2:18

Thing, Protestants falsely, "image." (Haydock) ---

This is addressed to all idolaters.

Haydock: Hab 2:20

Temple. Hebrew, "palace," or heaven. House is generally put for the temple. ---

Silence, out of respect, &c. The guards of the eastern princes observe the utmost silence and modesty. God is very different from idols. He is the arbiter of life and death. (Calmet) ---

Silence often denotes subjection, 1 Machabees i. 3. (Menochius)

Gill: Hab 2:15

Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink,.... Before the full accomplishment of the above prophecy concerning the abundance of the knowledge of the Lord in the earth, and before the utter destruction of antichrist; between that and the Reformation, when it had its fulfilment in part; the following practices inveighed against would be used, as we find they are, and for which the man of sin and his followers will be punished: one of which is expressed by a man's "giving his neighbour drink"; which is a commendable action, when drink is given to a person in want to quench his thirst, or in sorrowful and distressed circumstances to refresh and cheer him; but when this is done to intoxicate him, and draw him into uncleanness, it is an evil one; and which is the sense of the phrase here, as appears by the "woe" denounced, and by what follows; and is to be understood, not in a literal sense, but in a figurative one; and is expressive of the various artful methods and alluring ways used by the Papists, especially the Jesuits, after the Reformation, with the Protestants, to forsake their religion, and to draw them into the superstition and idolatry of the church of Rome; and which are in the New Testament signified by "the wine of her fornication", with which the kings, nations, and inhabitants of the earth, are made drunk, Rev 17:2 crying up the devotion and religion of their church, its antiquity, purity, holiness, and unity; pretending great love to the souls of men, that they seek nothing but their spiritual good; promising them great advantages, temporal and spiritual, worldly riches and honour, and sure and certain salvation within the pale of their church, without which they say there is none; and by such means they have intoxicated many princes, kingdoms, and multitudes of people, since the Reformation; and have drawn them off from the profession of the Protestant religion, and brought them back to Popery again, as in Poland, Bohemia, Hungary, Germany, France, and other places; and these methods they are now taking in all Protestant countries, and in ours, and that with great success, as is notorious, and time will more abundantly show; but there is a "woe" lies against them for it:

that puttest thy bottle to him; giving him not only a glass or cup at a time, but a whole bottle to drink off at once, in order to inebriate him. The word is by some translated "thy gall", or "thy poison" ^k; which fitly enough expresses the poisonous doctrines of the church of Rome, which men insensibly imbibe, infused in her wine of fornication, or drink in through the alluring and ensnaring methods taken. It properly signifies "heat" or "wrath". The Targum is,

"that pours it with heat, that he may drink, and be inebriated.''

The Syriac version is,

"woe to him that gives his neighbour to drink the dregs of fury.''

The words may be truly rendered, "adding thy wrath" ^l; that is, to the alluring and enticing methods before mentioned, adding menaces, wrathful words, and furious persecutions: and this the Papists do where they can; when good words and fair speeches will not prevail, and they can not gain over proselytes with flattery, deceit, and lying, they threaten them with racks and tortures, with prisons and galleys, and death itself in various shapes, to force men into their communion; and which they have put in execution in many places, in Bohemia, Hungary, and in France even to this day; and this is what in the New Testament is called "the wine of the wrath of her fornication", Rev 14:8,

and makest him drunken also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness! as Ham did on his father's nakedness when in such circumstances: all the above methods are taken in order to intoxicate them, deprive them of the use of their reason, as is the case of a drunken man; and so bring them to believe, with an implicit faith, as the church believes; to believe things contrary to reason; to give into the spiritual whoredom and idolatry of that church, as men when drunk are easily drawn into uncleanness; to cast off their profession of the true religion, as a garment is cast off, as men when drunk are apt to do; and particularly to reject the doctrine of justification by the righteousness of Christ, which is the only robe to cover the nakedness of men, and receive the doctrine of merit and justification by works; in short, to apostatize wholly from the religion they have professed, and join in communion with the whore of Rome, that so they may look upon their apostasy, which is their nakedness, with the utmost pleasure and delight.

Gill: Hab 2:16

Thou art filled with shame for glory,.... This is said by the Lord to the man that gives his neighbour drink to intoxicate him, that he may draw him into uncleanness, and please himself with it; who, instead of being filled with the glory of the Lord, and the knowledge of it, as the earth is before said to be, such are filled with shameful doctrines and abominable practices, as those of the church of Rome are; and instead of seeking the glory of God, and the honour of their neighbours, they are satiated with the shameful spectacle of their apostasy, they have been the instruments of; and yet, instead of taking shame to themselves, as they ought to do, they glory in their shame; count it an honour they have been the instruments of bringing them into such uncleanness and idolatry; and glut themselves with the delightful sight; which in the esteem of God, was filling themselves with shame, instead of bringing any glory to him, to themselves, or their neighbours; and therefore should severely smart for it:

drink thou also: of another cup, the cup "of the wine of the wrath of God"; as a just retaliation for giving to others "the wine of wrath of fornication" to drink, and to intoxicate men with; which will be given to mystical Babylon at the time she comes into remembrance before God, or when the time to punish her is come, and to all the followers and worshippers of the beast; see Rev 14:10,

and let thy foreskin be uncovered; in retaliation for uncovering the nakedness of others, and looking with pleasure on it; by which it will appear that the men here spoken of, that take all the above methods to draw or force others into the communion of their church, are no other than heathens; their religion consisting greatly of Gentilism; or what has a very great likeness to it; hence the Papists are sometimes called Heathens and Gentiles; see Psa 10:16,

the cup of the Lord's right hand shall be turned unto thee; who, in their turn, shall drink of it, when his right hand, in which it is, shall reach it out; for there is no resisting the power of that; when he gives the orders to drink it, they must; and this cup in his right hand is a cup of red wine, of the wrath, fury, and indignation of God, the dregs of which these wicked men must wring out, and drink up; see Psa 75:8. It is no unusual thing in Scripture for the wrath, vengeance, and judgments of God to be represented by a cup, as in Isa 51:17,

and shameful spewing shall be on thy glory: signifying that they should be like a man intoxicated with wine, that vomits it up again; and which, falling on his fine clothes, spoils the glory of them: so when this cup of wrath and vengeance should be given unto them, and they be made to drink of it, they should be so full of it, that all their glory should be covered with shame; or all their glorious things should be spoiled, and they deprived of all their riches and honours, their titles and grandeur; the magnificence of their temples, altars, idols, and vestments, &c.

Gill: Hab 2:17

For the violence of Lebanon shall cover thee,.... Lebanon was a mountain on the borders of the land of Israel, from whence cedar wood was brought, of which the temple was built, and for that reason is sometimes so called, as in Zec 11:1 and so the Targum and Jarchi interpret it,

"the violence of the house of the sanctuary shall cover thee;''

and this was a type of the church of Christ, the violence of which is that which is offered to it, and which it suffers; and designs all the injuries, oppressions, and persecutions of it by the Papists; who shall be surrounded with the judgments of God, and covered with his wrath and vengeance for the violence done to his people, as a man is covered with a garment: or else the sense is, that the same, or a like judgment, should come upon them, as did on Lebanon, or the material temple of Jerusalem, which with great force and violence destroyed it; as that was consumed by fire for the sins of the Jews in rejecting Christ and persecuting his people, so shall Rome be burnt with fire for the opposition of the inhabitants of it to Christ, and the injuries they have done to his church and people:

and the spoil of beasts, which made them afraid; or, "the spoil of the beasts" shall cover thee, which "made them afraid"; we read of two beasts, one rising out of the sea, and the other out of the earth; and both design the pope of Rome in different capacities, as considered in his secular and ecclesiastical power; and the spoil he has made of those that oppose him, the calamities of fire and sword he has brought upon them, are what have greatly terrified the sheep of Christ; but for all the spoil and havoc he has made, the judgments of God shall come upon him on all sides, and utterly destroy him; the beast and false prophet shall be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone; see Rev 13:1,

because of men's blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein; the same that is said in Hab 2:8 and here repeated, as respecting another body of men, guilty of the same or like crimes: there Rome Pagan, concerned in the crucifixion of Christ, the desolation of the land of Judea, and city of Jerusalem, and their inhabitants, as well as in persecuting the saints, the citizens of the church of God; here Rome Papal, where our Lord has been crucified again, and his blood, and the efficacy of it, set at nought; the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus shed in great abundance, and violent persecutions of the churches of Christ, and the members of them; for all which the above judgments shall come upon them; see Rev 11:8.

Gill: Hab 2:18

What profiteth the graven image that the maker thereof hath graven it,.... The graven images the church of Rome enjoins the worship of; the images of the Trinity, of Christ, of the Virgin Mary, of angels and saints departed, and which are still continued since the Reformation; but of what profit and advantage are they? they may be profitable to the graver, who is paid for graving them; and the metal or matters of which they are made, if sold, and converted to another use, may turn to account; but as deities, and worshipped as such, they are of no profit to them that worship them; they can not hear their prayers, nor answer them; can not bestow any favours on them, and deliver them out of any distress; and particularly can not save them from the judgments before denounced:

the molten image, and a teacher of lies: nor is a molten image any ways profitable, which is made of liquid matter, gold or silver melted and poured into a mould, from whence it receives its form: it may be profitable to the founder, and the metal to the owner, if put to another use; but, as a god, is of no service; and both the graven and molten image, the one and the other, each of then is "a teacher of lies", and so unprofitable; if they are laymen's books, as they are said to be, they do not teach them truth; they do not teach them what God is in his nature and perfections; what Christ is in his person and offices; what angels are, who are incorporeal; nor the saints, they neither describe the shape and features of their body, nor express their characters, minds, or manners; they teach men to believe lies, and to worship false deities, as they are. So the Targum renders it, a false deity; which imposes on men, and therefore cannot profit them: or this may be understood of an idolatrous priest, as Aben Ezra; as the idol itself cannot profit, so neither can the priest that teaches men such lies as to worship the idol, and put trust in it:

that the maker of his work trusteth therein, to make dumb idols? or, "whilst making dumb idols" ^m; which is great stupidity indeed! that while a man is graving an image, or casting an idol, which are lifeless senseless things, that can neither move nor speak, yea, are his workmanship, yet puts his trust and confidence in them, that they can do him service he needs, help him in distress, and save him out of his troubles; what profit can be expected from these, though ever so nicely framed, when he considers they are of his own framing, and that they are idols, which are nothing in the world, as the word ⁿ here used signifies; and dumb ones, which can give no answer to the requests of their votaries? The Targum is,

"idols in whom there is no profit.''

Gill: Hab 2:19

Woe to him that saith to the wood, Awake,.... That saith to a wooden image, let him go by what name he will; saint such an one, or such an one; awake, arise, exert thyself on our behalf; deliver us from present danger; save us from our enemies; or pray and intercede for us, that we may be delivered and saved, as the Papists do; addressing a block of wood as they would God himself, or as his people do, Psa 44:23. This must be very displeasing and detestable to God, and therefore a woe is threatened to such idol worshippers: who also say

to the dumb stone, Arise; to the idol of stone, as the Targum; the stone statue, an image made of stone, such as the Papists have even of wood, and of stone, as well as of gold, and silver, and brass, Rev 9:20 and so stupid as to say to such stocks and stones, arise, stand up, and help us:

it shall teach; the stone itself would teach them better, would they but consider what it is, look upon it, and handle it, when they would find it to be a mere stone, and no deity: or, "shall it teach?" so Jarchi, Kimchi, and Ben Melech; no, it cannot teach any true doctrine, or direct to right worship; it cannot teach men their duty, or where they may have help; it is a dumb idol; it cannot teach men the nature of God, and the knowledge of him; or instruct in his mind and will; or inform of things secret or future:

it is laid over with gold and silver; it is made of stone, and covered with gold and silver; how should it teach?

and there is no breath at all in the midst of it; or, "no spirit" ^o; so far from having the spirit of divinity in it, or the Spirit of God, that it has not the spirit of a man in it, nor even the spirit of a brute creature; it has not so much as animal breath, and so no life, motion, or activity in it; and therefore must be quite unprofitable to the worshipper of it; incapable of teaching those who apply to it; and they must be stupid that do it, and most righteously bring themselves under the displeasure and wrath of God, and expose themselves to the woe here denounced against such persons.

Gill: Hab 2:20

But the Lord is in his holy temple,.... Not in graven and molten images; not in idols of wood and stone, covered with gold and silver; but in heaven, the habitation of his holiness, the place of his residence, where he is seen and worshipped by the holy angels and glorified saints; and from whence he surveys all the children of men, and their actions; observes the folly and stupidity of idol worshippers; and hears and answers the prayers of his own people: or this intends his church, which is his temple, sanctified by him, and set apart for his service, worship, and glory: here he grants his gracious presence to those who worship him in spirit and in truth; and here he will appear as King of saints, in a most glorious manner, when these several woes before mentioned have taken place; as on Rome Pagan already, and in part on Rome Papal at the Reformation, so completely on it, and all worshippers of images hereafter. The word היכל, here used, signifies that part of the temple, called the holy place, as distinct from the holy of holies; which was the proper seat of the divine Majesty, and a figure of heaven, as the holy place was of the church; and so he was, as it were, removed from the one to the other; hence the more observable and remarkable, and the greater reason for what follows; and this serves to illustrate and confirm the sense given:

let all the earth keep silence before him; stand in awe of him, and reverence him; be subject to him, and silently adore him; as all the inhabitants of the earth will when the above enemies of his are entirely removed out of it; there will be no more clamours and objections against the Christian religion by Jews and Mahometans, on account of image worship, which will be no more; no more wars, or rumours of wars, but a profound peace everywhere; no more persecutions of the saints; no more will be heard the cry of violence and oppression, all their enemies being destroyed; no more repining and murmurings among the people of God, through impatience and unbelief, all afflictions being at an end; there will be an entire silence of this kind everywhere; only the voice of the Gospel, prayer, praise, and thanksgiving, will be heard. This is not the case now, nor was there ever as yet such a time on earth; this shows that the prophecy regards time to come.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Hab 2:15

¹ tn No direct object is present after “drink” in the Hebrew text. “Wine” is implied, however, and has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

² tn On the term הוֹי (hoy) see the note on the word “dead” in v. 6.

³ tc Heb “pouring out your anger and also making drunk”; or “pouring out your anger and [by] rage making drunk.” The present translation assumes that the final khet (ח) on מְסַפֵּחַ (misapeakh, “pouring”) is dittographic and that the form should actually be read מִסַּף (missaf, “from a bowl”).

sn Forcing them to drink from the bowl of your furious anger. The Babylonian’s harsh treatment of others is compared to intoxicating wine which the Babylonians force the nations to drink so they can humiliate them. Cf. the imagery in Rev 14:10.

⁴ tn Heb “their nakedness,” a euphemism.

sn Metaphor and reality are probably blended here. This may refer to the practice of publicly humiliating prisoners of war by stripping them naked. See J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 124.

NET Notes: Hab 2:16

¹ tn Heb “are filled.” The translation assumes the verbal form is a perfect of certitude, emphasizing the certainty of Babylon’s coming judgment, which will reduce the majestic empire to shame and humiliation.

² tn Or “glory.”

³ tc Heb “drink, even you, and show the foreskin.” Instead of הֵעָרֵל (he’arel, “show the foreskin”) one of the Dead Sea scrolls has הֵרָעֵל (hera’el, “stumble”). This reading also has support from several ancient versions and is followed by the NEB (“you too shall drink until you stagger”) and NRSV (“Drink, you yourself, and stagger”). For a defense of the Hebrew text, see P. D. Miller, Jr., Sin and Judgment in the Prophets, 63-64.

⁴ sn The Lord’s right hand represents his military power. He will force the Babylonians to experience the same humiliating defeat they inflicted on others.

NET Notes: Hab 2:17

¹ tn Heb “for the violence against Lebanon will cover you.”

² tc The Hebrew appears to read literally, “and the violence against the animals [which] he terrified.” The verb form יְחִיתַן (yÿkhitan) appears to be a Hiphil imperfect third masculine singular with third feminine plural suffix (the antecedent being the animals) from חָתַת (khatat, “be terrified”). The translation above follows the LXX and assumes a reading יְחִתֶּךָ (yÿkhittekha, “[the violence against the animals] will terrify you”; cf. NRSV “the destruction of the animals will terrify you”; NIV “and your destruction of animals will terrify you”). In this case the verb is a Hiphil imperfect third masculine singular with second masculine singular suffix (the antecedent being Babylon). This provides better symmetry with the preceding line, where Babylon’s violence is the subject of the verb “cover.”

sn The language may anticipate Nebuchadnezzar’s utilization of trees from the Lebanon forest in building projects. Lebanon and its animals probably represent the western Palestinian states conquered by the Babylonians.

NET Notes: Hab 2:18

¹ tn Or “of what value.”

² tn Heb “so that the one who forms it fashions it?” Here כִּי (ki) is taken as resultative after the rhetorical question. For other examples of this use, see R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 73, §450.

³ tn Heb “or a metal image, a teacher of lies.” The words “What good is” in the translation are supplied from the previous parallel line. “Teacher of lies” refers to the false oracles that the so-called god would deliver through a priest. See J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 126.

⁴ tn Heb “so that the one who forms his image trusts in it?” As earlier in the verse, כִּי (ki) is resultative.

⁵ tn Heb “to make.”

NET Notes: Hab 2:19

¹ tn Heb “Woe [to] the one who says.” On the term הוֹי (hoy) see the note on the word “dead” in v. 6.

² tn The words “he who says” in the translation are supplied from the previous parallel line.

³ tn Though the Hebrew text has no formal interrogative marker here, the context indicates that the statement should be taken as a rhetorical question anticipating the answer, “Of course not!” (so also NIV, NRSV).

NET Notes: Hab 2:20

¹ tn Or “holy temple.” The Lord’s heavenly palace, rather than the earthly temple, is probably in view here (see Ps 11:4; Mic 1:2-3). The Hebrew word ֹקדֶשׁ (qodesh, “holy”) here refers to the sovereign transcendence associated with his palace.

² tn Or “Be quiet before him, all the earth!”

Geneva Bible: Hab 2:15

Woe to him that giveth his neighbour ^{( m )} drink, that puttest thy bottle to [him], and makest [him] drunk also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness!

^{( m )} He reproaches by this the king of Babylon, who as he was drunken with covetousness and cruelty, so he provoked others to the same, and inflamed them by his madness, and so in the end brought them to shame.

Geneva Bible: Hab 2:16

Thou art filled with shame ^{( n )} for glory: drink thou also, and let thy shame come upon thee: the cup of the LORD'S right hand shall be turned to thee, and utter shame [shall be] on thy glory.

^{( n )} Whereas you thought to have the glory of these your doings, they will turn to your shame: for you will drink of the same cup with others in your turn.

Geneva Bible: Hab 2:17

For the ^{( o )} violence of Lebanon shall cover thee, and the spoil of beasts, [which] made them afraid, because of men's blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell in it.

^{( o )} Because the Babylonians were cruel not only against other nations, but also against the people of God, which is meant by Lebanon and the beast in it, he shows that the same cruelly will be executed against them.

Geneva Bible: Hab 2:18

What profiteth the graven ^{( p )} image that its maker hath engraved it; the molten image, and a teacher of lies, that the maker of his work trusteth in it, to make dumb idols?

^{( p )} He shows that the Babylonian gods could not help them at all, for they were but blocks or stones. See Jer 10:8

Geneva Bible: Hab 2:19

Woe to him that saith to the wood, Awake; to the dumb stone, Arise, it shall teach! ^{( q )} Behold, it [is] laid over with gold and silver, and [there is] no breath at all within it.

^{( q )} If you will consider what it is, and how it has neither breath nor life, but is a dead thing.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Hab 2:1-20

1 Unto Habakkuk, waiting for an answer, is shewn that he must wait by faith.

5 The judgment upon the Chaldean for unsatiableness,

9 for covetousness,

12 for cruelty,

15 for drunkenness,

18 and for idolatry.

MHCC: Hab 2:15-20

A severe woe is pronounced against drunkenness; it is very fearful against all who are guilty of drunkenness at any time, and in any place, from the stately palace to the paltry ale-house. To give one drink who is in want, who is thirsty and poor, or a weary traveller, or ready to perish, is charity; but to give a neighbour drink, that he may expose himself, may disclose secret concerns, or be drawn into a bad bargain, or for any such purpose, this is wickedness. To be guilty of this sin, to take pleasure in it, is to do what we can towards the murder both of soul and body. There is woe to him, and punishment answering to the sin. The folly of worshipping idols is exposed. The Lord is in his holy temple in heaven, where we have access to him in the way he has appointed. May we welcome his salvation, and worship him in his earthly temples, through Christ Jesus, and by the influence of the Holy Spirit.

Matthew Henry: Hab 2:15-20

The three foregoing articles, upon which the woes here are grounded, are very near akin to each other. The criminals charged by them are oppressors and extortioners, that raise estates by rapine and injustice; and it is mentioned here again (Hab 2:17), the very same that was said Hab 2:8, for that is the crime upon which the greatest stress is laid; it is because of men's blood, innocent blood, barbarously and unjustly shed, which is a provoking crying thing; it is for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein, which God will certainly reckon for, sooner or later, as the asserter of right and the avenger of wrong.

But here are two articles more, of a different nature, which carry a woe to all those in general to whom they belong, and particularly to the Babylonian monarchs, by whom the people of God were taken and held captives.

I. The promoters of drunkenness stand here impeached and condemned. Belshazzar was one of those; he was so, remarkably that very night that the prophecy of this chapter was fulfilled in the period of his life and kingdom, when he drank wine before a thousand of his lords (Dan 5:1), began the healths, and forced them to pledge him. And perhaps it was one reason why the succeeding monarchs of Persia made it a law of their kingdom that in drinking none should compel, but they should do according to every man's pleasure (as we find, Est 1:8), because they had seen in the kings of Babylon the mischievous consequences of forcing healths and making people drunk. But the woe here stands firm and very fearful against all those, whoever they are, who are guilty of this sin at any time, and in any place, from the stately palace (where that was) to the paltry ale-house. Observe,

1. Who the sinner is that is here articled against; it is he that makes his neighbour drunk, Hab 2:15. To give a neighbour drink who is in want, who is thirsty and poor, though it be but a cup of cold water to a disciple, in the name of a disciple, to give drink to weary traveller, nay, and to give strong drink to him that is ready to perish, and wine to those that are heavy of heart, is a piece of charity which is required of us, and shall be recompensed to us. I was thirsty, and you gave me drink. But to give a neighbour drink who has enough already, and more than enough, with design to intoxicate him, that he may expose himself, may talk foolishly, and make himself ridiculous, may disclose his own secret concerns, or be drawn in to agree to a bad bargain for himself - this is abominable wickedness; and those who are guilty of it, who make a practice of it, and take a pride and pleasure in it, are rebels against God in heaven, and his sacred laws, factors for the devil in hell, and his cursed interests, and enemies to men on earth, and their honour and welfare; they are like the son of Nebat, who sinned and made Israel to sin. To entice others to drunkenness, to put the bottle to them, that they may be allured to it by its charms, by looking on the wine when it is red and gives its colour in the cup, or to force them to it, obliging them by the rules of the club (and club-laws indeed they are) to drink so many glasses, and so filled, is to do what we can, and perhaps more than we know of, towards the murder both of soul and body; and those that do so have a great deal to answer for.

2. What the sentence is that is here passed upon him. There is a woe to him (Hab 2:15), and a punishment (Hab 2:16) that shall answer to the sin. (1.) Does he put the cup of drunkenness into the hand of his neighbour? The cup of fury, the cup of trembling, the cup of the Lord's right hand, shall be turned unto him; the power of God shall be armed against him. That cup which had gone round among the nations, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, and a hissing, which had made them stumble and fall, so that they could rise no more, shall at length be put into the hand of the king of Babylon, as was foretold, Jer 25:15, Jer 25:16, Jer 25:18, Jer 25:26, Jer 25:27. Thus the New Testament Babylon, which had made the nations drunk with the cup of her fornications, shall have blood given her to drink, for she is worthy, Rev 18:3, Rev 18:6. (2.) Does he take a pleasure in putting his neighbour to shame? He shall himself be loaded with contempt: " Thou art filled with shame for glory, with shame instead of glory, or art filled now with shame more than ever thou wast with glory; and the glory thou hast been filled with shall but serve to make thy shame the more grievous to thyself, and the more ignominious in the eyes of others. Thou also shalt drink of the cup of trembling, and shalt expose thyself by thy fear and cowardice, which shall be as the uncovering of thy nakedness, to thy shame; and all about thee shall load thee with disgrace, for shameful spewing shall be on thy glory, on that which thou hast most prided thyself in, thy dignity, wealth, and dominion; those whom thou hast made drunk shall themselves spew upon it. For the violence of Lebanon shall cover thee, and the spoil of beasts (Hab 2:17); thou shalt be hunted and run down with as much violence as ever any wild beasts in Lebanon were, shall be spoiled as they are, and thy fall made a sport of; for thou art as one of the beasts that made them afraid, and therefore they triumph when they have got the mastery of thee."Or, "It is because of the violence thou hast done to Lebanon, that is, the land of Israel (Deu 3:25) and the temple (Zec 11:1), that God now reckons with thee; that is the sin that now covers thee."

II. The promoters of idolatry stand here impeached and condemned; and this also was a sin that Babylon was notoriously guilty of; it was the mother of harlots. Belshazzar, in his revels, praised his idols. And for this, here is a woe against them, and in them against all others that do likewise, particularly the New Testament Babylon. Now see here,

1. What they do to promote idolatry; they are mad upon their idols; so the Chaldeans are said to be, Jer 50:38. For, (1.) They have a great variety of idols, their graven images and molten images, that people may take their choice, which they like best. (2.) They are very nice and curious in the framing of them: The maker of the work has performed his part admirably well, the fashioner of his fashion (so it is in the margin), that contrived the model in the most significant manner. (3.) They are at great expense in beautifying and adorning them: They lay them over with gold and silver; because these are things people love and dote upon wherever they meet with them, they dress up their idols in them, the more effectually to court the adoration of the children of this world. (4.) They have great expectations from them: The maker of the work trusts therein as his god, puts a confidence in it, and gives honour to it as his god. The worshippers of God give honour to him, by offering up their prayers to him, and waiting to receive instructions and directions from him; and these honours they give to their idols. [1.] They pray to them: They say to the wood, Awake for our relief, "awake to hear our prayers;"and to the dumb stone, " Arise, and save us,"as the church prays to her God, Awake, O Lord! arise, Psa 44:23. They own their image to be a god by praying to it. Deliver me, for thou art my God, Isa 44:17. Deos qui rogat ille facit - That to which a man addresses petitions is to him a god. [2.] They consult them as oracles, and expect to be directed and dictated to by them: They say to the dumb stone, though it cannot speak, yet it shall teach. What the wicked demon, or no less wicked priest, speaks to them from the image, they receive with the utmost veneration, as of divine authority, and are ready to be governed by it. Thus is idolatry planted and propagated under the specious show of religion and devotion.

2. How the extreme folly of this is exposed. God, by Isaiah, when he foretold the deliverance of his people out of Babylon, largely showed the shameful stupidity and sottishness of idolaters, and so he does here by the prophet, on the like occasion. (1.) Their images, when they have made them, are but mere matter, which is the meanest lowest rank of being; and all the expense they are at upon them cannot advance them one step above that. They are wholly void both of sense and reason, lifeless and speechless (the idol is a dumb idol, a dumb stone, and there is no breath at all in the midst of it ), so that the most minute animal, that has but breath and motion, is more excellent then they. They have not so much as the spirit of a beast. (2.) It is not in their power to do their worshippers any good (Hab 2:18): What profits the graven image? Though it be mere matter, if it were cast into some other form it might be serviceable to some purpose or other of human life; but, as it is made a god of, it is of no profit at all, nor can do its worshippers the least kindness. Nay, (3.) It is so far from profiting them that it puts a cheat upon them, and keeps them under the power of a strong delusion; they say, It shall teach, but it is a teacher of lies; for it represents God as having a body, as being finite, visible, and dependent, whereas he is a Spirit, infinite, invisible, and independent, and it confirms those that become vain in their imaginations in the false notions they have of God, and makes the idea of God to be a precarious thing, and what every man pleases. If we may say to the works of our hands, You are our gods, we may say so to any of the creatures of our own fancy, though the chimera be ever so extravagant. An image is a doctrine of vanities; it is falsehood, and a work of errors, Jer 10:8, Jer 10:14, Jer 10:15. It is therefore easy to see what the religion of those is, and what they aim at, who recommend those teachers of lies as laymen's books, which they are to study and govern themselves by, when they have locked up from them the book of the scriptures in an unknown tongue.

3. How the people of God triumph in him, and therewith support themselves, when the idolaters thus shame themselves (Hab 2:20): But the Lord is in his holy temple. (1.) Our rock is not as their rock, Deu 32:31. Theirs are dumb idols; ours is Jehovah, a living God, who is what he is, and not, as theirs, what men please to make him. He is in his holy temple in heaven, the residence of his glory, where we have access to him in the way, not which we have invented, but which he himself has instituted. Compare Psa 115:3, But our God is in the heavens, and Psa 11:4. (2.) The multitude of their gods which they set up, and take so much pains to support, cannot thrust out our God; he is, and will be, in his holy temple still, and glorious in holiness. They have laid waste his temple at Jerusalem; but he has a temple above that is out of the reach of their rage and malice, but within the reach of his people's faith and prayers. (3.) Our God will make all the world silent before him, will strike the idolaters as dumb as their idols, convincing them of their folly, and covering them with shame. He will silence the fury of the oppressors, and check their rage against his people. (4.) It is the duty of his people to attend him with silent adorings (Psa 65:1), and patiently to wait for his appearing to save them in his own way and time. Be still, and know that he is God, Zec 2:13.

Keil-Delitzsch: Hab 2:6-20

In Hab 2:6-20 the destruction of the Chaldaean, which has been already intimated in Hab 2:4, Hab 2:5, is announced in the form of a song composed of threatening sentences, which utters woes in five strophes consisting of three verses each: (1) upon the rapacity and plundering of the Chaldaean (Hab 2:6-8); (2) upon his attempt to establish his dynasty firmly by means of force and cunning (Hab 2:9-11); (3) upon his wicked ways of building (Hab 2:12-14); (4) upon his base treatment of the subjugated nations (Hab 2:15-17); and (5) upon his idolatry (Hab 2:18-20). These five strophes are connected together, so as to form two larger divisions, by a refrain which closes the first and fourth, as well as by the promise explanatory of the threat in which the third and fifth strophes terminate; of which two divisions the first threatens the judgment of retribution upon the insatiableness of the Chaldaean in three woes ( Hab 2:5 ), and the second in two woes the judgment of retribution upon his pride. Throughout the whole of the threatening prophecy the Chaldaean nation is embraced, as in Hab 2:4, Hab 2:5, in the ideal person of its ruler.

(Note: The unity of the threatening prophecy, which is brought out in the clearest manner in this formal arrangement, has been torn in pieces in the most violent manner by Hitzig, through his assumption that the oracle of God includes no more than Hab 2:4-8, and that a second part is appended to it in Hab 2:9-20, in which the prophet expresses his own thoughts and feelings, first of all concerning king Jehoiakim (Hab 2:9-14), and then concerning the Egyptians (Hab 2:15-20). This hypothesis, of which Maurer observes quite correctly, Qua nulla unquam excogitata est infelicior , rests upon nothing more than the dogmatic assumption, that there is no such thing as prophecy effected by supernatural causality, and therefore Habakkuk cannot have spoken of Nebuchadnezzar's buildings before they were finished, or at any rate in progress. The two strophes in Hab 2:9-14 contain nothing whatever that would not apply most perfectly to the Chaldaean, or that is not covered by what precedes and follows (compare Hab 2:9 with 6 b and 8 a , and Hab 2:10 with 5 b and 8 a ). "The strophe in Hab 2:9-11 contains the same fundamental thought as that expressed by Isaiah in Isa 14:12-14 respecting the Chaldaean, viz., the description of his pride, which manifests itself in ambitious edifices founded upon the ruins of the prosperity of strangers"(Delitzsch). The resemblance between the contents of this strophe and the woe pronounced upon Jehoiakim by Jeremiah in Jer 12:13-17 may be very simply explained from the fact that Jehoiakim, like the Chaldaean, was a tyrant who occupied himself with the erection of large state buildings and fortifications, whereas the extermination of many nations does not apply in any respect to Jehoiakim. Lastly, there is no plausible ground whatever for referring the last two strophes (Hab 2:15-20) to the Egyptian, for the assertion that Habakkuk could not pass over the Egyptian in silence, unless he meant to confine himself to the Chaldaean, is a pure petitio principii ; and to any unprejudiced mind the allusion to the Chaldaean in this verse is placed beyond all possible doubt by Isa 14:8, where the devastation of Lebanon is also attributed to him, just as it is in Hab 2:17 of our prophecy.)

Hab 2:6-8

Introduction of the ode and first strophe. - Hab 2:6. "Will not all these lift up a proverb upon him, and a song, a riddle upon him? And men will say, Woe to him who increases what is not his own! For how long? and who loadeth himself with the burden of pledges. Hab 2:7. Will not thy biters rise up suddenly, and thy destroyers wake up, and thou wilt become booty to them? Hab 2:8. For thou hast plundered many nations, all the rest of the nations will plunder thee, for the blood of men and wickedness on the earth, the city, and all its inhabitants." הלוא is here, as everywhere else, equivalent to a confident assertion. "All these:"this evidently points back to "all nations"and "all people."Nevertheless the nations as such, or in pleno , are not meant, but simply the believers among them, who expect Jehovah to inflict judgment upon the Chaldaeans, and look forward to that judgment for the revelation of the glory of God. For the ode is prophetical in its nature, and is applicable to all times and all nations. Mâshâl is a sententious poem, as in Mic 2:4 and Isa 14:4, not a derisive song, for this subordinate meaning could only be derived from the context, as in Isa 14:4 for example; and there is nothing to suggest it here. So, again, m^e lı̄tsâh neither signifies a satirical song, nor an obscure enigmatical discourse, but, as Delitzsch has shown, from the first of the two primary meanings combined in the verb לוּץ , lucere and lascivire , a brilliant oration, oratio splendida , from which מליץ is used to denote an interpreter, so called, not from the obscurity of the speaking, but from his making the speech clear or intelligible. חידות לו is in apposition to מליצה and משׁל , adding the more precise definition, that the sayings contain enigmas relating to him (the Chaldaean). The enigmatical feature comes out more especially in the double meaning of עבטיט in Hab 2:6 , נשׁכיך in Hab 2:7 , and קיקלון in Hab 2:16 . לאמר serves, like לאמר elsewhere, as a direct introduction to the speech. The first woe applies to the insatiable rapacity of the Chaldaean. המּרבּה לא־לו , who increases what does not belong to him, i.e., who seizes upon a large amount of the possessions of others. עד־מתי , for how long, sc. will he be able to do this with impunity; not "how long has he already done this"(Hitzig), for the words do not express exultation at the termination of the oppression, but are a sign appended to the woe, over the apparently interminable plunderings on the part of the Chaldaean. וּמכבּיד is also dependent upon hōi , since the defined participle which stands at the head of the cry of woe is generally followed by participles undefined, as though the former regulated the whole (cf. Isa 5:20 and Isa 10:1). At the same time, it might be taken as a simple declaration in itself, though still standing under the influence of the hōi ; in which case הוּא would have to be supplied in thought, like וחוטא in Hab 2:10. And even in this instance the sentence is not subordinate to the preceding one, as Luther follows Rashi in assuming ("and still only heaps much slime upon himself"); but is co-ordinate, as the parallelism of the clauses and the meaning of עבטיט require. The ἁπ. λεγ. עבטיט is probably chosen on account of the resemblance in sound to מכבּיד , whilst it also covers an enigma or double entendre . Being formed from עבט (to give a pledge) by the repetition of the last radical, עבטיט signifies the mass of pledges ( pignorum captorum copia : Ges., Maurer, Delitzsch), not the load of guilt, either in a literal or a tropico-moral sense. The quantity of foreign property which the Chaldaean has accumulated is represented as a heavy mass of pledges, which he has taken from the nations like an unmerciful usurer (Deu 24:10), to point to the fact that he will be compelled to disgorge them in due time. הכבּיד , to make heavy, i.e., to lay a heavy load upon a person. The word עבטיט , however, might form two words so far as the sound is concerned: עב טיט , cloud (i.e., mass) of dirt, which will cause his ruin as soon as it is discharged. This is the sense in which the Syriac has taken the word; and Jerome does the same, observing, considera quam eleganter multiplicatas divitias densum appellaverit lutum , no doubt according to a Jewish tradition, since Kimchi, Rashi, and Ab. Ezra take the word as a composite one, and merely differ as to the explanation of עב . Grammatically considered, this explanation is indeed untenable, since the Hebrew language has formed no appellative nomina composita ; but the word is nevertheless enigmatical, because, when heard from the lips, it might be taken as two words, and understood in the sense indicated.

In Hab 2:7 the threatening hōi is still further developed. Will not thy biters arise? נשׁכיך = נשׁכתם אתך , those who bite thee. In the description here given of the enemy as savage vipers (cf. Jer 8:17) there is also an enigmatical double entendre , which Delitzsch has admirably interpreted thus: " המּרבּה ,"he says, "pointed to תּרבּית (interest). The latter, favoured by the idea of the Chaldaean as an unmerciful usurer, which is concentrated in עבטיט , points to נשׁך , which is frequently connected with תּרבּית , and signifies usurious interest; and this again to the striking epithet נשׁכתם , which is applied to those who have to inflict the divine retribution upon the Chaldaean. The prophet selected this to suggest the thought that there would come upon the Chaldaean those who would demand back with interest ( neshek ) the capital of which he had unrighteously taken possession, just as he had unmercifully taken the goods of the nations from them by usury and pawn." יקצוּ , from יקץ , they will awake, viz., מזעזעך , those who shake or rouse thee up. זעזע , pilel of זוּע , σείω , is used in Arabic of the wind (to shake the tree); hence, as in this case, it was employed to denote shaking up or scaring away from a possession, as is often done, for example, by a creditor (Hitzig, Delitzsch). משׁסּות is an intensive plural.

So far as this threat applies to the Chaldaeans, it was executed by the Medes and Persians, who destroyed the Chaldaean empire. But the threat has a much more extensive application. This is evident, apart from other proofs, from Hab 2:8 itself, according to which the whole of the remnant of the nations is to inflict the retribution. Gōyı̄m rabbı̄m , "many nations:"this is not to be taken as an antithesis to kol - haggōyı̄m (all nations) in Hab 2:5 , since "all nations"are simply many nations, as kol is not to be taken in its absolute sense, but simply in a relative sense, as denoting all the nations that lie within the prophet's horizon, as having entered the arena of history. Through ישׁלּוּך , which is placed at the head of the concluding clause without a copula, the antithesis to שׁלּות is sharply brought out, and the idea of the righteous retaliation distinctly expressed. כּל־יתר עמּים , the whole remnant of the nations, is not all the rest, with the exception of the one Chaldaean, for yether always denotes the remnant which is left after the deduction of a portion; nor does it mean all the rest of the nations, who are spared and not subjugated, in distinction from the plundered and subjugated nations, as Hitzig with many others imagine, and in proof of which he adduces the fact that the overthrow of the Chaldaeans was effected by nations that had not been subdued. But, as Delitzsch has correctly observed, this view makes the prophet contradict not only himself, but the whole of the prophetic view of the world-wide dominion of Nebuchadnezzar. According to Hab 2:5 , the Chaldaean has grasped to himself the dominion over all nations, and consequently there cannot be any nations left that he has not plundered. Moreover, the Chaldaean, or Nebuchadnezzar as the head of the Chaldaean kingdom, appears in prophecy (Jer 27:7-8), as he does in history (Dan 2:38; 3:31; Dan 5:19) throughout, as the ruler of the world in the highest sense, who has subjugated all nations and kingdoms round about, and compelled them to serve him. These nations include the Medes and Elamites (= Persians), to whom the future conquest of Babylon is attributed in Isa 13:17; Isa 21:2; Jer 51:11, Jer 51:28. They are both mentioned in Jer 25:25 among the nations, to whom the prophet is to reach the cup of wrath from the hand of Jehovah; and the kingdom of Elam especially is threatened in Jer 49:34. with the destruction of its power, and dispersion to all four winds. In these two prophecies, indeed, Nebuchadnezzar is not expressly mentioned by name as the executor of the judgment of wrath; but in Jeremiah 25 this may plainly be inferred from the context, partly from the fact that, according to Jer 25:9, Judah with its inhabitants, and all nations round about, are to be given into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, and partly from the fact that in the list of the nations enumerated in Jer 25:18-26 the king of Sesach (i.e., Babel) is mentioned as he who is to drink the cup "after them"( Jer 25:26 ). The expression 'achărēhem (after them) shows very clearly that the judgment upon the nations previously mentioned, and therefore also upon the kings of Elam and Media, is to occur while the Chaldaean rule continues, i.e., is to be executed by the Chaldaeans. This may, in fact, be inferred, so far as the prophecy respecting Elam in Jer 49:34. is concerned, from the circumstance that Jeremiah's prophecies with regard to foreign nations in Jeremiah 46-51 are merely expansions of the summary announcement in Jer 25:19-26, and is also confirmed by Eze 32:24, inasmuch as Elam is mentioned there immediately after Asshur in the list of kings and nations that have sunk to the lower regions before Egypt. And if even this prophecy has a much wider meaning, like that concerning Elam in Jer 49:34, and the elegy over Egypt, which Ezekiel strikes up, is expanded into a threatening prophecy concerning the heathen generally (see Kliefoth, Ezech. p. 303), this further reference presupposes the historical fulfilment which the threatening words of prophecy have received through the judgment inflicted by the Chaldaeans upon all the nations mentioned, and has in this its real foundation and soil.

History also harmonizes with this prophetic announcement. The arguments adduced by Hävernick ( Daniel , p. 547ff.) to prove that Nebuchadnezzar did not extend his conquests to Elam, and neither subdued this province nor Media, are not conclusive. The fact that after the fall of Nineveh the conquerors, Nabopolassar of Babylonia, and Cyaxares the king of Media, divided the fallen Assyrian kingdom between them, the former receiving the western provinces, and the latter the eastern, does not preclude the possibility of Nebuchadnezzar, the founder of the Chaldaean empire, having made war upon the Median kingdom, and brought it into subjection. There is no historical testimony, however, to the further assertion, that Nebuchadnezzar was only concerned to extend his kingdom towards the west, that his conquests were all of them in the lands situated there, and gave him so much to do that he could not possibly think of extending his eastern frontier. It is true that the opposite of this cannot be inferred from Strabo, xvi. 1, 18;

(Note: This passage is quoted by Hitzig ( Ezech. p. 251) as a proof that Elam made war upon the Babylonians, and, indeed, judging from Jer 49:34, an unsuccessful war. But Strabo speaks of a war between the Elymaeans (Elamites) and the Babylonians and Susians, which M. v. Niebuhr (p. 210) very properly assigns to the period of the alliance between Media (as possessor of Susa) and Babylon.)

but it may be inferred, as M. v. Niebuhr ( Gesch. Assurs , pp. 211-12) has said, from the fact that according to Jeremiah 27 and 28, at the beginning of Zedekiah's reign, and therefore not very long after Nebuchadnezzar had conquered Jerusalem in the time of Jehoiachin, and restored order in southern Syria in the most energetic manner, the kings of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre, and Zidon, entered into negotiations with Zedekiah for a joint expedition against Nebuchadnezzar. M. v. Niebuhr infers from this that troublous times set in at that period for Nebuchadnezzar, and that this sudden change in the situation of affairs was connected with the death of Cyaxares, and leads to the conjecture that Nebuchadnezzar, who had sworn fealty to Cyaxares, refused at his death to do homage to his successor; for fidelity to a father-in-law, with whose help the kingdom was founded, would assume a very different character if it was renewed to his successor. Babel was too powerful to accept any such enfeoffment as this. And even if Nebuchadnezzar was not a vassal, there could not be a more suitable opportunity for war with Media than that afforded by a change of government, since kingdoms in the East are so easily shaken by the death of a great prince. And there certainly was no lack of inducement to enter upon a war with Media. Elam, for example, from its very situation, and on account of the restlessness of its inhabitants, must have been a constant apple of discord. This combination acquires extreme probability, partly from the fact that Jeremiah's prophecy concerning Elam, in which that nation is threatened with the destruction of its power and dispersion to all four winds, was first uttered at the commencement of Zedekiah's reign (Jer 49:34), whereas the rest of his prophecies against foreign nations date from an earlier period, and that against Babel is the only one which falls later, namely, in the fourth year of Zedekiah (Jer 51:59), which appears to point to the fact that at the commencement of Zedekiah's reign things were brewing in Elam which might lead to his ruin. And it is favoured in part by the account in the book of Judith of a war between Nabuchodonosor (Nebuchadnezzar) and Media, which terminated victoriously according to the Rec. vulg. in the twelfth year of his reign, since this account is hardly altogether a fictitious one. These prophetic and historical testimonies may be regarded as quite sufficient, considering the universally scanty accounts of the Chaldaean monarchy given by the Greeks and Romans, to warrant us in assuming without hesitation, as M. v. Niebuhr has done, that between the ninth and twentieth years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign - namely, at the commencement of Zedekiah's reign - the former had to make war not only with Elam, but with Media also, and that it is to this eastern war that we should have to attribute the commotion in Syria.

From all this we may see that there is no necessity to explain "all the remnant of the nations"as relating to the remainder of the nations that had not been subjugated, but that we may understand it as signifying the remnant of the nations plundered and subjugated by the Chaldaeans (as is done by the lxx, Theodoret, Delitzsch, and others), which is the only explanation in harmony with the usage of the language. For in Jos 23:12 yether haggōyı̄m denotes the Canaanitish nations left after the war of extermination; and in Zec 14:2 yether hâ‛âm signifies the remnant of the nation left after the previous conquest of the city, and the carrying away of half its inhabitants. In Zep 2:9 yether gōi is synonymous with שׁארית עמּי , and our יתר עמּים is equivalent to שׁארית הגּוים in Eze 36:3-4. מדּמי אדם : on account of the human blood unjustly shed, and on account of the wickedness on the earth ( chămas with the Genesis obj. as in Joe 3:19 and Oba 1:10). 'Erets without an article is not the holy land, but the earth generally; and so the city ( qiryâh , which is still dependent upon chămas ) is not Jerusalem, nor any one particular city, but, with indefinite generality, "cities."The two clauses are parallel, cities and their inhabitants corresponding to men and the earth. The Chaldaean is depicted as one who gathers men and nations in his net (Hab 1:14-17). And so in Jer 50:23 he is called a hammer of the whole earth, in Jer 51:7 a cup of reeling, and in Jer 51:25 the destroyer of the whole earth.

Keil-Delitzsch: Hab 2:15-17

The fourth woe is an exclamation uttered concerning the cruelty of the Chaldaean in the treatment of the conquered nations. Hab 2:15. "Woe to him that giveth his neighbour to drink, mixing thy burning wrath, and also making drunk, to look at their nakedness. Hab 2:16. Thou hast satisfied thyself with shame instead of with honour; then drink thou also, and show the foreskin. The cup of Jehovah's right hand will turn to thee, and the vomiting of shame upon thy glory. Hab 2:17. For the wickedness at Lebanon will cover thee, and the dispersion of the animals which frightened them; for the blood of the men and the wickedness on the earth, upon the city and all its inhabitants." The description in Hab 2:15 and Hab 2:16 is figurative, and the figure is taken from ordinary life, where one man gives another drink, so as to intoxicate him, for the purpose of indulging his own wantonness at his expense, or taking delight in his shame. This helps to explain the משׁקה רעהוּ , who gives his neighbour to drink. The singular is used with indefinite generality, or in a collective, or speaking more correctly, a distributive sense. The next two circumstantial clauses are subordinate to הוי משׁקה , defining more closely the mode of the drinking. ספּח does not mean to pour in, after the Arabic sfḥ ; for this, which is another form for Arab. sfk , answers to the Hebrew שׁפך , to pour out (compare שׁפך חמתו , to pour out, or empty out His wrath: Psa 79:6; Jer 10:25), but has merely the meaning to add or associate, with the sole exception of Job 14:19, where it is apparently used to answer to the Arabic sfḥ ; consequently here, where drink is spoken of, it means to mix wrath with the wine poured out. Through the suffix חמתך the woe is addressed directly to the Chaldaean himself, - a change from the third person to the second, which would be opposed to the genius of our language. The thought is sharpened by ואף שׁכּר , "and also (in addition) making drunk"( shakkēr , inf. abs.). To look upon their nakednesses: the plural מעוריהם is used because רעהוּ has a collective meaning. The prostrate condition of the drunken man is a figurative representation of the overthrow of a conquered nation (Nah 3:11), and the uncovering of the shame a figure denoting the ignominy that has fallen upon it (Nah 3:5; Isa 47:3). This allegory, in which the conquest and subjugation of the nations are represented as making them drink of the cup of wrath, does not refer to the open violence with which the Chaldaean enslaves the nations, but points to the artifices with which he overpowers them, "the cunning with which he entices them into his alliance, to put them to shame"(Delitzsch). But he has thereby simply prepared shame for himself, which will fall back upon him (Hab 2:16). The perfect שׂבעתּ does not apply prophetically to the certain future; but, as in the earlier strophes (Hab 2:8 and Hab 2:10) which are formed in a similar manner, to what the Chaldaean has done, to bring upon himself the punishment mentioned in what follows. The shame with which he has satisfied himself is the shamefulness of his conduct; and שׂבע , to satisfy himself, is equivalent to revelling in shame. מכּבוד , far away from honour, i.e., and not in honour. מן is the negative, as in Psa 52:5, in the sense of ולא , with which it alternates in Hos 6:6. For this he is now also to drink the cup of wrath, so as to fall down intoxicated, and show himself as having a foreskin, i.e., as uncircumcised ( הערל from ערלה ). This goblet Jehovah will hand to him. Tissōbh , he will turn. על (upon thee, or to thee). This is said, because the cup which the Chaldaean had reached to other nations was also handed over to him by Jehovah. The nations have hitherto been obliged to drink it out of the hand of the Chaldaean. Now it is his turn, and he must drink it out of the hand of Jehovah (see Jer 25:26). וקיקלון , and shameful vomiting, (sc., יהיה ) will be over thine honour, i.e., will cover over thine honour or glory, i.e., will destroy thee. The ἁπ. λεγ. קיקלון is formed from the pilpal קלקל from קלל , and softened down from קלקלון , and signifies extreme or the greatest contempt. This form of the word, however, is chosen for the sake of the play upon קיא קלון , vomiting of shame, vomitus ignominiae (Vulg.; cf. קיא צאה in Isa 28:8), and in order that, when the word was heard, it should call up the subordinate meaning, which suggests itself the more naturally, because excessive drinking is followed by vomiting (cf. Jer 25:26-27).

This threat is explained in Hab 2:17, in the statement that the wickedness practised by the Chaldaean on Lebanon and its beasts will cover or fall back upon itself. Lebanon with its beasts is taken by most commentators allegorically, as a figurative representation of the holy land and its inhabitants. But although it may be pleaded, in support of this view, that Lebanon, and indeed the summit of its cedar forest, is used in Jer 22:6 as a symbol of the royal family of Judaea, and in Jer 22:23 as a figure denoting Jerusalem, and that in Isa 37:24, and probably also in Zec 11:1, the mountains of Lebanon, as the northern frontier of the Israelitish land, are mentioned synecdochically for the land itself, and the hewing of its cedars and cypresses may be a figurative representation of the devastation of the land and its inhabitants; these passages do not, for all that, furnish any conclusive evidence of the correctness of this view, inasmuch as in Isa 10:33-34, Lebanon with its forest is also a figure employed to denote the grand Assyrian army and its leaders, and in Isa 60:13 is a symbol of the great men of the earth generally; whilst in the verse before us, the allusion to the Israelitish land and nation is neither indicated, nor even favoured, by the context of the words. Apart, for example, from the fact that such a thought as this, "the wickedness committed upon the holy land will cover thee, because of the wickedness committed upon the earth,"not only appears lame, but would be very difficult to sustain on biblical grounds, inasmuch as the wickedness committed upon the earth and its inhabitants would be declared to be a greater crime than that committed upon the land and people of the Lord; this view does not answer to the train of thought in the whole of the ode, since the previous strophes do not contain any special allusion to the devastation of the holy land, or the subjugation and ill-treatment of the holy people, but simply to the plundering of many nations, and the gain forced out of their sweat and blood, as being the great crime of the Chaldaean (cf. Hab 2:8, Hab 2:10, Hab 2:13), for which he would be visited with retribution and destruction. Consequently we must take the words literally, as referring to the wickedness practised by the Chaldaean upon nature and the animal world, as the glorious creation of God, represented by the cedars and cypresses of Lebanon, and the animals living in the forests upon those mountains. Not satisfied with robbing men and nations, and with oppressing and ill-treating them, the Chaldaean committed wickedness upon the cedars and cypresses also, and the wild animals of Lebanon, cutting down the wood either for military purposes or for state buildings, so that the wild animals were unsparingly exterminated. There is a parallel to this in Isa 14:8, where the cypresses and cedars of Lebanon rejoice at the fall of the Chaldaean, because they will be no more hewn down. Shōd b^e hēmōth , devastation upon (among) the animals (with the gen. obj. , as in Isa 22:4 and Psa 12:6). יחיתן is a relative clause, and the subject, shōd , the devastation which terrified the animals. The form יחיתן for יחתּן , from יחת , hiphil of חתת , is anomalous, the syllable with dagesh being resolved into an extended one, like התימך for התמּך in Isa 33:1; and the tsere of the final syllable is exchanged for pathach because of the pause, as, for example, in התעלּם in Psa 55:2 (see Olshausen, Gramm. p. 576). There is no necessity to alter it into יחיתך (Ewald and Olshausen after the lxx, Syr., and Vulg.), and it only weakens the idea of the talio . The second hemistich is repeated as a refrain from Hab 2:8 .

Keil-Delitzsch: Hab 2:18-20

Fifth and last strophe. - Hab 2:18. "What profiteth the graven image, that the maker thereof hath carved it; the molten image and the teacher of lies, that the maker of his image trusteth in him to make dumb idols? Hab 2:19. Woe to him that saith to the wood, Wake up; Awake, to the hard stone. Should it teach? Behold, it is encased in gold and silver, and there is nothing of breath in its inside. Hab 2:20. But Jehovah is in His holy temple: let all the world be silent before Him." This concluding strophe does not commence, like the preceding ones, with hōi , but with the thought which prepares the way for the woe , and is attached to what goes before to strengthen the threat, all hope of help being cut off from the Chaldaean. Like all the rest of the heathen, the Chaldaean also trusted in the power of his gods. This confidence the prophet overthrows in Hab 2:18 : "What use is it?"equivalent to "The idol is of no use"(cf. Jer 2:11; Isa 44:9-10). The force of this question still continues in massēkhâh : "Of what use is the molten image?" Pesel is an image carved out of wood or stone; massēkhâh an image cast in metal. הועיל is the perfect, expressing a truth founded upon experience, as a fact: What profit has it ever brought? Mōreh sheqer (the teacher of lies) is not the priest or prophet of the idols, after the analogy of Mic 3:11 and Isa 9:14; for that would not suit the following explanatory clause, in which עליו (in him) points back to mōreh sheqer : "that the maker of idols trusteth in him (the teacher of lies)."Consequently the mōreh sheqer must be the idol itself; and it is so designated in contrast with the true God, the teacher in the highest sense (cf. Job 36:22). The idol is a teacher of lying, inasmuch as it sustains the delusion, partly by itself and partly through its priests, that it is God, and can do what men expect from God; whereas it is nothing more than a dumb nonentity ( 'elı̄l 'illēm : compare εἴδωλα ἄφωνα , 1Co 12:2). Therefore woe be to him who expects help from such lifeless wood or image of stone. עץ is the block of wood shaped into an idol. Hâqı̄tsâh , awake! sc. to my help, as men pray to the living God (Psa 35:23; Psa 44:24; Psa 59:6; Isa 51:9). הוּא יורה is a question of astonishment at such a delusion. This is required by the following sentence: it is even encased in gold. Tâphas : generally to grasp; here to set in gold, to encase in gold plate ( zâhâbh is an accusative). כּל אין : there is not at all. רוּח , breath, the spirit of life (cf. Jer 10:14). Hab 2:18 and Hab 2:19 contain a concise summary of the reproaches heaped upon idolatry in Isa 44:9-20; but they are formed quite independently, without any evident allusions to that passage. In Hab 2:20 the contrast is drawn between the dumb lifeless idols and the living God, who is enthroned in His holy temple, i.e., not the earthly temple at Jerusalem, but the heavenly temple, or the temple as the throne of the divine glory (Isa 66:1), as in Mic 1:2, whence God will appear to judge the world, and to manifest His holiness upon the earth, by the destruction of the earthly powers that rise up against Him. This thought is implied in the words, "He is in His holy temple,"inasmuch as the holy temple is the palace in which He is enthroned as Lord and Ruler of the whole world, and from which He observes the conduct of men (Psa 11:4). Therefore the whole earth, i.e., all the population of the earth, is to be still before Him, i.e., to submit silently to Him, and wait for His judgment. Compare Zep 1:7 and Zec 2:13, where the same command is borrowed from this passage, and referred to the expectation of judgment. חס is hardly an imper. apoc. of הסה , but an interjection, from which the verb hâsâh is formed. But if the whole earth must keep silence when He appears as Judge, it is all over with the Chaldaean also, with all his glory and might.

Constable: Hab 2:6-20

3. The Lord's sentence on Babylon 2:6-20

The Lord pronounced taunts or mocking statements on the Babylonians announcing that they would receive judgment for their sins. This taunt song consists of five stanzas of three verses each. Five woes follow. Each woe is "an interjection of distress pronounced in the face of disaster or in view of coming judgment (cf. Isa. 3:11; 5:11; 10:5; et al.)."²⁷

Constable: Hab 2:15-17

Judgment for rapacity 2:15-17

2:15 God would judge Babylon because the Babylonians had deceived their neighbor nations with the result that they were able to take advantage of them. The Babylonians had behaved like a man who gets a woman drunk so she will lose her self-control and he can then undress her. That the Babylonians took advantage of their victims sexually is implied in the illustration as is their love for wine.

2:16 As they had made their neighbors drunk, so the Lord would give them a cup of judgment that would make them drunk. Yahweh's right hand is a figure for His strong personal retribution, giving back in kind what the person being judged had given (cf. Isa. 51:17-23; Jer. 25:15-17; Lam. 4:21; Matt. 20:22; 26:42; 1 Cor. 11:29). Having swallowed the cup's contents the Babylonians would disgrace themselves rather than honoring and glorifying themselves as they did presently. Their future disgrace contrasts with Yahweh's future glory (v. 14). They would expose their own nakedness as they had exposed the nakedness of others (v. 15). Nakedness involves vulnerability as well as shame (cf. Gen. 9:21-25). The Lord pictured Babylon as a contemptible, naked drunk who had lost his self-control and the respect of everyone including himself.

2:17 Babylon's violence (ethical and moral injustice) would come back to cover him because he had rapaciously stripped Lebanon of its vegetation and animals. However bloodshed in Lebanon's main town and the slaughter of its inhabitants was an even more serious crime. "Lebanon" is probably a synecdoche for Israel, as it is elsewhere (cf. 2 Kings 14:9; Jer. 22:6, 23), and "the town" most likely refers to Jerusalem.

Constable: Hab 2:18-20

Judgment for idolatry 2:18-20

2:18 Habakkuk, like other prophets, saw through the folly of idolatry and exposed it (cf. Isa. 41:7; 44:9-20; 45:16, 20; 46:1-2, 6-7; Jer. 10:8-16). An idol carved by human hands cannot help its maker because anyone who creates is always greater than his creation. Images really become teachers of falsehood since their existence implies a lie, namely, that they can help humans. An idol-carver trusts in his own handiwork by making it. Idols cannot even speak much less provide help (cf. Rom. 1:22-25).

"Modern people in their sophistications may regard themselves as free from the obvious folly of idolatry. What educated, self-respecting person would be deluded into expecting special powers to emanate from the form of an antiquated Idol? Yet the new covenant Scriptures make it plain that covetousness is idolatry (Eph. 5:5). Whenever a person's desire looks to the creature rather than the Creator, he is guilty of the same kind of foolishness. An insatiable desire for things not rightly possessed assumes that things can satisfy rather than God himself. Whenever a person sets his priorities on the things made rather than on the Maker of things, he is guilty of idolatry."²⁸

2:19 The Lord pronounced woe on those who ignorantly tried to coax their dumb idols, wood or stone perhaps overlaid with gold or silver, to speak (cf. 1 Kings 18:26-29). No matter what they looked like or out of what material they were made they were still only lifeless objects of art. How foolish it was to look to one of these as one's teacher or guide!

2:20 In contrast to lifeless idols stands the living and true God. Yahweh abode in His heavenly temple, not in the works of human hands. Therefore all the earth, everything in it, should be quiet before Him out of respect and awe (fear; cf. v. 1; 3:16). There is no need to try and coax Him to come to life or to speak (cf. v. 19). The implication of Yahweh's majestic sovereignty is that He would take care of Babylon; the Israelites did not have to concern themselves with that (cf. 3:16).

"God sometimes uses evil people to accomplish His larger purpose in life. But He never condones evil, and those who do evil He holds acccountable for their actions."²⁹

Guzik: Hab 2:1-20

Habakkuk 2 - God Justifies His Judgment

A. The proud rebuked.

1. (2-3) Preparation for the answer: how to publish the vision.

Then the LORD answered me and said: "Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."

a. Write the vision and make it plain: God told Habakkuk to record this "question and answer" time for the benefit of others - that he may run who reads it. Habakkuk's revelation wasn't just for himself, but also to edify others. Those who read it would make rapid progress (may run), but they couldn't make this progress if Habakkuk did not make it plain.

i. Habakkuk first had to see the vision. The preacher cannot make anyone else see what he does not see for himself.

ii. Habakkuk then had to make it known. The preacher must do what he can to make the word of God known, and make it known in as many ways as possible.

iii. Habakkuk had to make it known as permanently as possible - he was told to write the vision. The preacher must do what he can to make a permanent impact on his listeners.

iv. Habakkuk had to make it plain. "I have sometimes thought that certain ministers fancied that it was their duty to make the message elaborate, to go to the very bottom of the subject, and stir up all the mud they could find there, till you could not possibly see them, nor could they see their own way at all . . . They tell people all the difficulties they have discovered in the Bible, - which difficulties most of their hearers would never have heard of unless their ministers had told them." (Spurgeon)

v. Habakkuk had to make it practical - that he may run who reads it. It doesn't say, "that he who runs may read it," but "that he may run who reads it." The running - the activity and progress - comes forth from God's word.

b. For the vision is yet for an appointed time: Habakkuk spoke to an age beyond his own. The Babylonian conquest would not be evident in his own day, but in the future.

2. (4-8) God knows how to deal with the proud.

"Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith. Indeed, because he transgresses by wine, he is a proud man, and he does not stay at home. Because he enlarges his desire as hell, and he is like death, and cannot be satisfied, he gathers to himself all nations and heaps up for himself all peoples. Will not all these take up a proverb against him, and a taunting riddle against him, and say, 'Woe to him who increases what is not his; how long? And to him who loads himself with many pledges'? Will not your creditors rise up suddenly? Will they not awaken who oppress you? And you will become their booty. Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the people shall plunder you, because of men's blood and the violence of the land and the city, and of all who dwell in it."

a. Behold the proud: Habakkuk wondered why Babylon - a nation even more sinful than Judah - would be used to bring judgment to Judah. In answering the prophet, God first assures him that He sees the proud, and knows that his soul is not upright in him.

i. Pride is everywhere and takes all manner of shapes.

· Here is the rich man, proud of what he has

· There is the poor man, proud of his "honor" in having less

· Here is the talented man, proud of what he can do

· There is the man of few talents, proud of his hard work

· Here is the religious man, proud of his religion

· There is the unbeliever, proud of his unbelief

· Here is the establishment man, proud of his place in society

· There is the counter-cultural man, proud of his "outcast" status

· Here is the learned man, proud of his intelligence and learning

· Here is the simple man, proud of his simplicity

ii. "If there is a sin that is universal, it is this. Where is it not to be found? Hunt among the highest and loftiest in the world, and you shall find it there; and then go and search amongst the poorest and the most miserable, and you shall find it there. There may be as much pride inside a beggar's rags as in a prince's robe; and a harlot may be as proud as a model of chastity. Pride is a strange creature; it never objects to its lodgings. It will live comfortably enough in a palace, and it will live equally at its ease in a hovel. Is there any man in whose heart pride does not lurk?" (Spurgeon)

iii. Pride can be especially dangerous among the people of God. Once a man came to John Bunyan after a sermon and told him what a fine sermon he preached. "You're too late," Bunyan answered. "The devil told me that before I stepped down from the pulpit." Satan can tell the praying brother to be proud of his ability to pray, the growing brother to be proud of his growth, and even the humble brother to be proud of his humility.

iv. "Wherever pride is found, it is always hateful to God. Why! pride is even hateful to men. Men cannot bear a proud man; and hence it is that a proud man, who has any sense left, often sees that it is so, and he therefore tries to affect manners of modesty. He will seem to be humble, when he really is not, if he has the suspicion that all about him will dislike him if they know him to be proud. But God cannot bear pride; it is a part of his daily business to put down the proud." (Spurgeon)

b. But the just shall live by his faith: In contrast to the proud, there are the just. The principle of their life is faith, instead of pride that looks to self. True faith looks outside of self unto the LORD God, while pride always looks to self.

i. This brief statement from the prophet Habakkuk is one of the most important, and most quoted Old Testament statements in the New Testament. Paul used it to show that the just live by faith, not by law. Being under the law isn't the way to be found just before God, only living by faith is.

ii. If you are declared just - that is, approved - before God, you have done it by a relationship of faith. If your life is all about living under the law, then God does not find you approved.

iii. In Hebrew, the important part of the verse has only three words: "the justified man," "by his faith," and "will live." Every word in Habakkuk 2:4 is important, and the Lord quotes it three times in the New Testament just to bring out the fullness of the meaning

· Romans 1:17 is the commentary on the justified man - "The just shall live by faith"

· Hebrews 10:38 is the commentary on faith - "The just shall live by faith"

· Galatians 3:11 is the commentary on the Christian life - "The just shall live by faith"

iv. Before his bold declaration of the truth of the gospel, Martin Luther was an Augustinian monk. As a monk he went on a pilgrimage to Rome and as he crossed the Alps he fell deathly ill. As he lay sick he felt great turmoil, both physical and spiritual, and a verse that had previously touched him came to mind: The just will live by his faith, from Habakkuk 2:4. When Luther recovered he went on to Rome and did the tourist things that all the pilgrims did. One day he came to the church of Saint John's Lateran, where there is a staircase said to be from Pilate's judgment hall. It was the custom of pilgrims to climb this staircase, but never on their feet - they painfully climbed a step at a time on their knees, saying prayers and kissing the steps where is was thought the blood of Jesus fell. Luther came to this place and starting doing just as all the pilgrims, because the pope promised an indulgence to all who climbed the steps on their knees and said the prayers. As he did this, Luther remembered the words from Habakkuk: The just will live by his faith. It is said that when he remembered this he stopped, stood up, walked down and went straight home to Germany. Some say the Reformation began on those stairs.

v. "Before those words broke upon my mind I hated God and was angry with him because, not content with frightening us sinners by the law and by the miseries of life, he still further increased our torture by the gospel. But when, by the Spirit of God, I understood those words - 'The just shall live by faith!' 'The just shall live by faith!' - then I felt born again like a new man; I entered through the open doors into the very Paradise of God." (Luther, cited in Boice)

vi. We are called to live by faith, and nothing else.

· Some Christians live by devotions

· Some Christians live by works

· Some Christians live by feelings

· Some Christians live by circumstances

Each of these is meaningless and perhaps dangerous without faith.

c. He enlarges his desire as hell, and he is like death, and cannot be satisfied: God sees the proud man and how the proud man cannot be satisfied. The one who is declared just by faith is satisfied, but the proud man keeps grasping.

d. Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the people shall plunder you: Here, God assures Habakkuk that He knows how to deal with nations like Babylon. He promises the Babylonians that just as they plundered many nations, so one day others would plunder them. The Babylonians were perfect examples of the proud who set themselves against those who are declared just by faith - and Habakkuk could take comfort in the fact that God would deal with them.

i. "The immediate value of the word was the Habakkuk learned that God's employment of the Chaldeans did not mean the permanent power of this evil people." (Morgan)

B. Four woes to silence sinful man.

1. (9-11) Woe to the greedy.

"Woe to him who covets evil gain for his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of disaster! You give shameful counsel to your house, cutting off many peoples, and sin against your soul. For the stone will cry out from the wall, and the beam from the timbers will answer it."

a. Woe to him who covets evil gain for his house: God addresses the greedy man, and tells him that he is ripe for judgment. The greedy man does his best to protect himself (set his next on high), yet all his best will come to nothing.

b. You . . . sin against your own soul: The greedy man thinks in terms of nothing but gain, but ends of losing his own soul. Jesus' parable in Luke 12:16-21 is the perfect example of the greedy man who sins against his own soul.

c. For the stone will cry out from the wall: Habakkuk pictures a beautiful house built by a greedy man, and the very stones of the house cry out from the wall against the man's greed.

2. (12-14) Woe to the violent.

"Woe to him who builds a town with bloodshed, who establishes a city by iniquity! Behold, is it not of the LORD of hosts that the peoples labor to feed the fire, and nations weary themselves in vain? For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea."

a. Woe to him who builds a town with bloodshed: The LORD is not only displeased with the greedy, He also pronounces a woe against the violent.

b. The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD: The violent man thinks that his might makes right, so he feels free to abuse others for his gain. As a correction and a rebuke, the LORD reminds the violent man of His ultimate triumph.

3. (15-17) Woe to the drunk.

"Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbor, pressing him to your bottle, even to make him drunk, that you may look on his nakedness! You are filled with shame instead of glory. You also; drink! And be exposed as uncircumcised! The cup of the Lord's right hand will be turned against you, and utter shame will be on your glory. For the violence done to Lebanon will cover you, and the plunder of beasts which made them afraid, because of men's blood and the violence of the land and the city, and of all who dwell in it.

a. Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbor . . . You also; drink! Through the prophet Habakkuk, the LORD rebukes both the drunk and those who promote drunkenness. Though they think that alcohol makes them feel good, God rightly says they are filled with shame instead of glory.

i. In Ephesians 5:18 Paul calls drunkenness dissipation; drunkenness is a waste of resources that should be submitted to Jesus. John Trapp writes of drinking "all the three outs" - "that is, ale out of the pot, money out of the purse, and wit out of the head." (Trapp's commentary on Galatians 5:21)

ii. The damage of drunkenness goes beyond the act itself and into what it effects in lives and families. Yearly in the United States alcohol is responsible for almost 100,000 deaths (25,000 by drunk drivers alone), 6 million non-fatal injuries, and more than $100 billion in economic losses such as unemployment and loss of productivity.

b. The cup of the Lord's right hand will be turned against you: The drunk and those who promote drunkenness loved their own cup full of drink; now God promises a cup for them, a cup of judgment and just recompense for their sin.

4. (18-20) Woe to the idolater.

"What profit is the image, that its maker should carve it, the molded image, a teacher of lies, that the maker of its mold should trust in it, to make mute idols? Woe to him who says to wood, 'Awake!' To silent stone, 'Arise! It shall teach!' Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, yet in it there is no breath at all. But the LORD is in His holy temple. Let all the earth keep silence before Him."

a. Woe to him who says to wood, "Awake!": Having dealt with the greedy man, the violent man, and the drunk now God speaks to the idolater - who treats inanimate objects as if they had life and intelligence.

b. In it there is no breath at all. But the LORD is in His holy temple: In contrast to lifeless idols, the LORD is alive and well in His holy temple. The folly of the idolater will be exposed by the majesty of the living God.

i. Through it all, the point is proven. Habakkuk couldn't understand why God would judge a sinful nation (Judah) by an even more sinful nation (Babylon). Yet God reminds Habakkuk of His own wisdom and strength, and of His ultimate triumph over the wicked. God knew that Babylon was filled with the proud, the greedy, the violent, the drunk, and the idolater - and the LORD knew how to deal with them all.

© 2001 David Guzik - No distribution beyond personal use without permission

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

HABAKKUK, from a Hebrew root meaning to "embrace," denoting a "favorite" (namely, of God) and a "struggler" (for his country's good). Some ancient authors represent him as belonging to the tribe of Levi; others [PSEUDO EPIPHANIUS], to that of Simeon. The inscription to Bel and the dragon in the Septuagint asserts the former; and Hab 3:19 perhaps favors this. EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 7.29] states that in his time Habakkuk's tomb was shown at Ceila in Palestine.

The time seems to have been about 610 B.C. For the Chaldeans attacked Jerusalem in the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim, 605 B.C. (2Ki 24:1; 2Ch 36:6; Jer 46:2; Jer 36:9). And Habakkuk (Hab 1:5-6, &c.) speaks of the Chaldeans as about to invade Judah, but not as having actually done so. In the second chapter he proceeds to comfort his people by foretelling the humiliation of their conquerors, and that the vision will soon have its fulfilment. In the third chapter the prophet in a sublime ode celebrates the deliverances wrought by Jehovah for His people in times past, as the ground of assurance, notwithstanding all their existing calamities, that He will deliver them again. Hab 3:16 shows that the invader is still coming, and not yet arrived; so that the whole refers to the invasion in Jehoiakim's times, not those under Jehoiachin and Zedekiah. The Apocryphal appendix to Daniel states that he lived to see the Babylonian exile (588 B.C.), which accords with his prophesying early in Jehoiakim's reign, about 610 B.C.

The position of the book immediately after Nahum is appropriate; as Nahum treated of the judgments of the Lord on Assyria, for its violence against Israel, so Habakkuk, those inflicted by, and on, the Chaldeans for the same reason.

The style is poetical and sublime. The parallelisms are generally regular. Borrowed ideas occur (compare Hab 3:19, with Psa 18:33; Hab 2:6, with Isa 14:4; Hab 2:14, with Isa 11:9). The ancient catalogues imply that his book is part of the canon of Scripture. In the New Testament, Rom 1:17 quotes Hab 2:4 (though not naming him); compare also Gal 3:11; Heb 10:38. Act 13:40-41 quotes Hab 1:5. One or two Hebrew words peculiar to Habakkuk occur (Hab 1:9; Hab 2:6, Hab 2:16).

JFB: Habakkuk (Outline)

• HABAKKUK'S EXPOSTULATION WITH JEHOVAH ON ACCOUNT OF THE PREVALENCE OF INJUSTICE: JEHOVAH SUMMONS ATTENTION TO HIS PURPOSE OF SENDING THE CHALDEANS AS THE AVENGERS. THE PROPHET COMPLAINS, THAT THESE ARE WORSE THAN THOSE ON WHOM VENGEANCE WAS TO BE TAKEN. (Hab. 1:1-17)
• THE PROPHET, WAITING EARNESTLY FOR AN ANSWER TO HIS COMPLAINTS (FIRST CHAPTER), RECEIVES A REVELATION, WHICH IS TO BE FULFILLED, NOT IMMEDIATELY, YET IN DUE TIME, AND IS THEREFORE TO BE WAITED FOR IN FAITH: THE CHALDEANS SHALL BE PUNISHED FOR THEIR CRUEL RAPACITY, NOR CAN THEIR FALSE GODS AVERT THE JUDGMENT OF JEHOVAH, THE ONLY TRUE GOD. (Hab. 2:1-20)
• HABAKKUK'S PRAYER TO GOD: GOD'S GLORIOUS REVELATION OF HIMSELF AT SINAI AND AT GIBEON, A PLEDGE OF HIS INTERPOSING AGAIN IN BEHALF OF ISRAEL AGAINST BABYLON, AND ALL OTHER FOES; HENCE THE PROPHET'S CONFIDENCE AMID CALAMITIES. (Hab. 3:1-19)

TSK: Habakkuk 2 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Hab 2:1, Unto Habakkuk, waiting for an answer, is shewn that he must wait by faith; Hab 2:5, The judgment upon the Chaldean for unsatiableness, Hab 2:9, for covetousness, Hab 2:12. for cruelty, Hab 2:15. for drunkenness, Hab 2:18. and for idolatry.

Poole: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

THE ARGUMENT

The prophecy of Habakkuk seems to be an exact stating of that perplexed case, touching the seeming unequalness of the proceedings of God in the government of the world, in which the good suffer evil, and the evil rejoice in prosperity; the more righteous are afflicted, and the more unrighteous prosper; nay, the worst domineer over the best, among men. This case baffled the wise among philosophers, and it much troubled David and Jeremiah, Psa 73:2,3 , &c.; Jer 12:1,2 ; and hath ever been matter of some wonder. to the best and wisest of men, as here it was to Habakkuk, who lived in the times of great impieties against God, and of great injustice amongst men. It is most probable he lived and prophesied in the days of Manasseh, when the wicked devoured the man that was more righteous than himself; and this is the subject of his complaint, Hab 1:1-4 . Those grievous sins which then abounded, he declareth shall be punished by the Chaldeans, at which he again wondereth: it grieveth him to see, in Judah, the best afflicted by the worst; and it is as much grief to him to foresee the wicked nation of the Chaldeans prosper in the ruins of a more righteous nation, (from the 5th to the 11th verse of the first chapter,) which God commandeth him to foretell. On this he proposeth the case expressly, from verse 12 to the end of the chapter, and which God resolveth for him in the second chapter, where the sins of Judah and the sins of the Chaldeans are enumerated, and at once both are threatened with punishment; when the Chaldeans have punished Judah’ s sins, the Medes and Persians shall punish the same sins in the Chaldeans. In all which the unspotted righteousness and the admirable wisdom of God is seen, in the government of his church, chastised for her sins against God; and in his government of the world, sinning highly against God, and with greater wickedness acting the same or worse things than those for which by their means God had before punished his church. In fine, the prophet, with steady faith and fervent prayer, addresseth to God, and in most elegant manner recounting God’ s mercy and faithfulness to his people, Hab 3 , leaves it both a foundation to our hope and pattern for our practice. He doth resolve, as we should, to wait for, rejoice in, and submit to the Lord, in greatest distresses and darkness of providence. An excellent subject for our meditations at this day, as well as in the days of our prophet, whose name seems to imply his wrestlings with these difficulties, or his laying hold, embracing of God; our safest course in such circumstances being to adhere to God. We can but guess at the time of his prophesying, and that we think is rather in the time of Manasseh, than of Hezekiah, or Josiah, though possibly he might live and be a prophet in the first part of Josiah’ s reign. What tribe or what family he was of we pretend not to tell you, since we cannot pretend to know; but we are sure he was not the pretended messenger that carried a mess of broth out of Judea into Babylon, for Daniel’ s dinner; and we think it a wonder any thinking man should now believe it, as it would at that day have been, if really done.

Poole: Habakkuk 2 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 2

Unto Habakkuk, waiting for an answer, Hab 2:1 , is showed that he must wait in faith, Hab 2:2-4 . The judgment of the Chaldeans for insatiableness, Hab 2:5-8 , ambition, Hab 2:9-11 , cruelty, Hab 2:12-14 , treacherous dealing, Hab 2:15-17 , and idolatry, Hab 2:18-20 .

MHCC: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

The subject of this prophecy is the destruction of Judea and Jerusalem for the sins of the people, and the consolation of the faithful under national calamities.

MHCC: Habakkuk 2 (Chapter Introduction)

(Hab 2:1-4) Habakkuk must wait in faith.

(Hab 2:5-14) Judgments upon the Chaldeans.

(Hab 2:15-20) Also upon drunkenness and idolatry.

Matthew Henry: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Prophecy of Habakkuk

It is a very foolish fancy of some of the Jewish rabbin that this prophet was the son of the Shunamite woman that was at first miraculously given, and afterwards raised to life, by Elisha (2 Kings 4), as they say also that the prophet Jonah was the son of the widow of Zarephath, which Elijah raised to life. It is a more probable conjecture of their modern chronologers that he lived and prophesied in the reign of king Manasseh, when wickedness abounded, and destruction was hastening on, destruction by the Chaldeans, whom this prophet mentions as the instruments of God's judgments; and Manasseh was himself carried to Babylon, as an earnest of what should come afterwards. In the apocryphal story of Bel and the Dragon mention is made of Habakkuk the prophet in the land of Judah, who was carried thence by an angel to Babylon, to feed Daniel in the den; those who give credit to that story take pains to reconcile our prophet's living before the captivity, and foretelling it, with that. Huetius thinks that that was another of the same name, a prophet, this of the tribe of Simeon, that of Levi; others that he lived so long as to the end of that captivity, though he prophesied of it before it came. And some have imagined that Habakkuk's feeding Daniel in the den is to be understood mystically, that Daniel then lived by faith, as Habakkuk had said the just should do; he was fed by that word, Hab 2:4. The prophecy of this book is a mixture of the prophet's addresses to God in the people's name and to the people in God's name; for it is the office of the prophet to carry messages both ways. We have in it a lively representation of the intercourse and communion between a gracious God and a gracious soul. The whole refers particularly to the invasion of the land of Judah by the Chaldeans, which brought spoil upon the people of God, a just punishment of the spoil they had been guilty of among themselves; but it is of general use, especially to help us through that great temptation with which good men have in all ages been exercised, arising from the power and prosperity of the wicked and the sufferings of the righteous by it.

Matthew Henry: Habakkuk 2 (Chapter Introduction)

In this chapter we have an answer expected by the prophet (Hab 2:1), and returned by the Spirit of God, to the complaints which the prophet made of the violences and victories of the Chaldeans in the close of the foregoing chapter. The answer is, I. That after God has served his own purposes by the prevailing power of the Chaldeans, has tried the faith and patience of his people, and distinguished between the hypocrites and the sincere among them, he will reckon with the Chaldeans, will humble and bring down, not only that proud monarch Nebuchadnezzar, but that proud monarchy, for their boundless and insatiable thirst after dominion and wealth, for which they themselves should at length be made a prey (Hab 2:2-8). II. That not they only, but all other sinners like them, should perish under a divine woe. 1. Those that are covetous, are greedy of wealth and honours (Hab 2:9, Hab 2:11). 2. Those that are injurious and oppressive, and raise estates by wrong and rapine (Hab 2:12-14). 3. Those that promote drunkenness that they may expose their neighbours to shame (Hab 2:15-17). 4. Those that worship idols (Hab 2:18-20).

Constable: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title and Writer

The title of the book is the name of its writer.

All we know for sure about Habakkuk was that he was a prophet who lived during the pre-exilic period of Israel's history.¹ The meaning of his name is questionable. It may come from the Hebrew verb habaq, which means "to fold the hands" or "to embrace." In this case it might mean "one who embraces" or "one who is embraced." Luther thought it signified that Habakkuk embraced his people to comfort and uphold them. Jerome interpreted it to mean that he embraced the problem of divine justice in the world, the subject of the book.² The simple designation "the prophet" with no other identifying description characterizes only two other prophetical books: Haggai and Zechariah. So Habakkuk is the only book so designated among the pre-exilic Prophets. The content of the book, which includes wisdom literature and a psalm of praise, indicates that Habakkuk was a poet as well as a prophet.

There are traditions about who Habakkuk was that have little basis in fact but are interesting nonetheless. Since the last verse of the book gives a musical notation similar to some psalms, some students concluded that he was a musician and possibly a Levite. The apocraphal book Bel and the Dragon mentions him as the son of Jeshua of the tribe of Levi. It records a legend about him that is pure fantasy. Supposedly an angel commanded Habakkuk to take a meal to Daniel, who was in the lions' den a second time. When the prophet complained that he did not know where the den was, the angel picked him up by a lock of his hair and carried him to the spot (Bel vv. 33-39). According to rabbinic sources, Habakkuk was the son of the Shunammite woman whom Elisha restored to life (2 Kings 4). The basis for this theory is that Elisha' servant told the woman that she would "embrace" a son (2 Kings 4:16), and Habakkuk's name is similar to the Hebrew word for "embrace."

Unity

The major challenge to the unity of the book has come from liberal scholars who view psalmic material such as chapter 3 as postexilic. The commentary on Habbakuk found at Qumran does not expound this psalm either. However, the continuity of theme that continues through the whole book plus the absence of any compelling reasons to reject chapter 3 argue for the book's unity.³

Date

References in the book help us date it approximately but make it impossible to be precise or dogmatic. The Lord told Habakkuk that He was raising up the Chaldeans (Neo-Babylonians), the fierce and impetuous people who were already marching through the whole earth, and that they would expand their territory even farther (1:6).⁴ This points to a time before 605 B.C. when Babylon defeated the united forces of Egypt and Assyria at the battle of Carchemish and became the major power in the ancient Near East. It may even point to a time before 612 B.C. when the Babylonians (with the Medes and Sythians) destroyed Nineveh. However other references in the book that describe conditions in Judah and the ancient Near East support a date between 608 and 605 B.C. (cf. 1:7-11).⁵ King Jehoakim ruled Judah from 609-598 B.C., so it was apparently during his reign that Habakkuk prophesied (cf. 2 Kings 23:36-24:7; 2 Chron. 36:5-8). The background to Habakkuk is the decline of the Judean kingdom that began with the death of King Josiah in 609 B.C.

Place of Composition

Since the Chaldeans were on the rise when Habakkuk wrote, the prophet must have lived in Judah. The Northern Kingdom of Israel had passed out of existence in 722 B.C. with the Assyrian invasion. Thus Habakkuk was a prophet of the Southern Kingdom who lived in times of increasing degeneracy and fear in his country.

Audience and Purpose

The people to whom Habakkuk ministered were Judeans who apparently lived under the reign of King Jehoiakim. During his reign the Israelites were looking for help in the wrong places, Egypt and Assyria, in view of growing Babylonian power. They should have been looking to the Lord primarily, and their failture to do so was one of the burdens of Jeremiah, Habakkuk's contemporary.

Habakkuk's concerns were more philosophical, however. What disturbed him was that the sovereign Lord was not responding to Habakkuk's evil generation and its internal injustices. He voiced his concern to Yahweh in prayer (1:2-4). The Lord replied that He was working. He was raising up a nation that would punish His people for their covenant unfaithfulness 1:5-11). This raised another problem for Habakkuk, which he also took to the Lord in prayer. How could He use a more wicked nation than Judah to punish God's chosen people (1:12-2:1)? The Lord explained that He would eventually punish the Babylonians for their wickedness too (2:2-20). The final chapter is a hymn of praise extolling Yahweh for His wise ways. The purpose of the book, then, was to vindicate the justice of God so God's people would have hope and encouragement.

Literary form

This book contains a variety of literary forms. The first part of the book contains a dialogue between Habakkuk and his God that alternates between lament and oracle (1:2-2:5). The second part is a taunt or mocking song that the prophet put in the mouths of the nations that had suffered under Babylon's oppression. It consists of five "woes" (2:6-20). The third part is a psalm, complete with musical directions (ch. 3).

Distinctive features

"Habakkuk is a unique book. Unlike other prophets who declared God's message to people this prophet dialogued with God about people. Most Old Testament prophets proclaimed divine judgment. Habakkuk pleaded for divine judgment. In contrast with the typical indictment, this little book records an intriguing interchange between a perplexed prophet and his Maker."⁶

"The prophet asked some of the most penetrating questions in all literature, and the answers are basic to a proper view of God and his relation to history. If God's initial response sounded the death knell for any strictly nationalistic covenant theology of Judah, his second reply outlined in a positive sense the fact that all history was hastening to a conclusion that was [as] certain as it was satisfying.

"In the interim, while history is still awaiting its conclusion (and Habakkuk was not told when the end would come, apparently for him prefigured by Babylon's destruction), the righteous ones are to live by faith. The faith prescribed--or faithfulness,' as many have argued that emunah should be translated--is still called for as a basic response to the unanswered questions in today's universe; and it is this, a theology for life both then and now, that stands as Habakkuk's most basic contribution."⁷

Message⁸

Habakkuk is unusual among the prophetical books in that it tells a story. In this the book is similar to Jonah, which is also the record of a prophet's experience. Jonah gives the account of a prophet's failure to sympathize with God. Habakkuk gives the account of a prophet's failure to trust God. Jonah deals with a problem posed by Nineveh, and Habakkuk deals with a problem posed by Babylon. Habakkuk, like Jonah, also records one major event in the life of the prophet. Most of the other prophetic books record the messages and activities of a prophet over an extended period of years. Habakkuk does contain prophecies, so it is like the other prophetic books in this respect.

The key verse in the book is 2:4: "Behold, as for the proud one, his soul is not right within him; but the righteous will live by his faith." This verse suggests the difficulty that Habakkuk faced, and it contains his declaration following his struggle with faith.

Habakkuk is a book in which a man, the prophet, asked questions and received answers. Note, for example, 1:2, which voices the prophet's initial question. Then turn to 3:19, which gives his final affirmation after having received answers. The contrast between these verses is startling. It is a contrast between a wail of despair and a shout of confidence. G. Campbell Morgan observed, "From the affirmation of faith's agnosticism we come to the affirmation of agnosticism's faith."⁹

This is the story of Habakkuk. At the beginning we hear a believer questioning God. The prophet's problem was why God was not doing what He promised to do, specifically delivering His people from the violence with which the Babylonians were threatening them. Every believer faces the same problem sooner or later. Circumstances challenge the promises of God, and we wonder why God does not do something about the situation. Habakkuk wondered how God could use a more wicked nation, Babylon, to disciple the wicked Judahites.

The key verse, 2:4, is similar to the constricted part of an hour-glass. Everything that precedes it leads up to it, and everything that follows it results from it. It is like a doorway through which everything in the book passes.

Let's look at that doorway statement in 2:4. It contains two contrasting viewpoints on all of life. First, we have a swollen, proud, conceited person. Second, we have a person who is full of faith. The first is full of himself or herself, and the second is full of God. The difference is in attitude: great confidence in self or in God. In both cases, we have something hidden and something manifest.

In the case of the proud, his soul or inner man is not straight or right within him. It is not upright or level, but crooked or twisted. His is an unnatural condition. While his inner, hidden condition is crookedness of soul, his outer, manifest condition is conceit or pride. He is wrapped up in himself, and being wrapped up in himself he is wrapped up in a ball, so to speak--all twisted up on the inside. It is interesting that the verse says nothing about the outcome of the proud. We only have a description of him as swollen and twisted.

In the case of the righteous, his soul is right within him. His inner, hidden condition is straight. His outward manifestation of that condition is trust in God. It is interesting, in passing, that there is only one straightness, but there are many kinds of crookedness, perversity. If I asked you to imagine a straight stick, everyone in this room would visualize straightness. But if I asked you to imagine a crooked stick, everyone in this room would visualize a different shape of crookedness. A crooked stick may be crooked in a hundred different ways, but there is only one way a straight stick can be straight. Goodness is basically simple, but evil is exceedingly complex. Goodness looks only one way, but evil can take many different forms and shapes.

The central affirmation of Habakkuk is the last part of 2:4: "the righteous will live by his faith." There are three key words in this affirmation: righteous, live, and faith. It is interesting that in the three places where this verse is quoted in the New Testament, in each case a different word receives the emphasis. In Romans 1:17, the emphasis is on "righteous." Paul's concern in Romans was with the righteousness of God and how people can obtain it. In Galatians 3:11, the emphasis is on "faith." Paul contrasted salvation by works and salvation by faith in Galatians. And in Hebrews 10:38, the emphasis is on "live." The writer to the Hebrews stressed the importance of living by faith as a way of life rather than turning back to Judaism and living by the Law. Thus we can see that this statement is packed with meaning. In fact, many people believe that this verse expresses the central theme of the entire Bible.

Now let's relate this to what Habakkuk saw that created a problem of faith for him. He saw the proud flourishing. He saw crookedness all around him in a hundred different manifestations of evil. He also saw the righteous who were trusting in God oppressed, threatened, and persecuted. Specifically, he saw the proud Babylonians, who did not acknowledge Yahweh, gaining more and more power. They appeared to be the ones truly alive. He saw the people of God, who were trusting in Yahweh, losing more and more power. They appeared to be headed for certain death and extinction. And, most disturbing of all, Habakkuk saw God doing nothing.

In the hour of his crisis of faith, God spoke to the prophet and gave him the great truth of 2:4. Faith is the principle that leads to life in spite of all appearances, and pride is destructive in spite of all appearances. Godless people and their plans seem so strong and invincible. Their enterprises, which are in rebellion against God, seem so inevitable and sure to succeed. Nevertheless the one whom God regards as righteous because of his or her trust in Him will live on and not die.

What is God doing? He is causing things to work out in harmony with the principle set forth in 2:4 in spite of appearances. The sovereign of the universe, who often takes centuries to work out His plans, when we want Him to do it in years if not months, holds everything in His grasp. He will fulfill His promises. He will reward faith. He will destroy the crooked and swollen proud.

The last part of the book, which follows 2:4, helps us see the outcome of believing God's revelation in 2:4. Habakkuk reviewed many of the crooked manifestations of evil and announced the final destruction of them all. He also viewed the history of the Israelites as a testimony to the truth of the book's central affirmation, and he trembled as he projected what God had done in the past forward to what He would do to the Chaldeans. The prophet who started out thinking that God was doing nothing ended by praying that Yahweh would remember mercy when He poured out His wrath. He who thought God had forgotten about the faithful broke out into a song of praise as He realized that he could continue to trust God in spite of appearances.

Habakkuk does not end with a wail but with a song. It does not end with inquiry but with affirmation. It does not end with frustration but with faith: 3:17-18.

There are several lessons of timeless importance that Habakkuk teaches its readers.

One abiding lesson of this book is that people of faith sometimes have trouble continuing to trust God. If we look at what is happening in our world, we can come up with the same questions Habakkuk voiced at the beginning of the book. But if we continue to listen to the Word of God, we can have peace in our hearts and songs on our lips as we wait for God to reward the righteous with life for their faith. This principle is true on two levels: justification and sanctification. The only way to obtain a proper legal standing before God (justification) is by trusting Him. The only way to continue to live in that righteous standing before God (sanctification) is to continue to trust Him in spite of appearances. We can do so because God has established a flawless record of faithfulness to His promises, and the Bible is the record of that faithfulness. Thus we must live in the light of Scripture rather than in the light of experience. God's promises and covenants are a better indication of reality than circumstances.

We also need to be careful that we do not fall into the category of the proud who are wrapped up in themselves. We too quickly look to the proud of this world, who do not bow before God, for explanations. Rather, we should express our own righteousness by continuing to trust in God in spite of appearances. Today scientific explanations attract more faith than the simple statements of Scripture. Where will our trust be? We dare not join the ranks of the twisted and scoffing mockers whose end is not life but destruction.

Notice, too, how Habakkuk handled his problem of agnosticism. He could have set up a schedule of speaking engagements all over Judah to point out how inconsistent God was in His government of human affairs. Fortunately, instead he took his questions to God in prayer. God responded by giving him answers. The word of God came to Habakkuk. The prophet listened to the Word of God. We can say anything to God in prayer. The best place to take our questions is to God in prayer. And the best place to find answers from God is in His Word. Some people say that God does not speak as He spoke in days gone by. It is truer to say that people do not listen to God as they did in days gone by.

Furthermore, the inner attitude always manifests itself in outward action. This is true whether the inner attitude is pride or faith. What is our outward action betraying about our inner attitude? Are we really trusting man or God?

In 2:3 God said, "Though the vision tarries, wait for it, for it will certainly come." Part of being people of faith is that we wait for explanations, verbal or experiential, that will only come in the future. Someone has said that Christians are people who do not live by explanations but by promises. We must be content with God's promise that one day we will understand what is now obscure. How God will bring His will to pass is a mystery in large measure. We only have the outlines of His actions in prophecy, though we have some remarkably specific details revealed here and there. Nevertheless for the most part we must be willing to wait. The promise of God is life for those who do. Waiting is the hardest work of all, but like Habakkuk we will be able to sing as we wait if we keep talking to God and listening to God.

Constable: Habakkuk (Outline)

Outline

I. Heading 1:1

II. Habakkuk's questions and Yahweh's answers 1:2-2:20

A. Habakkuk's question about Judah 1:2-4

B. Yahweh's answer about Judah 1:5-11

C. Habakkuk's question about Babylonia 1:12-17

D. Yahweh's answer about Babylonia ch. 2

1. The introduction to the answer 2:1-3

2. The Lord's indictment of Babylon 2:4-5

3. The Lord's sentence on Babylon 2:6-20

III. Habakkuk's hymn in praise of Yahweh ch. 3

A. The introduction to the hymn 3:1

B. The prayer for revival 3:2

C. The vision of God 3:3-15

1. Yahweh's awesome appearance 3:3-7

2. Yahweh's angry actions 3:8-15

D. The commitment of faith 3:16-19a

E. The concluding musical notation 3:19b

Constable: Habakkuk

Habakkuk

Bibliography

Armerding, Carl E. "Habakkuk." In Daniel-Minor Prophets. Vol. 7 of The Expositor's Bible Commentary. 12 vols. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and Richard P. Polcyn. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1985.

Blue, J. Ronald. "Habakkuk." In The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, pp. 1505-22. Edited by John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck. Wheaton: Scripture Press Publications, Victor Books, 1985.

Chisholm, Robert B., Jr. "A Theology of the Minor Prophets." In A Biblical Theology of the Old Testament, pp. 397-433. Edited by Roy B. Zuck. Chicago: Moody Press, 1991.

Dyer, Charles H., and Eugene H. Merrill. The Old Testament Explorer. Nashville: Word Publishing, 2001.

Laetsch, T. Bible Commentary: The Minor Prophets. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1956.

Lloyd-Jones, D. Martyn. From Fear to Faith: Studies in the Book of Habakkuk and the Problem of History. London and Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter-Varsity Press, 1953.

Robertson, O. Palmer. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah. New International Commentaries on the Old Testament series. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990.

Rudolph, W. Micha-Nahum-Habakuk-Zephanja. KAT 13/3. 2nd ed. Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1975.

Yadin, Yigael. The Art of Warfare in Biblical Lands. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1963.

Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION.

THE PROPHECY OF HABACUC.

Habacuc was a native of Bezocher, and prophesied in Juda some time before the invasion of the Chaldeans, which he foretold. He lived to see this prophecy fulfilled, and for many years after, according to the general opinion, which supposes him to be the same that was brought by the angel to Daniel, in Babylon, Daniel xvi. (Challoner) --- He might very well live to see the captives return, as only sixty-six years elapsed from the first of Joakim, when he began to prophesy, till that event. He retired at the approach of the Chaldeans, and afterwards employed himself in agricultural pursuits. (Calmet) --- The sins of Juda, the coming of the Chaldeans, and the relaxation of the captivity are specified; and in the canticle, the appearance of Christ, the last judgment and eternity, (Worthington) are mentioned in the most sublime style. (Haydock)

Gill: Habakkuk (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO HABAKKUK

This book is called, in the Vulgate Latin and Syriac versions, "the Prophecy of Habakkuk". Of this prophet, Aben Ezra and Kimchi say, we know neither his age nor his family; which shows they paid no regard to a tradition of their nation, mentioned by some of their ancient writers ^a, that he was the son of the Shunammite, whom Elisha raised from the dead; and find the etymology of his name in the words of the prophet to her, "about this season, according to the time of life, thou shalt embrace a son", 2Ki 4:16 where the root of his name is used; and they account for the doubling of the last radical in his name, because of the two embraces of him, one by his mother, and the other by the prophet. His name indeed signifies "an embrace" ^b; or, as some, "an embracer" ^c; and the last letter being doubled, it is with others interpreted "the best embracer" ^d; to which name his character and conduct agree; who, in the most tender manner, embraced the people of God, as parents their children, and comforted them with the assurance of their preservation, notwithstanding their captivity, and with the promise of the Messiah's coming; suggesting to them they should live by faith, to which he led them the way by his own example, Hab 1:12, Hab 2:3 but as this is placing him too early, to put him in the times of Elisha; so it is fixing him too late, to make him to be in the times of Daniel, and to feed him in the den of the lions, as Joseph ben Gorion ^e, and the author of the apocryphal book of Bel and the Dragon, say he did, which was after the Babylonish captivity was ended; whereas it is certain this prophet prophesied of it, and must have lived some time before it; for he speaks of the Chaldeans by name coming against the Jews, and carrying them captive, Hab 1:6. The learned Huetius ^f, and others, think there were two prophets of this name; one of the tribe of Simeon, who lived before the captivity; and another of the tribe of Levi, who lived after it. The Jewish chronologers ^g generally place this our prophet in the times of Manasseh; with which well enough agrees the description of the times the prophet lived in, given in Hab 1:2 though some think he lived in the latter times of Josiah ^h, or the beginning of Jehoiakim ⁱ; and it is probable he was a contemporary of the Prophet Jeremiah, with whom he agrees in many things, and prophesied of the same. However, there is no room to doubt of the authority of this book, being always received by the Jewish church, and agreeing with other parts of Scripture, and especially with the prophecies of Jeremiah; and may be further confirmed and established by the quotations out of it in the New Testament, as Hab 1:5 in Act 13:41 and Hab 2:4 in Rom 1:17. The general design of the prophecy is to comfort the people of God under the afflictions that were coming upon them, and to encourage them to the exercise of faith and patience, in the hope and view of the coming of the Messiah. Pseudo Epiphanius ^k says that Habakkuk died two years before the people of the Jews returned from Babylon, and was honourably buried in his own native place, which he says was Bethsocher, in the tribe of Simeon. With whom Isidore ^l agrees, as to the time of his death; but the place of his birth, he says, was Bethacat; and of his death, Sabarta. Sozomen ^m reports, that, in the days of Theodosius, the grave of Habakkuk was found in Cele, formerly the city Ceila. So Eusebius says it was shown at Kela, eight miles from Eleutheropolis; though, in another place, he says it was to be seen at Gabbatha, twelve miles from the same place; which may be reconciled, by observing that it might be between them both, and be seen from each, since they were places near to each other ⁿ. But the Cippi Hebraici ^o say it was at a place called Jakuk in Galilee, not far from Sephetta, where was an academy of the Jews; and this seems to agree with what Sanderson, a countryman of ours, as quoted by Van Till ^p, observes; that in his journey from Damascus to Jerusalem, between Sephet and Chapherchittin, he found a village, in which, the Jews report, Habakkuk the prophet dwelt and died, the name of which is Jeakoke. But these things are not to be depended on.

Gill: Habakkuk 2 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO HABAKKUK 2

This chapter contains an answer from the Lord to the expostulations, pleadings, and reasonings of the prophet, in the name of the people. The preparation of the prophet to receive this answer is described, Hab 2:1 then follows the answer itself, in which he is bid to write and make plain the vision he had, that it might be easily read, Hab 2:2 and a promise is made, that vision should still be continued to the appointed time, at which time the Messiah would come; and this the righteous man, in opposition to the vain and proud man, is encouraged to live in the faith of, Hab 2:3 and then the destruction of the enemies of the people of God is threatened for their pride, ambition, covetousness, oppression, and murder, Hab 2:5 which would be unavoidable, Hab 2:13 and issue in the spread of the knowledge of the glory of God in the world, Hab 2:14 and also the ruin of other enemies is threatened, for drawing men into apostasy, and for their violence and idolatry, Hab 2:15 upon which would follow an universal silence in the earth, Hab 2:20.