Habakkuk Chapter 1

     1^:1The Oracle That Habakkuk the Prophet Saw

Habakkuk’s Complaint

² How long, LORD, will I call out for help,

and you won’t listen?

                  I cry out, “Violence!”

                        but you don’t protect me.

³ Why do you make me watch wickedness?

Destruction and violence go on right in front of me;

                  fighting and arguing keep getting worse and worse.

⁴ The courts ignore the Law,

                        so they don’t render justice;

      sinners are in the majority,

                        so they pervert justice.

Hab 1:1-4

The LORD’s Answer

⁵ The LORD’s first answer:

“Look around at the nations

and be astounded.

            I’m doing something in your own day

you wouldn’t believe if somebody told you.

⁶ I’m arousing the Babylonians,

                        that fierce, impetuous people

            that marches across the region

      to seize places to live that aren’t theirs.

⁷ They’re dreaded and feared;

                        they’re a law unto themselves

                        and make their own rules

⁸ Their horses are faster than cheetahs,

            more vicious than wolves at dusk.

Their cavalry comes charging from far away

                        and swoops down like eagles to devour their prey.

⁹ They come bent on violence;

                        their hordes surge forward like a desert wind

                        and sweep captives away like sand.

¹⁰ They scoff at kings and ridicule rulers;

                        they laugh at fortresses

                        and pile up ramparts to besiege them.

¹¹ They rush through like the wind and move on;

                        they’re guilty men whose power is their god.”

Hab 1:5-11

Habakkuk’s Second Complaint

¹² Aren’t you from everlasting,

                        LORD, my God, my Holy One?

                        Surely you won’t let us die.

You, LORD, have appointed the Babylonians to judge us;

                        you, Rock, have sent them to punish us.

¹³ You’re too pure to approve of evil;

                        you can’t countenance wickedness.

Why do you tolerate treacherous people?

Why are you silent when sinners swallow up

                        people better than themselves?

Hab 1:12-13

¹⁴ They treat us like fish in the sea,

                        like creatures with no rulers.

¹⁵ Sinful people fish us out with hooks

      and scoop us up with nets.

                        They catch us in their seines;

      they’re happy and celebrate.

¹⁶ So they sacrifice to their seines

      and burn incense to their fishing nets,

                        because they make large catches with them

      and have lots to eat.

¹⁷ Will they empty their nets then

                        and keep on killing nations without mercy?

Hab 1:14-17