Habakuk 1:2

1:2 How long, Lord, must I cry for help?

But you do not listen!

I call out to you, “Violence!”

But you do not intervene! ¹ 

Habakuk 3:4

3:4 He is as bright as lightning; ² 

a two-pronged lightning bolt flashes from his hand. ³ 

This is the outward display of his power. ⁴ 

Habakuk 3:9-10

3:9 Your bow is ready for action; ⁵ 

you commission your arrows. ⁶  Selah.

You cause flash floods on the earth’s surface. ⁷ 

3:10 When the mountains see you, they shake.

The torrential downpour sweeps through. ⁸ 

The great deep ⁹  shouts out;

it lifts its hands high. ¹⁰ 

[1:2]  ¹ tn Or “deliver.”

[3:4]  ² tn Heb “[His] radiance is like light.” Some see a reference to sunlight, but the Hebrew word אוֹר (’or) here refers to lightning, as the context indicates (see vv. 4b, 9, 11). The word also refers to lightning in Job 36:32 and 37:3, 11, 15.

[3:4]  ³ tn Heb “two horns from his hand to him.” Sharp, pointed lightning bolts have a “horn-like” appearance. The weapon of “double lightning” appears often in Mesopotamian representations of gods. See Elizabeth Van Buren, Symbols of the Gods in Mesopotamian Art (AnOr), 70-73.

[3:4]  ⁴ tn Heb “and there [is] the covering of his strength”; or “and there is his strong covering.” The meaning of this line is unclear. The point may be that the lightning bolts are merely a covering, or outward display, of God’s raw power. In Job 36:32 one reads that God “covers his hands with light [or, “lightning”].”

[3:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “[into] nakedness your bow is laid bare.”

[3:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “sworn in are the arrow-shafts with a word.” The passive participle of שָׁבַע (shava’), “swear an oath,” also occurs in Ezek 21:23 ET (21:28 HT) referencing those who have sworn allegiance. Here the Lord’s arrows are personified and viewed as having received a commission which they have vowed to uphold. In Jer 47:6-7 the Lord’s sword is given such a charge. In the Ugaritic myths Baal’s weapons are formally assigned the task of killing the sea god Yam.

[3:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “[with] rivers you split open the earth.” A literal rendering like “You split the earth with rivers” (so NIV, NRSV) suggests geological activity to the modern reader, but in the present context of a violent thunderstorm, the idea of streams swollen to torrents by downpours better fits the imagery.

[3:9]  sn As the Lord comes in a thunderstorm the downpour causes streams to swell to river-like proportions and spread over the surface of the ground, causing flash floods.

[3:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “a heavy rain of waters passes by.” Perhaps the flash floods produced by the downpour are in view here.

[3:10]  ⁹ sn The great deep, which is to be equated with the sea (vv. 8, 15), is a symbol of chaos and represents the Lord’s enemies.

[3:10]  ¹⁰ sn Lifting the hands here suggests panic and is accompanied by a cry for mercy (see Ps 28:2; Lam 2:19). The forces of chaos cannot withstand the Lord’s power revealed in the storm.