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?
1:2 The prophet could not get an answer to his prayers, could not get an explanation from God for the problem that troubled him. This was sometimes the complaint of other Old Testament believers – Ps 6:3; 13:1-4; 74:10-11; 89:46-47; Lam 5:20. Probably this same thing has bothered all of us at one time or another. All they (or we) could do was to wait and look to God for Him to work in His time and way.⚜
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;
1:3-4 Here is the problem which tormented Habakkuk. In Judah, where he lived, wicked people had the upper hand and crushed the righteous. Injustice, oppression and violence were everywhere. Yet it seemed to the prophet that God did not care; that He tolerated the situation and did nothing about it. This is a problem that has vexed many people, perhaps nearly all of us at one time or another (see Job 24:1-12; Ps 10:1-12; 13:1-2; 73:2-12; Eccl 3:16-17). God is the all-powerful Ruler of the universe, and He loves justice and righteousness – Ps 33:5; 47:2; 89:14. Yet in this world the wicked prosper and the good suffer and are denied justice. Why doesn’t God do something about it?⚜
God’s answer: He is bringing the Babylonians to punish His people
so perverted justice results.
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 📖”.
1:5-11 In these verses God gives an answer to Habakkuk. He assures him that He is going to do something about the corrupt society of Judah. He will bring an end to it, and the instrument He will use is the Babylonian army.⚜
1:6-11 From this description of the Babylonians we see they were an exceedingly violent, arrogant and lawless people who cared nothing at all for the true 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?
1:12-17 God has given an answer to Habakkuk’s questions in vs 2-4. But the prophet was not happy with the answer. He wanted God to do something, but was not pleased with what God planned to do. It seems to him that the proposed remedy was worse than the disease. He knew that his own people were bad, but that the Babylonians were even worse (v 13). And now his question is, how can a perfectly holy God use such a wicked nation to punish His own people?⚜
1:17 This is an important question in the prophet’s mind. Could God continue to tolerate the atrocities of the Babylonians? Would He not put a stop to them?⚜