The prophet is alarmed at the evil conditions in Judah in his days
1
📚The burden✭ which Habakkuk the prophet saw.2 📚✭O LORD, how long will I cry out,
and you not listen?
And call out to you
about violence,
and you not save?
3 📚✭Why do you make me look at evil,
and cause me to see trouble?
For plundering and
violence are before me,
and there is strife,
and contention rises up.
4 📚Therefore the law is made feeble,
and justice never goes forth.
For the wicked surround
the righteous;
so perverted justice results.
God’s answer: He is bringing the Babylonians to punish His people
5 📚✭“Look among the nations,
and watch, and be
utterly amazed✭,
for I will do a work in your days,
which you will not believe,
even though it is told✭ you.
6 📚✭For, see, I am raising up✭
the Chaldeans✭,
that bitter and rash nation.
They will march through the breadth
of the earth✭ to take possession
of dwelling places which are
not theirs.
7 📚They are terrible
and dreaded.
Their judgment and their exaltation
come from themselves.
8 📚And their horses are swifter
than leopards,
and fiercer than evening wolves.
And their horsemen charge ahead,
and their cavalry comes from afar.
They fly like an eagle swooping
to eat.
9 📚They all come for violence.
Their faces advance like
the east wind,
and they gather captives like sand.
10 📚And they scoff at kings,
and princes are scorned by them.
They deride every stronghold,
for they heap up earth, and take it.
11 📚Then his mind changes,
and he passes on, and offends,
imputing this his power
to his god✭”.
The question of the prophet: Why should God use the wicked Babylonians for this?
12 📚✭Are you not from everlasting✭,
O LORD my God, my Holy One✭?
We will not die✭. O LORD,
you have appointed them
for judgment, and,
O mighty God, you have established
them for correction✭.
13 📚Your eyes are too pure
to gaze at evil,
and cannot look on wickedness✭.
Why do you look on those
who deal treacherously✭,
and hold your tongue
when the wicked devours
the man who is more
righteous than he✭?
14 📚Why do you make men like
the fish of the sea,
like crawling things which have
no ruler over them?
15 📚They take up all of them
with a hook;
they catch them in their net,
and gather them in their dragnet.
Therefore they✭ rejoice
and are glad.
16 📚Therefore they offer sacrifices
to their net✭,
and burn incense to their dragnet,
because through them
their portion is rich,
and their food abundant.
17 📚✭So will they go on emptying
their net,
and continually slaying nations
without sparing?